The Eight-Circuit Brain
Basic Definitions and Functions
© 1985-2009 Antero Alli
updated 12/1/09
THE FOUR SURVIVAL CIRCUITS
AND HOW THEY'RE INTEGRATED
C-1 Physio-Biological Intelligence; the will to survive
How it’s integrated: degree of confidence earned and
maintained to assure physical survival
C-2 Emotional-Territorial Intelligence; the will to power
How it’s integrated: degree of emotional confidence earned
and maintained to assure personal worth
C-3 Symbolic-Conceptual Intelligence; the will to reason
How it’s integrated: degree of mental confidence earned
and maintained to assure peace of mind
C-4 Social-Moral Intelligence; the will to socialize
How it’s integrated: degree of social confidence earned
and maintained to assure sense of belonging
THE FOUR POST-SURVIVAL CIRCUITS
THEIR SOURCES AND SHOCKS.
C-5 Somatic Intelligence of Body Wisdom and Five Senses
Sources: whatever triggers the experience of rapture, communion
with nature, tantra (yoga, meditation, ritual), charisma, second wind,
falling in love (endorphins) and the expanding presence of being
here now. The Shocks of Ecstasy and Bliss (absence of suffering)
C-6 Intuitive-Psychic Intelligence of the Brain, Spine, & CNS
Sources: whatever triggers the experience of the energetic body or
aura,
the second attention, intuition, clairvoyance and other psychic
abilities, ritual magick, reality selection, direct perception of a relative
nature of reality. The Shocks of Uncertainty and Freedom (absence
of
false assumptions, certitudes and dogmas)
C-7 Mytho-Genetic Intelligence of DNA and the Planetary Entity
Sources: whatever triggers the experience of ancestral and past life
memories, autonomous archetypes, synchronicity, planetary (Gaia)
mind, cosmic consciousness.
The Shocks of Indivisibility and Cosmic
Unity (absence of dualistic consciousness)
C-8 Quantum-Nonlocal Intelligence of Subatomic interactions
Sources: whatever triggers the experience of near death, out of body
states, the dreambody and dreamtime, lucid dreaming, communion
with Void, the mystery of singularity. The Shocks of Death and
Impermanence (absence of ego identification).
THE THREE SUB-PHASES
HOW INTELLIGENCE CAN BE INCREASED
These eight functions of Intelligence can be accessed through any experience allowing for the full absorption, integration and transmission of each level. These three sub-phases reflect the funtioning of our most basic biological unit of intelligence: the neuron (alternative terms: receive/digest/eliminate, experience/process/communicate, study/interpret/articulate). All three stages are necessary for the advancement of intelligence. If you only absorb, nothing is integrated; if nothing can be integrated, we regurgitate and parrot whatever we are absorbing. Each of the eight levels express distinct ways in which this 3-stage process can occur, ways that do not necessarily apply to other levels. For example, C-2 emotions do not follow the same “logic” as C-3 ideas and visa versa.
SHOCKS, ANCHORS AND VERTICAL CONNECTIVITY
Each of the eight functions exist within each individual at various degrees of expression and latency. They can be viewed and approached in a linear sequential "evolutionary" way and/or in a nonlinear "radial" way; both vantages carry their own values. I think it would be erroneous to assume any one circuit to be "better" or "worse", or "higher" or "lower" than any other, if they symbolize simultaneously existing states of consciousness working together as a dynamic changing whole.
To view them hierarchically, by positing any circuit as superior or inferior than any other, only perpetuates the emotional plague, a term proposed by Wilhelm Reich for the psychological syndrome marked by irrational insistence on beliefs and ideas that depend on dissociation of mind from body. Reich also refered to it as "the neurotic character in destructive action on the social scene".
Though there are countless ways these eight functions interact and/or act on each other, the area I have found most interesting so far addresses how the first four "survival" circuits and the second four "post-survival" circuits act on each other in very precise two-way vertical connectivities. I specifically refer to how the upper circuits act on the lower circuits as distinct shocks and how the lower circuits act on the upper circuits as stabilizing anchor points, or the absrobtion and integration of those shocks.
1/5; 2/6; 3/7; 4/8
The Vertical Connectivities
Without a supple and resilient foundation (circuits 1-4 integrated), any significant force of expanded consciousness (circuits 5-8) can leave us destabilized at varying degrees of personality disintegration and disassociation. Once the survival circuits can be more fully experienced, integrated and embodied, they can also better serve to (re)stabilize the personality to better absorb and integrate the shocks delivered by any activation of the post-survival circuits.
Upper circuit post-survival shocks stimulate growth and development in the four survival circuits, just as the survival circuits (once integrated) can help substantiate the more ephemeral and subtle states symbolized by circuits five through eight. If monitored and tended to, all eight circuits can be made to work together in more meaningful ways to serve the dynamic changing whole they are expressions of. By tending to the specific verticalities shared between upper circuit shocks and lower circuit anchors (1/5; 2/6; 3/7; 4/8), the 8-Circuit Brain model can offer safer and more creative guidelines to the high seas adventures of consciousness research.
excerpted from
THE EIGHT-CIRCUIT BRAIN
Navigational Strategies for the Energetic Body
by Antero Alli (Vertical Pool Publishing, 2009)
LINKS TO MORE 8-CIRCUIT BRAIN MATERIAL
ANTERO ALLI
click for bio
8-CIRCUIT BRAIN -- THE DVD
Lecture by Antero Alli; Esozone in Portland OR, 2008
"ANGEL TECH" (book on the 8-circuit brain)
by Antero Alli; Original Falcon Press
EIGHT CIRCUIT BRAIN ONLINE COURSE
an 8-week course of study and practice with Antero Alli
THE EIGHT-CIRCUIT BRAIN (book)
Navigational Strategies for the Energetic Body
by Antero Alli (Vertical Pool Publishing 2009)
ANTERO'S PODCAST INTERVIEWS
On the 8-Circuit Brain and ParaTheatrical ReSearch
The NeuroPharmacy of the Eight-Circuit Brain
Antero revisions the circuits as "trances" and their catalysts
Tim Leary, Robert Anton Wilson, Gurdjieff
multiple translations of this model
an overview of multiple interpretations
courtesy of Steve Mizrach and The MindWarp
The Origins of the 8-Circuit model
where and who Leary inherited it from
Alli Books in print and Alli Films on dvd