Octagon: The eight corners of the Kosmos
A general description of the Octagon
The Octagon is a configuration of eight corners which represent a model of the eight major dimensions of the Kosmos. Each corner has a stratification of twelve levels.
The octagon depicts eight dimensions of the Kosmos. These are:
- Levels of consciousness;
- Subtle energy fields;
- Brain structures (physical);
- Physical world/technological/geographical area;
- Non-physical worlds;
- Non-local resonance, platonic realm;
- Collective worldviews;
- Maturation/ Field activation.
Each dimension (or corner) has a stratification of twelve levels. All these eight dimensions within this matrix are related to each other. The octagon is divided into vertical ontological levels and horizontal (physical) complexity levels. The corners such as ‘levels of consciousness’ and ‘subtle energy fields’ and the other corners are divided in four lateral sublevels A, B, C and D. Furthermore the octagon contains both the involutionary and evolutionary development. The Absolute can be seen to be represented by the white of the paper itself.
In the following paragraphs, the eight corners of the octagon are described.
Levels of consciousness
An individual human consciousness proceeds through a series of stages. Each stage brings more possibilities to perceive and understand Reality with its inner- and outer worlds. These levels are illuminated by various well demonstrated developmental lines in developmental psychology.
Were the vertical stages of developmental lines represent increasing possibilities to perceive and understand reality at ever increasing depth, a person can laterally expand his or her consciousness by applying the capabilities of a level onto increasing larger parts of its personally experienced reality.
This can be done for one or more developmental lines at any level.
One of Howard Gardner’s ‘multiple intelligences’ (‘bodily-kinesthetic intelligence’) is a clear example of a lateral expanding capability at the physical level. In the octagon lateral capacity is divided into A-, B-, C- and D-level.
A-level indicates basic human functioning capability in one or more developmental lines at any level.
B-level indicates good functioning capability in one or more developmental lines at any level.
C-level indicates the capability to excel in one or more developmental lines at any level and can be called ‘talents’.
D-level indicates a rare and extraordinary capability (‘genius’) in one or more developmental lines at any level.
The lateral capacity described above corresponds directly to the intensity of the lateral activation of subtle energies at each level in the ‘subtle energies’-corner (also divided into A-, B-, C- and D-level).
Subtle energy fields
This corner represents subtle and causal exteriors that transcend the physical level. Subtle energies are the carriers of consciousness and they form the connection between biological forms and the Absolute/consciousness.They are stratified in twelve ontological levels, ranging from the ‘etherical’-level up to the ‘high-causal’-level.
With every level the energy-potentiality of the subtle energies present at that level increases.
Brain structures
The part of the central nervous system that is enclosed within the cranium, continues with the spinal cord, and is composed of gray matter and white matter. It is the primary center for the regulation and control of bodily activities, it receives and interprets sensory impulses, and transmits information to the muscles and body organs. At higher levels complex arrangements throughout the brain are initiated and formed. At the highest levels the brain is transformed by kundalini activation.
Physical worlds/technological/geographical area
This corner is about the way people influence and structure their interaction among each other as well as with their environment. This doesn’t just concern the technological infrastructure which enables physical ‘manipulation’ of this environment, but also includes other societal systems. This corner is about the social infrastructure, for example the political system that establishes co-existence, the legal system to enforce norms to secure co-existence, the art system that invigorates the way we perceive and religious systems that underpin and establish the fundamental relationship between man and the transcendental nature of Reality. At the higher levels the collective interaction of Kosmic forces with the physical world will be established.
Non-physical worlds
Many cultures have concepts of “higher” worlds. Most of these descriptions find their origin in ‘out of the body’-experiences (OBE) and mystical experiences. They represent ontological, collective levels inhabited by conscious beings composed of subtle energies. Each of these worlds has distinct properties, such as the character of movement (various degrees of displacement across time and space), energetic structures and landscapes (distinct form appearances to more energetic appearances) and variance of time experience (from delay to instantaneousness).
Non-local resonance
Non-local resonance concerns the transfer of information (for example feelings, thoughts and higher dimensional resonance) between individuals by other means than the physical senses. It is characterized by a (distinctly appreciated) direct connection between two or more individual sentient beings. The experience is characterized by union.
The concept of non-locality can be found in several academic disciplines:
In mathematics: The Twistor theory – Roger Penrose
In psychology: Synchronicity – Carl C. Jung/ Wolfgang Pauli/ F. David Peat
In biology: Morphogenetic fields – Rupert Sheldrake
In parapsychology: Extra-sensory perception
In theology: The concept of omnipresence
In philosophy: Platonic realm
In theoretical physics: Bell’s theorem, Alain Aspect’s 1982 experiment,
David Bohm’s ontological interpretation of Quantum theory
In technology: Entanglement in Quantum computers, Quantum cryptography
Physicist Nick Herbert, in his book Quantum Reality, describes eight possible interpretations:
1. there is no underlying reality;
2. reality is created by observation;
3. reality is an undivided wholeness;
4. there are actually many-worlds;
5. the world obeys a non-human kind of reasoning;
6. the world is made of ordinary objects;
8. unmeasured quantum reality exists only in potential.
Each of these interpretations poses its own paradoxes. Given Bell’s Theorem and the EPR effect, all of them must allow for non-local interactions.
Collective worldviews
A worldview describes a consistent (to a varying degree) and integral sense of existence and provides a framework for generating, sustaining, and applying knowledge. It is sometimes described as “a set of presuppositions (assumptions which may be true, partially true or entirely false) which we hold (consciously or subconsciously, consistently or inconsistently) about the basic makeup of our world”. ’Additionally’, it refers to the framework of ideas and beliefs through which an individual interprets the world and interacts in it.
Maturation / field activation
The Maturation corner holds the unconscious/subconscious patterns and processes supporting humans and their development growing up.
Maturation concerns the emergence of personal and behavioral characteristics, laid down previously by humans in human history as collective accessible patterns at each of the twelve different vertical ontological levels, through growth processes.
These collective accessible patterns were created by a combination of psychological, biological, social and cultural processes during the evolutionary development of humans through history.
They unfold ‘autonomously’ within a person and form the ‘platforms’ at each ontological level of consciousness, from which a person engages with the world in the ‘level of consciousness’-corner.
These collective accessible patterns are formed by the coupling processes of subtle energies to the physical body.
This requires time, because the lowest ontological subtle energies (low astral) have to be connected first with the physical body.
From there the coupling processes work all the way up to the highest level of subtle energies obtained by a person in previous lives.
For the subtle energies of each ontological level to become stably attached to the physical body, the physical body has to complexify its structure in order to match the increasing internal energy potential and operating parameters of the subsequent levels of subtle energies.
The more humans occupy a certain level of consciousness, the easier it becomes for the next person to evolve to that stage (a collective accessible pattern is formed).
The mystics where the first to lay down new patterns on higher levels. This involved activating and connecting new (higher) levels of subtle energies with the physical body.
This meant the physical body had to complexify its structure in new and novel ways, requiring time before the higher levels of subtle energies were stably attached to the physical body.
Every mystic after that benefited from the patterns already laid down, meaning they required less time to attain the same level of consciousness.
For example the Buddha reached the high-causal level at the age of 35 years, while Krishnamurti reached the high-causal level at the age of 27. The age constraint can be seen as the vertical indicator of maturation.
Differences between Octagon and the AQAL scheme / quadrant model of Ken Wilber
- The Octagon takes lateral development (from A to D) on all ontological levels into account, hereby making a distinction between the increase in ontology (‘vertical’) and the increase in complexity (‘horizontal’). The AQAL-scheme doesn’t make this distinction.
- Retro-causal Time: The D-line of the non-physical corners represents the definitive and final manifestations of each ontological level from A to D sublevel at each non-physical corner of the Octagon, retro-causally projected back from the future by Kosmic steering to act as ‘attractors’ to guide development at each ontological level at each corner to its final manifestation.
- The Octagon makes a fundamental distinction between physical and subtle corners in each quadrant. The subtle corners contain the creating evolutionary patterns, which steer developments in the physical corners. The subtle corners create patterns, the physical corners ‘lay down’ patterns.
- The Octagon takes the non-physical worlds into account, the AQAL-scheme does not.
- The Octagon takes non-local resonance into account, the AQAL-scheme does not.
- The Octagon takes ‘maturation’ of the individual’s consciousness into account, including the ages at which the different levels of consciousness emerge. The AQAL-scheme does not. However, in his tables in ‘Integral Psychology’ Ken Wilber represents the ages of emergence.
- The Octagon takes subtle energies into account, the AQAL-scheme does not. In his excerpt G ‘towards a comprehensive theory of subtle energies’ Ken Wilber introduces subtle energies in his IT-quadrant, however they are not differentiated enough to distinguish the existing 12 levels of subtle energies.
- The Octagon contains the evolutionary and the involutionary stream, the AQAL-scheme only represents the evolutionary stream.
- The Octagon places and connects the involutionary stream with the evolutionary stream by coupling them ‘horizontally’ (from A to D), the AQAL-scheme does not.
- The Octagon represents three forms of mysticism (The Void, Fullness, Non-dual), the AQAL-scheme represents evolutionary and Non-dual mysticism.
- The Octagon does not represent the evolution of the material levels and biological levels in its physical corners, the AQAL-scheme does.
- The Octagon introduces Kundalini-activation by introducing new and higher levels above Structure Function 3 in its physical corner, the AQAL-scheme does not.
- Supramentalisation and Divinisation are located in the Octagon, the AQAL-scheme does not refer to these Kosmic processes.
- The Octagon distinguishes between different mystical levels of ecstatic experiences, the AQAL-scheme does not.
15. The Platonic realm is a corner in the Octagon (the Non-local resonance corner).
