Hi. I'm the Layman Pascal.

You may remember me from such varied conceptual tools as: Tetrabucks!, The 5 Pillars of Planetary Wisdom-Civilization, Tier 2.5, integralite vs. integralist & Metaphysics of Adjacency. Now I am working on evolving a contemporary "integral tarot" in a new style. I am looking forward to input and possible partnership in terms of making the cards more concrete.

Here are basic ideas I'm starting with:

PREMISE 1 - We shall not presuppose the numbers. Sacred maths & geometries provide many important lessons but they are improvised over the centuries to adapt to the intuitive usage of people will little in-depth knowledge about the "systems" implied by their festive and divinatory decks of cards. We should produce first and then afterwards look for metaphorical webs. 

PREMISE 2 - The quadrants can be the suits. SWORDS (UL) is the mind-realm of we human beings. CUPS (LL) of gushing emotion connect us in our cultural communion. PENTACLES (UR) are the solid treasures of the external objective reality. And WANDS (LR) is that mysterious realm of unseen patterns, habits and dynamics which is the secret will of the world and ourselves included... our behavioural directives. This correlations are not common in contemporary Tarot study. They are new. 

PREMISE 3 - The two most basic lines of intelligence form the basic levels and sub-levels of the developmental journey of the human being -- cognition & temperament -- must be included. By "cognition" we mean having access to a sphere of reality, understanding it consciously or unconsciously. And  by "temperament" we mean the general flavor of motivation, of feeling-about-life, of values, of ethical emotions and a great array of vital drives. When these two are put together they form 28 bands of personal and shared human history. From the emerging layer of teal or integrative being-space we can count up to ourselves. The first clearing in which human reality appeared is called the infrared (the bottom of the spectrum). We may casually call it the "humanimal" or the "wise ape". It just was what it was... just as any animal is what it is. All the dumbness AND depth of animals. But when the great old clans of the arising aboriginal cultures became "speakers" and "story-tellers" they still sometimes slipped back into the creature mode which was still so fresh in their minds and hearts and flesh. This new layer of reality which had opened to their amplified consciousness could be feelingly inhabited with their aboriginal temperaments and their humanimal temperaments. The second level has two options. The third level has three options. It is growing as we go. 7th level has 7 options plus all the previous options = 28 sublevels on the journey of the sapient feeling animal. Its sapience and its feelings are the two great drivers of all the other kinds of intelligence, skill and experiential states. One grow forward while the other embraces what has already appeared. Eros and Agape inhabit the basic knowing-being and responding-feelingly-to-being. 

PREMISE 4 - Inverted cards signify pathology. Pathology is sickness, imbalance and nihilism of all kinds. It can be present at any level or any quadrant. Do not worry about lines for the time being. Wherever beings, parts, teams or systems are present then there is a risk of depraved activity. This decadence can show up as pretending to think  impossible thoughts. Losing humor. Overvaluing fragile things in opposition to robust things. Feeling against your own feelings. Select to toxins and ignore nutrients. Trying to solve social stress by eliminating whole segments of the population. Or acting in such a way that you are more likely to return us to a more primitive worldspace, than to regenerate yourself and your evolving possibilities. Every self-divided form of nature is perishing at all times. We ARE only by generating ourselves. 

PREMISE 5 - The story told by the deck is initially unimportant. The users of tools invent and reinvent the narrative as they wield the symbolic resonances of the underlying structures. Like plants growing in the jungle we could fill theses spaces in many kinds of living ways. And we will. But at the moment we just need to get all the pieces which describe transformative journeys. All the healing and growing moves. An assorted set of the basic moves. Then story will be generated and start to become obvious, necessary.

 

MINOR ARCANA / BASIC CARDS IN "QUADRANT" SUITS

INFRARED

SWORDS - UL - The Naked Ape. The human animal stands as virtually culture-less "person" who has not yet even grasped fire or clothing in any significant sense. But they CAN now grasp things...

PENTACLES - UR - The Opposable Thumb. This is the basic tool that wields our tools. To grasp is an act of body and mind. The tool-using tool helps us learn to think. Although maybe regular mass consumption of psychedelic fungi also played an instrumental role in generating proto-cultural consciousness.

CUPS - LL - The Hominid Pack. Weird small bands of hominids wander into strange places. Together they can overcome many dangers. Like in Jurassic Park. Inveterate explorers sharing team epiphanies, unpredictable sexual habits, and bodily projects amplitudes of feeling-a-new-personhood!

WANDS - LR - The Tree. Although we wandered onto the plains, across the waters, into the ices and jungles our souls never loss the imprint of the great Tree in which our simian grandparents orchestrated their politics, art, spirituality, love and survival. This was our Network. Rising and falling, shitting into demonic cat-infested mysteries below and ascending with pride to the very pinnacle that enters you into the Sky. Our hive. Our city. A tree is the branching growth system in which many primates live and have ancestors. In this environment there is both hunting and picking. Sometimes there are skirmishes, deaths, orgies, graves, sounds that verge on speech... and then often there are none of these. Non-verbal but emotive noises are used for coordination in the trees and on the plains and into the new hills and mountains. Physical surges producing postures and emotional vocalization. Will is a feeling.

INVERTED (PATHOLOGICAL) INFRARED

The Wolf Man. Here we find a feral hominid in its shredded rags or exposed animal skin. Here is the diseased gorilla and the simpering victim of agitated drug withdrawal. Virtually inhuman. Just an upset body that suffer and creates suffering. A word -- regression.

The Fist. This is the negative flip side of the useful human hand. It is like a face frozen in a death-snarl captured on a hard old mask of wood. A closed hand is compressed in stupid attack readiness.

The Starving Pack. This pack will turn on each other. It is a dark joke that people love to film amateur "Bum fights!" between addled street-dwellers.

The Brutal Cave.  The image of dangerous, dank, jagged, infested and eerie cavernous holes. In the modern sense we see a man sleeping a doorway in cold doorway on the street, inarticulate and almost willing to die. And yet these caverns lured us into their will.

MAGENTA (understanding) / INFRARED (temperament)

SWORDS - UL - The Neanderthal. Or the Interhuman. These cousins of ours were somewhere between our level of cultural sophistication and the simple humanimals we used to be. The level of aboriginal worldspace permits itself to be inhabited by the sensibility of its more primitive consciousness. Thus we have a kind of aboriginal/human animal.

PENTACLES - UR - Animal Skins. Some our cousins also developed simple stone knives -- but none were such snappy dressers as us! Even the Neanderthals did not seem strangers to the wearing of skins. 

CUPS - LL - Interbreeding. Did humans and neanderthals copulate? Almost certainly... judging by most human beings I've met. But that same quality would not be far away from the socio-sexual practices of neanderthal-like inter-humans. 

WANDS - LR - The Simple Grave. Flowers or stones left at the site of a death. These kinds of behavior directives (intentions) stare to show up even among people who cannot tell you what or why they are doing. They act out an evolving script which moves their feet without telling their mind.

INVERTED MAGENTA / INFRARED

The Zombie. The Interhuman gone bad. We have the image of the Zombie. This character is both self-destructively passive and irrationally predator. Both types of zombies are cannibalistic, ugly and have forgotten everything about tool usage or speech. In short they are decadent or regressed aboriginals. Perhaps the ancient clans were always turning these people loose in the forest or putting them to death. When the stress of taboo violation creates a loss of motor function, a withdrawal of consciousness and violent outbursts then "natives" become "interhumans" in a very un-smooth and unsatisfying manner. We are inappropriately returned to the infrared realm.

The Blood-stained Stone. Whether boulder or simple dagger or spear tip or arrowhead we still have the records of many unnecessary and horrible-feeling deaths at the hands of upset stone-wielders.

Cannibal Madness. The depraved predatory rush of the Cannibal Clans is an dark peak -- a group emotional high which is neither good for us nor for others. 

Refusal to Flee. Breakdown of pro-life gestural communication exhibited by mutual non-signalling. Bodies simple halt in deadly awe before the awe-ful doom. As if they have been given a shared order (a will-command) to permit the collapse.

MAGENTA / MAGENTA

SWORDS - UL- The Aboriginal. The Prehistoric Wise Woman. The true Elder. One has lived long enough as a human to tell stories about it that contain many summaries and invocations that may be helpful. 

PENTACLES -UR - Fire. May things are tamed by such people -- from the flame to the wolf. The tools created became the tools with which to created and the world illuminated by artificial light-production began.

CUPS - LL - The Sacred Orgy. Clan love. Plant-induced (often fungi) dissolution of habits and personal boundaries. The Sacred Mask-Dance and Animal Parade is another kind of orgy.

WANDS - LR - The Story-Tellers. Consulting the council-like Elders became a standard move for establishing the direction of social activity. Their tools (fire, memory, imagination and calendars) set the marching orders for the clans. People self-organize by wild stories that evolve while remaining the same. They describe aspects of the layout of the world and of how good and bad actions differ. The morals of these stories, often unknown to the story-tellers, operated to generate taboos, names and "ghost stories" by which to pass on cultural patterns. 

INVERTED MAGENTA / MAGENTA

The Depraved Animist. Gollum is alone in his cave eating cold raw fish, sucking on muck and descended into a fragmented psyche of bickering aboriginal voices that keep him focused upon the binding sensation in his mind.

The Poison Berries. When taboos are bad or forgotten the People do not get good advice about what to eat. Rotten meat. Sick water. The wrong mushrooms. Purple cultures were in danger of collapse from the effects of unprepared or badly prepared "found food".

The Mass Suicide. Collective self-termination in the face of broken taboos.

The Forgotten Lore. Stories not passed on. Secrets lost. Elders disobeyed. Taboos violated. Names lost. Symbols unreadable. The "will" of the people not longer is generated and does not pass into individuals.

RED / INFRARED

SWORDS - UL - The Berzerker. Now we meet the barbarian tribesman and village-dweller in the characteristic mode typified by the mentality of a cultureless savage human animal. This mindless villager can be very useful and often gains in capacity. His battle stare reflects a battle trance. The haze of conflict in which he "sees red" but acts as if he were "almost infrared". The capacity to be a crazy-warrior is born for men and women alike. 

PENTACLES - UR - The Magic Potion. Some of the magic berries got you really high. The fungi and vines and vapors were marked out by the barbarians and used with great proficiency. "Asterisk and Obelisk" is a comic parody of the use of stimulants by naturalistic village-dwellers and horticultural caravans. But these red folks would often become like a beast or a jellyfish under the influence of the drugs. Senselessly revved up or senselessly shut down. Nonetheless the effects could be very pleasurable, meaningful and affirming of the mysterious complexity of life and body.

CUPS - LL - The Rough Team. In the great stormy North Atlantic ocean, before modern ships, many small groups of Northern Europeans worked in silent barbaric teamwork to move the dragon ships and exploratory canoes through effort and danger. Under those conditions a great sharing of spirit is necessary but also a great suppression of the idiosyncratic elements of the individual personality. Silent physical teamwork as a shared high or trance of moral utility.

WANDS - LR - The Delirious Rite. People are given their identities in rites that often test them to the edge of their consciousness. Young men suspended by hooks in the air. Women with their necks stretched and their bodies branded. Everyone is firewalking all the time! All the damned time! Sensory overload rituals like these take the barbarian back to the mindset of the mere human animal body. These rites direct people forward through their lives. You are submitted to play a character in the village. From your capacity and style you work with others to acquire a intention that will direct your extra energy in creative, tribe-supporting activities.

INVERTED RED / INFRARED

The Violent Abuser. The sado-masochistic family member. Cutting oneself. Blanking out during horrible deeds in the home realm. Negative self-assertion through mindless physical means.

The Bad Drug. Toxic uppers and downers which cause more confusion and distress than they cure. Chemicals which cause violent ruptures in the tribe. Self-asserters doing wicked things in a prehuman haze.

The Violation Gang. Teams of people delighting in thuggish violations of property, attacking and hurting in order to feel empowered. Mute, grunting rapist squads.

The Smashed Hut. The cracked glass on a family photo next to an empty whiskey  bottle. Active attack on cultural communication lines within the tribal family. Enforced cowering. Resistance to soothing. Signalling of non-recognition of the tribal care lines. 

RED / MAGENTA

SWORDS - UL - The Village Shaman. The individual taking possession of omens. The one who heals himself from his own paranoia and schizoid vulnerability.

PENTACLES - UR - The Dream-Catcher. Solitary vision-quest drugs. Devices for asserting oneself in the realm of archaic resonances and taking private possession of those energies for the use of the tribe.

CUPS - LL - The Marveling Mob. Villagers united in marvel. People voting for astonishing candidates. The support of villagers for the shaman such that his status rivals or exceeds even the chief.

WANDS - LR - The Great Stone Calendar. Stonehenge. More elaborate stone-and-star calendars and calculations. The direction (will) that these cosmic devices give to humans and human cultures.

INVERTED RED / MAGENTA

The Necromancer. The Diabolist. The kleptomaniac (primitive theft). The professional taboo-breaker. The criminal shitting or masturbating at the crime scene. The ritualistic serial killer in action.

The Voodoo Doll.

The Witch Hunt. The villagers terrified by the diabolical. People in prison after "satanist" scares. 

The Soul-Crushing Icons. The icons of dread. The display of dread-inducing symbols. The whispering that encourages suicide.

RED / RED

SWORDS - UL - The Chieftain. Or the Chieftain's Wife. The good barbarian. The Simple Craftsman. Protector and supporter of tribal life.

PENTACLES - UR - The Vessel. The boat. The horse. The tribal invention that serves tribal purposes and gives life-producing access to the full worldspace which is available to the barbarian consciousness.

CUPS - LL - Village Life. The Life of the Village. 

WANDS - LR - Trade, Totem & Potluck. Control of harvest areas, arranging of festivals, negotiations and battles with rival tribes. Overseeing elaborate system of favors. Group organization-speech by verbal assertions of tribe loyalty (You've GOT to go to your mom's funeral!) and questions/observations about immediate practical functionality. Private ownership of village goods divided up by families and decisions made by conclaves of owners. Natural oligarchy, advised by the Elders and with special say going to the larger resource holders.

INVERTED RED / RED

The Home Invader. The Raider. The Pillager. Disruptor of tribal life. The games of inter-tribal combat turned into deadly genocide.

The Vile Tool. The evil sword with treacherous spikes.

Gang Life. 

The Patriarchy. "Godfather" as center of violently-enforced favor-network which does not recognize any trans-tribal codes. Stress, disease, loveless families, heartless group gatherings, group organization by insults and threats. Patriarchal stress-patterns and the ritual abuse of children's innocence, sexuality and humor. Attempt to distort trade and possession system.

AMBER / INFRARED

SWORDS - UL- The Uneducated Slave. The psychology of the kingdom's servant who does not understand the speech, writings and concerns of the "masters".

PENTACLES - UR - The Cart of Filth. A plough to be pulled. Offal to be removed. Critical tasks to maintain the emerging Amber society. 

CUPS - LL - Clustering at the Gates. Gathering to receive food from a citizen, a lord or a lady of the City-Kingdom.

WANDS - LR - The Slave-District. The official slave district in an ancient city-state. Self-organized by periodic muttering and imposed physical roles to play all day. The rules which govern the integration of the official slave class in the City-State Kingdom of Rural Regions. The direction which these rules give for the reproduction of this caste and its sacred role in society.

INVERTED AMBER / INFRARED

The Zombified Cultist. Thoughtlessly obeying the anti-life principles of the pathological Amber symbol zone. Barely communicative promulgator of distorted versions of the Holy Text. At odds with the main views of his nation -- curving back towards a tribal subculture.

The Crucifixion. A tortured criminal carrying his own cross. Objects used thoughtlessly for self-destruction under the observation of the Kingdom.

The Diseased Rabble. Sick, ugly peasant rabble clustered depressively or with stupid outrage at the gates of the castle wall. Moaning and wailing.

Muttering toward the Grave. Constant small remarks and muttering keep each other on track to complete the means of their own murder.

AMBER / MAGENTA

SWORDS - UL- The King's Wizard. The Court Astrologer. The Wiccan Woman who lives in a hut in the forest not far from the castle-city.

PENTACLES - UR - The Apothecary. Witches' cauldron and table of potions and ingredients. Folk remedies both helpful and unhelpful.

CUPS - LL - The Festival of Shamans. Gathering of the sages. The official yogi and shaman festival. The carnival atmosphere.  The spirit of the Kumba Mehla. The Royal Magic Competitions witnessed by the folk. The adoption of superstitious beliefs to permit allegiance and unification of the nation. 

WANDS - LR - Tricks & Sayings. Organize by demonstrations of magic and wise-sayings. Slight of hand becomes a functional aspect of the economy. Official and populist items begin to bear "wise slogans" in addition to their imprimaturs.

INVERTED AMBER / MAGENTA

The Decadent Seer. The Evil Witch. Morgana Le Fey. The addict-visionary unable to tell apart hallucination, lust and omen.

The Cursed Icon. Superstitious objects in home perpetuate fear and unreason but are used in participation with kingdom (nation) rituals. Although it appears patriotic, traditional and magical it actually induces stress and breakdowns. Many "christmas tradition objects" may be in this category.

A Murder of Crows. The nasty cabal. The dark Gathering of the Skexis in "The Dark Crystal". The adoption of destructive superstitious beliefs to permit allegiance and unification of the nation. Climate Change Denial as statement of ethnocentric commitment.

Deluding the Folk. The Kingdom Representatives (a kind of government) use tricks and lies to induce the gullible people to acts that are not good for them individually or collectively.

AMBER / RED

SWORDS - UL - The Local Craftsman (or woman)The Militia Man.

PENTACLES - UR - The Stadium.

CUPS - LL - The Squad Spirit.

WANDS - LR - The Trumpet Show. The parade of craftsmen, warriors, skill-bearing self-asserters who belong to the City-State from various regions which are represented. 

INVERTED AMBER / RED

The Terrorist.The amateur bomb-maker. The disgruntled student stockpiling guns and ammo for his school shooting. Upset impulsive emotions of people who feel they are not getting plugged into the Popular Nation and therefore want to punish it on behalf of its own "principles". Shoot the president while raving about the constitution. Kill your teacher or a policeman in order to uphold truth and law.

The Drug Den. Quasi-official "watering hole" where urbanites and citizens can go to engage in activities which are accepted but as "degenerate" versions of the national dogma. A hive of villany. A kind of weird community spirit existing between dangerous and self-destructive characters engaged in a common effort to throw themselves into dreaming squalor.

The Soccer Riot.   The dark orgiastic spirit of patriotically inspired destruction festivals which harness barbarian rebellion/discharge emotions but involve multiple tribes. Riots by the supports of the winners AND riots by supporters of the losers.

A Neo-nazi Gang. The ethnocentric-oriented barbarian tribe who gathers to prevent knowledge, thwart social progress, hurt others and attack institutions under the guise of saving the "national" from the "bad other subcultures". 

 

AMBER / AMBER

SWORDS - UL - The Faithful Lord (or Lady). The psychological embodiment and willing symbol of the Ways of the Folk. The Good Queen. The Normal King. The Official Person.

PENTACLES - UR - The Plumbing. Irrigation Pipes. Wells. Baths. Sewers. The control of water flows which allows city-states to emerge. 

CUPS - LL- The Good Townsfolk. Decent, hardworking folks joined together in the national patriotism of village life. True blue. Ready to fight and work hard. Impressed by and therefore supportive of the Capital Cities. Shared love of the symbols and willingness to labor on their behalf.

WANDS - LR - The Edicts & The Treasury. The Town-Crier, the Posted Edicts, the Castle on Market Day. The official standardization of metal coinage secured by the Royal Treasury under the command of the Supreme Bureaucrat Priest.

INVERTED AMBER / AMBER

The Fundamentalist. The Dogma Fanatic. The uncomfortable and inwardly desperate voice of the Sacred Text Principles. The embodiment of regressive hostility toward any apparent subculture.

The Broken Sewer. Infrastructure failing. Unrepaired roads. Objects which display lack of interest or poor planning of the nation. The sources of national power and pride are not being maintained.

The Town Mob. Pitchforkers storm the castle to protest against the inhuman experiments of the Rationalists and Postmodernists. An almost hysterical shared mood that the nation is corrupted and the city-state rulers are illegitimate. Moody, sullen, depressed, withdrawn, half-ready to just stop participating... but able to come together in this spirit.

Official Desecration. Signals send by the wrecking of national symbols within the nation. Toppling our statues. Attack our police. Ruin our parades. Speak out against our soldiers. Spoil our families. Discredit our governors. This kind of message sending may play a role in critically toppling bad regimes but it also incites stress and regression in the popular masses.

ORANGE / INFRARED

SWORDS - UL- The Sportsman. Active as rational individual skills in the most primitive sense.

PENTACLES - UR - Solitaire. Tetris. Sudoku. Or gardening. A rational, skill-based individual enterprise which allows one to zone out of cultural thought into a simple physical activity invoke primitive brain functions.

CUPS - LL - The Communion of Knitters & Whittlers. The shared use of individual productive skill sets without any particular cultural exchanges beyond the mere physical presence. "Watching the game".

WANDS - LR - The Handshake & Nod. Social organization by handshake and head nod. Orange deals made almost wordlessly.

INVERTED ORANGE / INFRARED

The Brutalized Worker. The Depressed Drone. The toxified mine worker. A reasonable person destroyed or crippled into nearly mindless pseudo-existence for a "reasonable" cause.

The Oppressive Factory. The mute identity tag at the Kafka factory.

The Land Mine. Invisible Trap. The clothesline. The booby trap. The wordless but productive and rational strategy to cause simple physical harm to other oppressed rational people for no good reason. Land mines blow up orange folks and apes alike.

The Poisonous Regulation. Rules, city-layouts and charities which operate to collectively keep the metropolitan beggars in their current situation. Badly privatized care facilities resulting from obviously destructive policy experiments. Rules which decrease the likelihood of well-being among those who are simply physical inhabitants in the society.

ORANGE / MAGENTA

SWORDS - UL - The Mentalist. The rational Mage. 

PENTACLES - UR - The Prognostication Machine. Crystal Ball. Gypsy Fortune Teller's set up. Business card for Astrologer. Nielsen ratings. Gallop polls. 

CUPS - LL - Disney Audiences. People enjoying a magical movie together.

WANDS - LR - Secret Teachings of All Ages. "A True History of Occult Secrets of All Lands".

INVERTED ORANGE / MAGENTA

UL - The Duped Customer. Hocus pocus, special effects, cons and tricks exist to take advantage of the archaic trusts and intuitions of the modern citizen. Vulnerable to the street hustler magician and the magical pickpocket.

UR - The Black Cat. Occult resonances reduced to neurotic modern supersitutions with not sense of its history. 

LL - Occult Product Hysteria. people manipulated and rendered dysfunctional by the peddlers of wishful thinking. the secret! these books make you go mad!

LR - The Black Magic Club - Using NLP to teach fools to control the minds of women. Oxytocin as bodyspray. Everyone is a marketer.  "How to Hex People for Fun and Profit". 

ORANGE / RED

SWORDS - UL - The Sensible Mercenary. This rational and strategic individual makes use of exploration, hypothesis, innovation and dogma-violation while serving mostly impulsive and muscular-emotional feelings. Conan. The Bodyguard. Understands the barbarian need for indulgences and conquest but ponders it in a reasonable manner. This character is a great favorite of early-modern human males.

PENTACLES - UR - The Flak-Jacket. Industrial production from gang-land realities. The flak jacket is a symbol that is sensibly prepared for both physical and emotional flack.

CUPS - LL - Cheering the Boss Lady. The professional leader-warrior in a modern setting appears in simplistic self-assertion mode and "stirs up the troops". The readiness and battle-joy that people feel during a speech by General Patton. A barbarian woman insisting upon herself in garish shoulder pads as she strides onstage flanked by her assistants and security. The crowd enjoys and responds to this person even as they indulge their own impulses and send out various stress signals. But this figure can be of great use in modern battles for the benefit of nation-state on the condition that he or she actually can touch into this shared field of feeling.

WANDS - LR - Study, Explore & Outburst. An interplay of strategies and outbursts. People direct each other using "opportunities" and "life worry" into courses of action which seem to make rational sense but actual enter into simple swindles and grabs.

INVERTED ORANGE / RED

A Thug in the Machine. "The Wolf of Wall Street". The rising dictator. This personality is inventive, experimental and understands abstract machine-systems which govern the world through systems of structural pressure and incentive. However this rational individualistic thinking collapses frequently into obsessional self-destruction and endangers the people it contacts. A distressed egocentric sensibility is driving sensible goal-oriented moves in a way that outputs chaos and stress. This figure plays a large part in unleashing the flaws of Orange systems and regenerating Amber sensibilities..

The Weapon of Mass Destruction. From the gas attack to the suitcase bomb and the viral outbreak we find nihilistic tribal impulses trying to harness Orange systems. Their constant attempt to secure Orange powers for their self-destructive and socially malignant gangs drives higher levels to attack it -- often compromising themselves in the promise. 

The Overdose Party. - no rules! is the rule.

The Bull Market. An almost bestial, value-smashing aggressive system of moves and communications. Wall Street and other systems which attract destructive, Red-motivated, quasi-Orange thinkers. The momentum and brutality of the "system" seems to be enough of a motive to drive predators and victims into culturally destructive dances of distress.

ORANGE / AMBER

SWORDS - UL - The Good Officer. A police officer, military defender. Even the Emperor as he is rising in the society. Orange/Amber is a transition figure which brings international scale and attempts to basically royal & racial intuitions.

PENTACLES - UR - The Houses of Parliament. The Imperial Style of objects. Neo-classical. The palaces of the 18th and 19th century. Monoliths with clocks. Sensible flags. A more humane electric chair.

CUPS - LL - Romantic Comedy. Romantic Comedies. Nationalistic action movies with high-tech props. The Bad Plots of long porn movies. Patriotic suffering in exchange for individual worldly pleasure. Industrial "free society" productions which capitalize upon Amber sentiments of all kinds. 

WANDS - LR - The Boy Scout Handbook. Communication habits which efficiently inculcate practical mechanical knowledge and skills-based self-esteem such that people can be generally trusted.

INVERTED ORANGE / AMBER

The Corrupt Official.

The Industrial Victim. Number tattooed on Jewish concentration camp victims.

Sharing Cynical Nationalism. The Republican Primaries.

Private Propaganda. The After School Special. Just Say No ads. Televised Nationalistic Propaganda.

ORANGE / ORANGE

UL - The Detective. Honest, complicated, inquisitive, individual. A creative explorer and supporter of modern values. Evidence-based. Bit of a teacher. 

UR - Telescope & Notebook. Pocket tape-recorder. Personalized wardrobe. Making observations and applying logic in pursuit of reasonable virtues.

LL - Wry Chat & Curious Banter. Wry humor. Small chat about life and business projects. Temporary appreciation of cosmic and deep time natural splendours. 

LR - The Debt & Debate Society. Group training and organization by argumentation, devil's advocate, competition between factions for project control. Judiciary and parliament by oppositional debate. Paper economy of narrow abstract exchange value organized through deed holders, contracts and promise-papers. The machinery of increasing debt flows and "turn over".

INVERTED ORANGE / ORANGE

UL - The Evil Scientist.

UR - The Great Bomb. The Immoral Experiments. "Testing on the public"

LL - The Sinister Boardroom. Shadowy men in suits.

LR - Atomized & Fragmented Mass Culture. Specialization and Industrialization creating "mass man" -- an overcrowded, polluting mass characterized by uncultured sensibilities such as those exhibited even by technical specialists in other areas of their life. Non-integrated arts, sciences and politics.

GREEN / INFRARED

SWORDS - UL - The Peaceful Stoner. This is the psychology of a mind blown by a simple object. The mute and dumb appreciation the shifting pluralistic potentials of otherwise ordinary items. William Burroughs staring at a bug in Naked Lunch. A progressive spa in which massage returns you to the simple consciousness of the body.

PENTACLES - UR - The Trippy Art.  Escher's art loops... going nowhere VIA metacontext. Plots which involved great loops of multiplistic time but leave you just "gapped out".

CUPS - LL - At the Rave.

WANDS - LR - Yeah, totally... Nonverbal, mood-based signals and degrees-of-appreciation noises used to negotiate behaviors which pursue sensitized cultural pleasures without violating private concerns. Supportive gesturing used more or less continuously. People given direction about life using the ironic and performative syntax of Green intelligence.

INVERTED GREEN / INFRARED

The Apathetic Slacker.

The Toxic Pharmacy. A large variety of possible drugs.

Interracial Clusterfuck - People of many races and faiths zoned out together in a filthy flat.

The Pointless Protest.  "It's important just to show your values..."

GREEN / MAGENTA

SWORDS - UL- The Occult Pluralist. The Poly-Occultist. The Psychonaut feels that he or she can magically enter into almost any kind of reality-tunnel. Any situation can be may shamanically better by altering our interpretive assumptions about it. The explorer of old and new intuitive systems. "I've started my own religion... I'm an Omnist -- I believe in everything!. I don't just have past lives... I have sideways lives.

PENTACLES - UR - The Aura Machine. Aura photography. Intelligent digital attempts to engage subtle plane entities. Various electronic devices which seek out wondrous entities between possible realities.

CUPS - LL - The Experimenter's Club. The light cooperative pleasures of the free-form dance class. The shared understanding of the mask-switchers. Creative anonymity and self-expression joined flowingly together. The mood of experimental flow between between groups, states and settings while engaging in commentary about these with an assortment of different people who understand about such intergroup issues. The Brotherhood or Sisterhood of the Benevolent Infiltrators.

WANDS - LR - Hyper-Referential Speech. The collected works of Jung and Campbell providing intergroup recontexualization symbolism. Group organization-speech involves use of pop culture characters and the contents of film, music and television and the internets are exchanged as if they were archetypal clan stories.

INVERTED GREEN / MAGENTA

The New Age Flake.

Super-Tachyon Positivity Crystals.

The Lame Seance. A bad "psychic fair". The spirit of affected open-mindedness and hollow support for every potential reality that anyone is excited about. The sad mood of the "too open".

The Ghost Show. Trendy newspaper horoscopes. Shows about ghosts and aliens who are being constantly -- and inanely -- faux-recorded on digital equipment. The irresistible impulse to enter into unproductive feeling-contemplation of the "maybe possible" entities between the worlds. A compulsion toward the flattened cognition which accompanies these engagements.

GREEN / RED

SWORDS - UL - The Ironic Barbarian. Dr. Gonzo. The self-styled rebel. The brazen multiple-reality agent. The embodied chaos that the system needs. The surrealist provocateur. Good humored.

PENTACLES - UR - The Karaoke Machine. Trans-self electroplay with humiliation, victory and emotional assertion to family and small groups.  

CUPS - LL - The Nonviolent Protest. Gandhi. Several people streaking a football game. Lennon's "bed in" for peace.

WANDS - LR - The Open House Policy - the demand and willingness for bold transparency. And the voluntary support with space and resources for rebellious artists and thinkers. Networks of idiosyncratic art and entertainment supporters. Gaining status in thematic non-local networks. Daring to grant access. The boldness which creates transparency. Anarchism.

INVERTED GREEN / RED

UL - The Sensitive Egomaniac. The Postmodern Narcissist. The constant assertion that I am "a strong woman" who must prevent herself from being subsumed by other people's contextual assumptions. The neo-shaman who, despite being protective of family and possessions, is oddly immune to anyone else's sensitivity.

UR - The Online Rant. The webcam. The Youtube rant.

LL - Your so-called "friends". The group of friends filming you do a totally self-destructive stunt.

LR - The Anarchist's Cookbook. Jersey Shore. Much of Reality TV. A lot of paranoid Youtube documentaries.

GREEN / AMBER

UL- The Hipster. The Green Conformist. The Pluralistic Joiner. Coolness turned into fashion. Member of an anarchist society.

UR - The Organic Label. The official Organic product.

LL - Hobby Communion. Fantasy Role-Playing Communities. Falun Gong in the park. Working in an organic garden together. The EPA protecting citizens (insofar as it might actually do that). Fantasy role-playing community.

LR - Shangri-la. temporary dogmatic advocacy of pluralistic, exotic or minority versions of classical truths, principles and social patterns. The Celestine Prophecy, Harry Potter (note: not a pluralistic fantasy about magic but a deep pluralistic desire for nation-like training institutions. A multidimensional urge toward British Boarding schools). Tolkienism. Communism.

INVERTED GREEN / AMBER

UL - The Tortured Romantic. Angry animal rights activist. The nasty ecological soldier. The Dysfunctional Romantic.

UR - The Distorted Channel. FOX news online. Faux-nationalistic subversions of "select your reality" technologes. Using nationalistic moral sentiments and green stylistic concerns to regress society toward a dark orange oligarchy.

LL - The Incoherent Uprising. The Wagner Movement in 1800s. The Tea Party. Ignorant and stressful ruralistic "conversative" attempts to express themselves on a level with the freedom and pageantry of pluralism.

LR- P.C. Gone Mad. "Political Correctness Gone Mad". Very contemporary ways to oppose the habits of the modern world which actually suppress vital energy and enforce distressing connotations. 

GREEN / ORANGE

SWORDS - UL - The Green Capitalist. The self-consciously "virtuous and progressive" immersion merchant who harnesses faster, more hyperlinked networks of capital that flow in the standard narrow Orange fashion. Here is the Progressive Liberal Democrat who can see into Green needs but whose feelings always gravitate back to the flawed international financial system. This person may think of themselves as a Sober Relativist. 

PENTACLES - UR - The Yoga Mat. The gluten-free cookie. The nuanced, ironic HBO comedy-drama. A Picasso painting on the wall at Starbucks.

CUPS - LL - A Course in Postmodernism. Ironic Movie Night. involving light-buzz drugs, naturalism and nuanced entertainment. 

WANDS - LR - The Sensitized Logo System. Voting with your dollars. Social organizing using semi-autonomous franchises which provide immersive services or products which make a show of support for ecological and human wellness goals. Micro-exchanges serving progressive value-goals but operating through standard orange corporate systems. The humanitarian "free market" of Adam Smith.

INVERTED GREEN / ORANGE

The Compromised Progressive. The Excessive Compromiser selling the country out to extremists. The tolerator of the intolerant. Unwilling to radicalize even benevolently.

The Toxic Self-Help Lecture. Naive or Predatory. ugly product labelled ALL NATURAL!!!!! pushy books and lectures about shifting your reality so that you can be your best and succeed.

Heartless Mutual Congratulation. The Mood at the Fatuous Eco-Party. agitated, over-motivated people seeking self-satisfaction in setting involving light-buzz drugs, naturalism and nuanced entertainment. self-congratulatory cosmopolitan parties where people benefiting themselves are enabled to systematically indulge in appearing to support progressive values. 

Evil Rebranded.

GREEN / GREEN

UL- The Benevolent Hacker. Deconstructionist. The Juxtaposition Artist. The Hyper-Ironic Comedian. The Hacker. Humorous. Hide speed. Shifting. Resplicing. Unearthing constantly. 

UR - Windows. The smart phone. Downloading. Windows. Internets. Overlays. Mods.

LL - The Naturally Hip Audience. The audience of the Daily Show enjoying it together.

LR - Meta-Networks. Talking "meta". Moving between systems and contexts in order to make decisions. Communicating social information by side-stepping simple identification with any cultural comment. Exchange of books of Foucault, Derrida. Family Guy. South Park. Robot Chicken. Stephen Wright. The Office. Electronic currency projects. 

INVERTED GREEN / GREEN

UL- The Compulsive Relativist. The Flatland Pluralist. Constantly neutralizing all values. Returning to a relativistic void which inhibits culture.

UR - Framed Junk. Junk in a frame on display as art. The mere fact of form mistake for insight.

LL - The Whining Herd. Outraged sentimentalists moving in herds. Lightweight, socially-critical, pseudo-progressive righteousness as a group mood.

LR - The Bog of Consensus. Attempt to make pathetic consensus. Input disallowed in the degree to which it makes distinctions or evaluations. 

TEAL / INFRARED

UL - The Visionary Animal. integral understanding with little or no cultural expression; inarticulate but true teal insights. people who instinctively sense integral level energies and priviledge them in their actions.

UR - Accidental Brain Training. tools and material which stem from an integral-equivalent level of understanding but do not need to be understood. unwitting holacracy. naturally gifted subtle-gross integrators. actual orgone machines. picking up a 'tetrabuck' off the ground.

LL - Digging Ditches for Saints. familiarity and teamwork among people who enact integral level energies without any special thought for it. ditch digging for Gurdjieff. relationship between Maharshi and his cow.

LR - Tai Chi in all Interactions. habits of action for animal bodies which put them in alignment with integral styles whether they know it or not.

INVERTED TEAL / INFRARED

The Integral Cynic. The Integral Anti-Intellectual. Active Rejection of the "discussion" or "intellect" involved in Higher Vision.

Toxicity. simple tools whose use thoughtlessly undermines integral progress. the anti-evolutionary diet.

Naive Integral Sharing. communities which reinforce their allegiance to basic bodily instincts that oppose developmental integration. nihilistic gut instincts shared by integral crowds.

Bad Posture and Diet. simple patterns of behaviour which, though seeming harmless, foreclose or undermine integrative possibilities. urban architecture as enemy of integralism.

TEAL / MAGENTA

SWORDS - UL- The Integral Occultist.

PENTACLES - UR - The Transrational Rite. functional tools which harness archaic insights and feelings in the service of integral individuals. Vision-logic star charts. 

CUPS - LL - Planetary Voodoo Community. integral community on subtle plane, lucid dreaming community, integral movement maintained by tokens and resonances. healthy voodoo integralism.

WANDS - LR - The High Integration Symbols. An impetus to action is given by the resonant and surrealistic power of the archaic energies that are discussed in "trans-rational" fashion. Like the Buddhist sages using Tibetan hill-magick to secure the Dharma-Field. The arrangement of this symbols suggests a drive to the higher level integration of archaic energies. Use of symbols and archetypes to deepen, expand, make more coherent or more persuasive the realm which is patterned in the integralesque style.

INVERTED TEAL / MAGENTA

The Integral Paranoiac. The Stressed-Out Psychic. 

The Dysfunctional Spells. dysfunctional tools of integral magick.

The Distressing Ritual. regressive moods in integral clan engagement.

The Subtle Worm of Superstition. bad habits and systems which prevent integral emergence by their adherence to archaic feelings

TEAL / RED

SWORDS - UL - The Visionary In Barbarian Mode. This stance allows us to take a practical stand against the self-assertion of other levels -- especially in their pathological versions. One can understand and respond to impulsive and egocentric moves without becoming locked into that reality. The skill set surrounding the use of emotional and muscular self-assertion to encourage the best overall developmental and well-being outcome given the various levels, lines and quadrants is an assertion. And this often involves winning through unexpected taboo violation or emotional speech and demonstrations of power-in-the-service-of-inner-progress.

PENTACLES - UR - The Alternate Model. Or: Giving "Levels" the Finger! One creates or locates rival "tribes" of integrative worldviews in order to challenge the philosophy, to invoke action and to assert oneself so that one has internal space for new integral thought. Rise up against existing styles and consensus in higher visionary models.

CUPS - LL - Fight the First Tier! This is not a call to violence but a readiness to engage in vital struggle to assert higher values against (and on behalf of) any of the so-called first tier layers of consciousness. People join together to heed this call and work as a team to carry it out -- although each time member is enjoyed in their mode of individual rebellion and self-assertion. The crew of the Enterprise.

WANDS - LR - The Language of Visionary Aggrandizement. The triumphal and combative language of higher intregrative instincts. Trumpets in the soul. Wisdom by muscular assertion. The potent speech of the Great Federation of the Wise. At this level people self-organize by exchanging self-supporting references and invoking examples of the principles which empower the Great Chiefs and system-builders and higher consciousness. And of course counting yourself among them by implication. The destiny of the Great Trans-Epistemic Village is defended by warriors of many kinds. It gives them a "will" to do so.

INVERTED TEAL / RED

The Integral Narcissist. This person is constantly asserting their status as an integral visionary. They argue that other people are complacent, devitalized and/or constantly oppressing them in integral spaces. Personal rebellion is always called for and they loose no opportunity to explain how they have been misrepresented or how they are experiencing grand phenomenon just as the Great Saints do! Their constantly struggle against perceived rejection creates rejection. Spiritual angst is too personal for them to acknowledge the subtleties of others. In a more empowered form this person can be the genuine illuminated visionary whose efforts to improve the world are constantly undermined by their personality cult and their fondness for instinctively dominating others in both subtle and gross fashion.

The Dismissive Post. Messages

The Higher Sulk. The commiseration of those who do not creatively respond to their complaints about the inadequacy of "the standard higher theory". They constantly call for integrative viewpoints but cannot feel that they are joined with the common critical consciousness of all the integralites.

The Subtle Manufacture of Enemies. Being wise in opposition to others suggests a regressive position which downgrades Teal into an anemic version of Green. A regression toward a version of Green sophistication which results from the position of faux-rebellion. By asserting-defending one's "integrality" we see a pattern arise which creates (integralite) enemies, forces confusion among well-meaning responders, and sows bad blood under the name of high principles. This sense of unnecessary exclusion gravitates back toward flatland postmodernism. A perverse relationship to will is generated in which one is actively creating that which one sees as the inappropriate form of Integralism.

TEAL / AMBER

SWORDS - UL- The Standard Integralist. The Course-Taker. The User of "Kennilingus". Willing to build up an Integral Kingdom.

PENTACLES - UR - The Flag of Integralism. functional tools for producing integral nation usually in institutional contexts.

CUPS - LL - The Conformist Integral Mood. integral mood being created. simple view of colors. Salzman's Daily Evolver approach. Quite good for preliminaries and welcoming people into a worldspace. 

WANDS - LR - Functional Holarchy. HOLARCHY -- A hierarchy that works. orange etiquette and protocols which serve integral purposes. Merit-based integral aristocracy. Orgnomic Functionalism. etiquette and symbols of a possible integral nation building up

INVERTED TEAL / AMBER

The Integral Dogmatist. Unwitting Arrogance. Existential angst presumed to characterize our nation generally.

The Invisible Hole in the Map. dysfunctional tools. uninspected flaws in "standard integralism". shadow effects that integral shadow systems are not getting at.

Drifting Apart.  possible integral nation constantly breaking down.

Dysfunctional Holarchy. 

TEAL / ORANGE

UL- The Integral "Classical Liberal". The Good Social Libertarian and Planetary Futurist. The Integral Business Man. Nietzsche. Jose Ortega y Gasset.

UR - Subtle Machines. functional tools which benefit teal individuals but are built by or make sense to our Orange level of complexity.

LL - Strategic Talks Communion. implementers of Higher Level systems allowing the emergence of transpersonal spirit. Strategy talk as excuse for integral sharing to occur. "Survivor" as invitation to Sangha.

LR - Integral Algebra.

INVERTED TEAL / ORANGE

UL- The Compulsive Integral Gamer. (in the sense of pointless, nonproductive strategy engagements). A Green Axe to Grind. Obsessive idea that integral is overrun with "naive green democrats" and "anti-capitalists". The Integral Gamer 

UR - dysfunctional tools which appear integral but actually are drive by and regenerate orange patterns.

LL - Commanding the Ethos. sabotaging integral moods with orange assumptions and relating styles. failure to created higher transpersonal spirit due to overly strategic approaches. too much emphasis on the "leader" or the "reason for being here" or "the project" leading to disaster. rational integral individualism being sabotaged by group dynamics.

LR -Financialism in Drag. Capitalism/Financialism maintaining itself in an integral costume.

TEAL / GREEN

SWORDS - UL - The Chartreuse. "Yellow-green" on the Spiral Dynamics scale. This person is a soft integralite. Very often characterized by felt allegiances to "progressive" social politics... allegiances which become complex and inadequate as soon as they are examined. The beginning of the sense that "-ish" or "like" or "meta-" actually has a sacred evolutionary utility which can recontexualize and clarify the central insights of developmental nodualism. One takes a kind of easy pride in the fact that one cannot entirely agree with visionary assumptions... but that this uncertainty is not necessarily a rebuttal of these assumptions. Just more space and flexibility and sensitivity are needed in order hold the higher worldspace with a good conscience. A Visionary Splicer. A Sacred Surfer. Very good at ferreting out little zones or edges which regenerate the basic integral insights. Possibly a Zizek.

PENTACLES - UR - The Visionary Splice. The philosophical "short circuit". The intercontextual threshold as a tool of grown, harmony and integration. The Sacred Beach. The Nondual Rift.

CUPS - LL - Waking Down in Mutuality. Democratic Transperonal Communion. moods which serve integral consciousness in a green feeling and sharing style. 

WANDS - LR - Aetherometry. Tetrabucks Radical New Integrative Systems Systems which apply a post-relativistic, post-informational, multiplicity approach to encoding reality including both subtle, material and paradoxical points. Nietzschean or Deluezian physics realized. A true string theory. The drive to establish a functional system which builds upon energetic multiplicity and bypasses both classical and quantum approaches.

INVERTED TEAL / GREEN

The Self-Doubting Visionary. Missing aggression. Overly worried about appearing to be too attached to a vision.

The vMemes are Equal! Maps and dysfunctional tools which sabotage integral with green assumptions, or smuggle green under teal appearance.

Let's Not Push Higher Patterns! Rejection of integral self-confidence. Opposition to intervention. Culturally paralyzed by trying to get people to accept other people's perspectives.

Gullible Alternative Sciences. Expansive new or repressed systems of physics, society and thought which compel one with somehow unlikely seeming dreams of heaven-on-earth. The suppression of real alternative innovations by their discrediting inclusion among every kind of farcical nonsense. Higher systems which collapse because they shift focus too often or because they overgeneralize the "invisible omnipotent nothing" which lives within and between all things.

TEAL / TEAL

SWORDS - UL- The True Integralite.

PENTACLES - UR

CUPS - LL

WANDS - LR - Speech patterns around Patten's Beyond Awakening Series. Impulse to simultaneously enact fullspectrum revolutionary world efforts in the context of experiential nondual consciousness.

INVERTED TEAL / TEAL

The corrupted and corrupting teal psychology.

The degenerative integral objects or structures.

The impossibility of healthy integral communion.

Argument between "be love now" and "work to evolve change in ourselves and the world through revolutionary struggle". (in the sense of pointless, nonproductive strategy engagements).

THE THIRD TIER CARD

A lotus-posture meditator, hovering above the ground, with a hushing finger over his/her lips. This card is silent in its nature. First tier and second modes of speech describe third tier realities but on its own this realm is non-theoretical.

 

TRUMPS/ MAJOR ARCANA / ORACLE CARDS

Minor Arcana are dealt. One, Three or One with an Overlay, etc. Then an oracle card is drawn to provide a integrative process suggestion for the situation.

JUDGEMENT - "Reverse the Judgement" - This is the Byron Katie card. It indicates reversing the attitude invoked by the dealt cards. Applying to yourself what sees problematic with the other... over vice versa.

SHADOW - "Speak as the Shadow" - This is the Integral 321 card. Greenlighting the negative aspect of the situation in order to facilitate the integration of its energies. Speaking from its point of view.

NUANCE - "Make a finer distinction" - The Nietzsche card.

LOVE - "Generate appreciation" - The Heart-Math card. The Ram Dass card.

MEDITATION - "Establish neural coherence" - The Maharishi card. The David Lynch card. The Holosync card.

WITNESS - "Be the Witness" - The Maharshi card. The Kegan card. Allow whatever exists to exist, including your reactions, and abide as the knower/feeler of all that.

SYNTHESIS - "Build a hybrid" - Create an idea or suggestion that makes the basic sides of the issue into one thing. Coincidentia oppositorum. The Wilber card.

OSCILLATE -   - The Peter Levine Card. Alternate between your concern state, trauma, stress, and a comfortable, reliable, relationally engaged and somatic state.

BODY - Do some exercise. Jump around. Breathe better for a while. Get a massage. The Reich card. 

DESIRE - Clarify your desire in this situation by clarifying what you do not want... and flipping that around. Become inspired by the specific element you are frustrated by.

CONFESS - "Share" - Articulate the emotional aspects of your concern to someone who matters.

SURRENDER - Let go. Let it die. Let it fall. Experience the sensations of non-trying. The Lester Levenson card.

ELIXIR - Change your chemistry. Eat something. Eat something different. Get high. Go for a jog.

SPLICE - "Resonance matching" - The Gendlin card. Find a word or image or additional structure which feels tacitly the same as the general quality of the situation you are working on. Poetry. Art therapy. Creative languaging. 

RESPONSIBILITY - "Assume responsibility" -

CHANCE - "Take a risk" - Novelty. The Osho card. Be daring. Touch the edge.

PLEASURE - "Make the indulgence smarter" - The Bhogi card.

WAR - "Inner friction" - The Gurdjieff card.

STREAM - Image streaming. Free association.

EVOKE - Contemplate the evocative quality of the vexation image, teaching apart senatino from conceptual reaction. 

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A quick comment. Your reiterative sub-levels for each level remind me a lot of Ray Harris' Temenos system. He too also explored these relationships with 'astrological' (tarot-like) symbolism. I think what you're doing can inform his system and vice-versa. Check it out and let me know what you think.

Another possible model of at least partial confluence is Goddard's book Transpersonal Theory and the Astrological Mandala. I used it as one of the sources for my 'fold' thesis. He also incorporates lower level sub-phases in higher levels in a similar manner.

This Goddard excerpt for example illustrates the astrological sub-phases in next level octaves.

Thanks for the links. The reiterative sublevels aspect is certainly very suggestive. I appreciate Harris' inclusion of the developmental fulcrums although, in my own practice of "chakra psychology" I have become quite skeptical of the resonances between the chakra levels and the developmental stages.

Your point of support for Goddard (that previous phases are not simplistically subsumed in their successor holons but, in various ways, remain in play) is a good reason to have a tarot deck that also keeps the sublevels of previous stages in play. Any major organ, in its healthy or unhealthy manifestations, may be central to any issue even further down the line. Unless that is kept in mind, our systems will always lack something in terms of both their accessibility to shadow work and their general flexibility.

I do not think a generally useful "integral tarot" can take a definitive stand with either linear unfolding time or classical astrological cyclic time. In fact the notion of time must be adaptable to the levels and perspectives which are in play. So I think open-ended reiterative gestures are key -- so as not to give a naive sense of progress nor an archaic sense of foretold loops.



theurj said:

This Goddard excerpt for example illustrates the astrological sub-phases in next level octaves.

Now I've just about produced appropriate "characterizations" for each quadrant of each sub-level including inverted/pathological variants. The effect in my mind of such distinctions connected to images is quite intoxicating. I am hoping that someone (I'm thinking of Camosy perhaps?) has a good argument about relating the quadrants to cups, wands, swords, pentacles. Or has a better idea about basic suits?

Hey Joe,

Thanks for the feedbacks.

I was initially uncertain whether to attempt a direct mapping of quadrants to suits. Although your remarks make this sound a little sketchy they have actually boosted my confidence in this matter. Since I am not looking for direct correspondence to the conventional interpretations I can see an adequate amount of wiggle room. I am perfectly willing to forgo old-fashioned (sic) notions that the suits ought to pertain to "levels of reality". However it is not too divergent.

Here is what I am considering:

SWORDS are "mental" in the sense of being interior to personal consciousness. These cards signify types of personalities in the Upper Left Quadrant.

PENTACLES are "physical" in the sense of describing external objects in the Upper Right.

CUPS are "emotional" in the sense of being a shared mood, a way of feeling-together involved in the cultural movements, festivals, tones and communion styles of the Lower Left.

WANDS are "will-like" in the sense of describing the patterning directives which we receive from our physical systems, habits of communication and modes of social self-organization. This is the Logos appearing in the world. It is the "I" of Language Itself and the ideological "intentionality" which is hidden in the operations of our systems.

As for parsimony... well, there are a few more cards than I would like. Not 196 minor arcana but 112. The developmental pattern being described is not locked into symmetry. We do not have equal numbers of motivational sublevels at all cognitive levels. The 7th level has 7 subphases, the 6th has 6 subphases. A pattern is described which both reiterates in a loop and progresses toward toward increasing inclusion.

But that still gives me 112 (+3 to handle the 3rd tier in its three possible modes of appearance... and incidentally this would describe the locus where "higher models" are proposed). 

Would IMP be an advantage? I think it may be extravagant. Most integralites are somewhat familiar with a developmental spectrum of basic levels and it is already challenging them to grow in their comprehension of quadrants-at-levels and the primary line-pairs at each level.

Would other lines be advantageous? Again, I think that would be excessive.

On the one hand because we already have the two main lines which are encountered in human experience. Cognition (which is not "mental" but rather describes "access to a level of reality") and motivation (ethical, emotional, temperamental, etc.). These two are of the most universal concern in broad discussions in the world and do a very good job of enfolding many of the others. Most talk about aesthetics, for example, involves what we can understand about it and how we feel, how we are moved to respond to it.

On the other hand, the scheme is not confined to its own initial framework. As it becomes symbolically encoded it becomes able serve broader and more flexible functions than the correspondences which produced it. 

So I'm quite happy with "two lines" in this sense.

And I don't really think the lack of an "ontology of consciousness" is a hindrance to developing a tarot deck. I suspect the ancient decks were emergent from simple usage. A complex geometrization which makes explicit the implied ontological structure of the conventional integral map is not a crucial piece for grassroots tool-building.

That said, my attention turns to what loosely approximates a "major arcana". This is the advice or processing aspect of the deck. It should consist of all the basic developmental, integrative procedures which could be applied as solutions to whatever healthy or unhealthy versions of the minor arcana are dealt. 

Here's an area where I could use some more of your input if you are willing. I am looking for the smallest set of procedures which encompass what I have previously listed as the "tantric technologies" for social and personal transformation. These are the miscellaneous (any patterns should be found later rather than read into it from the beginning) set of ascending and descending developments. For example: to experimentally identify with a shadow self, to look for nuances which tease apart the apparent content, to contemplate the image, to allow the rot, to invent a bridge between apparent opposites, to explore the reaction energy apart from the reaction, to work on a weak quadrant, etc. 

What "moves" for growth or healing absolutely have to be included?

Hi Layman,

Your "Tantric Technologies" seem analogous to Alchemy and thus have a connection to the Planets (7 Alchemical Metals) and to the Zodiac (as 12 Alchemical process stages).  That's about all of a hint that I can offer you as unfortunately, I don't have the time right now to research the details.

Best Wishes!

Joe

I don't know much about the Tarot, so I'm not much help with that, but years ago I attempted to create a divination system using Tolkien's runic and Quenyan characters (for two different systems).  I abandoned the project and no longer have my notes, but I still think that would be a fun project (and tool).

It still might. As I am evolving the entries in the opening post of this thread, I am acutely aware that I will soon crash into the need for art, decoration and card production. Perhaps some of the marks on these cards could be in Quenya? It is a beautiful language...

So now I've got the basic cards sorted into suits (quadrants), with representational images and examples of the inverted/pathological versions of each. And I've got 20 "trumps" which are cards that should suggest one of the basic integrative healing or growth options. If anyone has a suggestion to adumbrate or shrink this list (at the bottom of the opening post) let me know.

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