The Gurdjieffian Roots of Leary's Eight-Circuit Model of Consciousness

An examination of the correspondences between Gurdjieff's centers and Leary's Eight-Circuit Model of Consciousness

In this time of Chaos Magick, it pays to seek out concepts that can serve as points of stability in the new sea of flux. The eight-circuit model of consciousness was drawn up by Timothy Leary and then popularized by Robert Anton Wilson, but its roots are found in the works of the mystic Gurdjieff as reported by his student Ouspensky in the book In Search of the Miraculous.

Gurdjieff divided his system into two levels, the Lower Centers and the Higher Centers. Notice however that this division is not identical to that of Leary's Terrestrial and Extra-Terrestrial Circuitry.

Lower centers:

The first of these centers is the Instinctive center which controls involuntary processes. In medical terminology, this is the autonomic nervous system.

The next is the Moving center which consists of those learned physical processes whose mechanisms have become subconscious, such as walking, eating, driving, etc.

Next is the Sexual center. This controls sexual function but it is also the source of the imagination.

Then we have the Lower Emotional center.

The final lower center is the Lower Intellectual center.

Higher centers:

The Higher Emotional center. It allows one to experience states of self-consciousness, self-awareness, and other deep feelings.

The Higher Intellectual center. It allows one to experience states of objective consciousness and superior intellect.

So let's see how these match up to Leary's system.

The bio-survival circuit, with its possibility of moving towards pleasant stimuli and away from unpleasant stimuli, seems to be a good match for the Moving center.

The muscular-political circuit, with its direction of up for domination and down for submission, likely corresponds to the Lower Emotional center.

The symbolic-laryngeal circuit matches the Lower Intellectual center.

The socio-sexual circuit is probably identical to the Higher Emotional center.

The artistic-pleasure circuit would seem to go with the Sexual-Imagination center, which Gurdjieff claimed functioned as a higher center when accessed in the proper manner.

The meta-intelligence circuit is undoubtedly the same as the Higher Intellectual center.

Finally, we are left with the Instinctive center and the genetic-consciousness circuit, which don't seem to be identical so much as lower and higher octaves of a single aspect of existence. It is as though the Gurdjieff sequence runs Do Re Mi Fa So La Si, while the Leary sequence runs Re Mi Fa So La Si Do.

The next circuit is the quantum consciousness circuit which doesn't have a corresponding center as Gurdjieff's system had only seven centers, still, much like the previous circuit, it can be seen as related to the circuit/system one octave lower, which is the bio-survival circuit /Moving center. The lower center/circuit is concerned with keeping the body alive, the higher circuit/center is concerned with expanding consciousness beyond the physical limits of time and space. So, once again, while the Gurdjieff sequence runs Do Re Mi Fa So La Si, the Leary sequence is one note longer and is offset by one, running Re Mi Fa So La Si Do Re.