Starting with Dr. Don Beck

As life condition to the power of 7 (that’s the terminology used to describe one side of Dr. Graves double helix model where seven represent the complexity of conditions causing yellow to emerge) continue manifest all around us, it is even more apparent that the yellow code is brightening in many minds around the globe. There is a conscious awareness or conscious evolution that exists today, meaning that as the code brightens in minds, it (the intelligence of the code) may know that is what is happening… like right now as you read this! or you may have developed a strong enough observer with yourself that you can watch yourself as your thinking changes.

In any event, second tier remains an area of intense curiosity for most of us interested in all things integral. This was certainly true for me. Over the past five years I have been sitting in three questions: What is second tier? How do I model it, and how can it be used to meet the challenge we face, not only on global scale, but on a personal scale as well?

I’ve decided to post to this list, my own as well as other’s, thoughts about possible answers to those questions, with the intent inform, inspire and explore what the coaching field might offer in this context.

To get started here’s a segment written by Don Beck a couple of years ago I thought you might finding interesting.

“The “momentous leap” in Clare W. Graves’ language describes something of an emergence surge that appears to be much more than simply the seventh ratchet in the developmental sequence of complexity. Several of his graphics make this point dramatically and he believed this GT (Yellow) system contained greater conceptual capacity than the sum total of the first six.

He justified the notion of sets of six by the extraordinary quality and complexity in decision-making and other aspects of cognition in certain people he had tested and observed. The individuals who were expressing the 7th Level pattern had less fear, could generate many more options, appeared to be much more resourceful, etc. I believe he found early tracings of minds that were becoming aware of Problems “G” long before they become visible to the rest of us. Remember, Graves conducted his research before the age of the microchip, the end of the Cold War, the onset of molecular biology, and the more general impact of the FS code in its deconstruction and pluralistic influences. FS did, indeed, seek to cleanse and compress the Spiral by “liberating” the indigenous people (and all vMeme codes) from the dominance hierarchy. This created the memetic theatre where all the value systems that humans have expressed since the big brain emerged, thus appearing in real time on CNN – all demanding their respective places in the sun and in the higher valued niches. Herein lies the complexity that Graves could only imagine but could not directly experience. So, the Life Conditions to the Power of Seven that would require the new thinking complexity that he had observed three decades ago finally cascaded onto the scene. He knew something was up and was quite accurate in his future visions. The Gravesian blueprint will serve us well for decades to come.

Keep in mind that the ultimate texture and capacity within this 7th Code must match and/or exceed the complexity within the Life Conditions that it confronts. Those who exhibit this thinking will not be clones, nor cut from the same cloth. Each will have a unique mixture of agency or communal subtexts; each will bring diverse levels of motivation and energy to the task; and each will respond to its own internal drummer. But ALL will have an enhanced vertical perspective with the ability to transcend but include (and value) what came before, and also transcend but anticipate what will be next, thus declaring that we exist in the tension zones between ascending and descending priority systems. I also believe the 8th Code will rise in conjunction with the 7th, that we will always have a dominant expressive and dominant sacrificial system working in conjunction with other. Think of 7th Level (Yellow) as “left brain with feelings” and the 8th Level (Turquoise) as “right brain with data.” Yellow will identify the particles up and down the spine of the Spiral and will seek to surf the spine with its multimemetic tool kit; Turquoise will focus on the waves and energy flows that engulf the Spiral and will be much more comfortable in a command, control and conformity function, but only on behalf of the Life Force itself, and in its many manifestations in life forms on the planet

I hope you can see that these are not discrete steps that everybody have to climb in a uniform manner. Think of these as color chalk marks on a sidewalk that “nature” has laid down in a sequential fashion, because each is simply a complex, adaptive, and contextual intelligence that addresses the emerging complex of Life Conditions. We all play vMemetic hopscotch along these conceptual spaces, often landing with two feet on one zone but moving on one foot through the others.”