The fifth and final element of the AQAL Model is Types.
“Levels Represent Vertical Differences, Types Represent Horizontal Differences”
Types. An obvious Type differential is that of male / female.
Types complement the other aspects of Quadrants, Levels, Lines and States, and they are about Horizontal differences – differences which have nothing whatever to do with things being on different levels.
The most obvious Type is that of male / female.
This has many more occurrences though, of course, with all manner of differnces in things, such as; types of buildings, types of sports, types of comedy, types of fashion, types of terrain, or the well-known Myers-Briggs personality typing, and so on.
“You may have noticed that you often prefer one type to another. For instance, you might enjoy listening to jazz over heavy metal, prefer to live near the ocean as opposed to the mountains, be attracted to blonds over brunettes, or have a fetish for nimbus clouds. But again, we can’t say that one type is deeper, more evolved, or better than another. They’re just different – period. Each type has its own unique properties, its own strengths and weaknesses, gifts and faults, yet none is more fundamental and none should be ignored according to AQAL. Helium and carbon are two types of atoms. In contrast, molecules exist at a higher level of complexity than atoms because molecules transcend and includeatoms in their own makeup. Levels represent vertical differences; types represent horizontal differences.” – Integral Life Practice
So Types may well stay with you throughout development. This is also worth noting. If a person is left-handed at egocentric, they will probably still be left-handed at ethnocentric or worldcentric.
As with all aspects of AQAL, and perspective understanding in general, the point is not to tie ourselves to certain Types or truths, but to simply make use of the value of being aware of them, for as ILP says, once you can see a pattern, you are no longer bound by it, but are freer to change it!
James Blacker
http://mind.wholelifewholeworld.com/the-aqal-integral-map-of-reality/and-types/