Gurdjieff On the Nature of Man

[RflctnOfU]

I didn't get the feeling or impression that RflctnOfU knows something, but rather that RflctnOfU is missing the point that G's entire life is a testimony to the fact that the Work on the self must be done via direct interactions with other people in 'normal life' and also within a group of people who have the specific aim of Working on themselves via their interactions with each other and with 'normal life'. The idea that there could be something in the text of his books that could itself have a direct effect on the reader and in some way supersede or be more important than the truths that the books attempt to convey to the reader about the inner nature of humans beings that must then be experienced directly by way of the aforementioned interactions, sounds contrary to everything G taught. Basically, RflctnOfU's comments about the effect of reading or hidden messages that must be experienced by each person alone, sound like 'wiseacreing'.

Of course Work on the self is done through 'normal life', although it isn't limited to "direct interactions with other people," as implied. One can work on oneself through any number of means. One's craft, whatever it is, if impartial, is a means of Work. Struggle, in myriad forms, is a means. As to "...and also within a group of people who have the aim of Working on themselves...", I am searching for this in relation to G's teaching, the manual/handbook of which is Beelzebub's Tales. I wish to understand, as completely as possible, this labyrinth of ideas, because I have seen results from applying what I have understood thus far - with the ultimate aim of putting it to use for others -- but as Gurdjieff said "Before you can be an altruist, you must first be an out and out egoist". I see the sense in this. I used to say "how can you have faith in god if you don't have faith in yourself? to my christian friends." The ideas contained within this book, that I have understood thus far, have stood up to verification every single time. For myself, there is no more important task than getting to the bottom of this. It is a mania similar, I think, to Laura's mania to get to the bottom of the matter with history. I can't decode this book on my own, thus my search for a group of people with a similar aim. And it seems that no one takes this book as seriously as I do. I hope I am wrong on that.

I have been vague not out of 'missing the point of the (Perceval's perceived) testimony of G's life...', on which, incidentally, I couldn't disagree with you more (missing the point of G's life), but rather that the inner experience of the results of putting the pieces of the puzzle together cannot be expressed in words. If you haven't had that experience for yourself, no amount of verbiage will convey the truth of the matter, and if I attempted to do so, it would lead to misunderstanding. I wish others the inner experience. But it takes work. Gurdjieff knew what he was doing (regarding my post about crystalization of associations, which I assume was the 'wiseacring' you perceived, no?) He talks plainly of it in Chapter one, page 24.

Something that is "real" bears "fruits".

Right you are my friend, which is why I feel saddened that, it seems, noone takes this book as seriously as I do.

Kris

 

[Vic]

I don't yet have the level of knowledge of G's work being discussed here so please indulge me for a second. Reading this thread reminded me of a friend back in the eighties. She was reading one of G's books (and was a member of a G group in London) every spare moment she had. I had never heard of Gurdjieff and asked her what the book was about. She said it wasn't 'about' anything and that there was no linear journey or logic to it. One just had to read the words and changes would take place in the reader.

Thinking about that and reading these posts I come up with hidden (to the conscious mind) symbolism that is understood by the subconscious mind through linkage with the universal mind. Or some other non-conscious process of transformation?

Is this what RflctnOfU is referring to?

Or am I wide of the mark?

 

[RflctnOfU]

I don't yet have the level of knowledge of G's work being discussed here so please indulge me for a second. Reading this thread reminded me of a friend back in the eighties. She was reading one of G's books (and was a member of a G group in London) every spare moment she had. I had never heard of Gurdjieff and asked her what the book was about. She said it wasn't 'about' anything and that there was no linear journey or logic to it. One just had to read the words and changes would take place in the reader.

Thinking about that and reading these posts I come up with hidden (to the conscious mind) symbolism that is understood by the subconscious mind through linkage with the universal mind. Or some other non-conscious process of transformation?

Is this what RflctnOfU is referring to?

Or am I wide of the mark?

In a sense, yes. The 'symbolism' that transfers to the subconscious occurs as a result of the 'friction' of various associations created from struggle with the text (which includes reading it aloud).

Kris

 

[Menna]

I have not read through this whole thread yet I will tomorrow when I have the time and will give my insight with my current level of being. However I have read "life is real" throughout the book and throughout his books in general I believe G was giving us hints and clues but at the end of the day for us to really assimilate knowledge we have to find the answer on our own. I feel that it is important to note the the C's make it a point for Laura and her team to read/research/network and don't give answers out easily. There is an important reason for this. If we are given things then the knowledge wont sink into our being but if we have worked for the knowledge I believe it has a different effect on a person. I believe G had the same intention as the C's do. He didn't want to just tell us by finishing life is real IMO he wanted us to go through the work to understand his message. So maybe one way to look at it is that Life is real is finished because this might have been his intent.

an analogy...If one is given a million dollars one will not know what a million dollars is really worth compaired to someone who has worked for that money. The person that worked will have a different perspective of the million dollars will protect it and value it and will know what it takes to earn it. I believe G left the end of the book blank so that a group of like minded people could read/research/network so that they/we can enhance our being and really know what this knowledge is worth.

just my 2 cents

 

[Laura]

FWIW, Gurdjieff brings up four types of hasnamuss individuals (which I take to mean beings of an STS orientation):

"The first kind of hasnamuss individual is a three-brained being who, while acquiring this 'something' in his common presence, still consists only of his planetary body and who, during the process of the sacred rascooarno is subject to the consequences of the properties of this 'something' in him and is thus destroyed forever such as he is.

"For the hasnamuss of the first kind, who acquires this 'something' while consisting only of a planetary body, the decomposition of his planetary body does not proceed according to the general rule, that is to say, all the various sensed impulses in his organism do not stop functioning simultaneously at the approach of the sacred rascooarno, that is, death. "But the process of the sacred rascooarno already begins in him during his planetary existence and proceeds in stages, that is, one by one his 'separate spiritualized localizations' gradually cease to function in his common presence—or, as your favorites would say, in such a being first one of his brains with all its functions dies, later on, the second one dies, and only then does the final death of the being occur.

"In addition to this, after the final death, the disintegration of all the active elements of which the 'planetary body' was formed proceeds much more slowly than usual, and is subject to the inextinguishable action—lessening only in proportion to the volatilization of the active elements—of the 'nalooossnian
impulses' sensed during his life.

Essentially these are people who have already had their mental and/or emotional center die due to a combination of hereditary and environmental factors. My interpretation is that a person with a dead mental center is an authoritarian follower, because they cannot think for themselves and always require their emotions or reactive conditioning to oversee the pseudothinking. The essential psychopath, I think, corresponds quite nicely with one who has a dead emotional center. Naturally this can be either inborn or acquired.

I agree that this is darn close. I think that G was, as has been mentioned, trying to cast things in terms that were less loaded with religious/esoteric baggage and since his ideas were ahead of their time, and he didn't have access to the development of scientific terminology that would have been useful up to a point, he just made up words. It would be interesting if some of his terms could be connected to more scientific words and a "find and replace" could be done throughout the text just to see how it makes sense.

 

[Joe]

In all seriousness, I don't know. I think he started out life with some kind of cognitive advantage(s) over the bulk of mechanical humanity.

I think he gives a bit clue to this in 'Meetings'. He says that he was brought up by parents who had a correct/normal functioning conscience which, he says, allowed him to be "impartial". Which I can imagine is a very strong advantage indeed.

'It is particularly appropriate to tell you certain details of my education, since we are gathered today to celebrate the opening of an institution which has as its fundamental aim the correct, harmonious education of man. The more so, since this institution is based on experimental data accumulated over the course of many years and thoroughly verified by me—that very man who has sacrificed almost his whole personal life to the study of this vital question of education, so painful for the present day, and who, having been brought up by people with normally developed consciences, has been able to acquire the capacity, no matter what the circumstances, always to be impartial.

 

[Joe]

I have been vague not out of 'missing the point of the (Perceval's perceived) testimony of G's life...', on which, incidentally, I couldn't disagree with you more (missing the point of G's life), but rather that the inner experience of the results of putting the pieces of the puzzle together cannot be expressed in words. If you haven't had that experience for yourself, no amount of verbiage will convey the truth of the matter, and if I attempted to do so, it would lead to misunderstanding. I wish others the inner experience. But it takes work.

Don't you see a problem with this in that, if someone else were to do what you say and gain the insight you claim to have gained, there would never be a way for you and that other person to verify whether or not your understandings are the same since, as you claim, it "cannot be expressed in words". If any important teaching of G's could never be expressed in words, that suggests that his teaching was severely limited because, not only could he never tell it to anyone directly, despite the fact that his main method of teaching was through talking to others in groups, but he couldn't even write it down and disseminate it that way either.

Added: what might a conversation between two people who, supposedly, had this intuited understanding from G's texts, look like? After your description of it, if I *thought* I knew what you meant and had the same understanding, how would the exchange go? Like this?

Me: "Yes, I know what you mean, it's like.....well, I can't really put it into words"

You: "Yes, I see you understand what I have understood, because, like me, you can't describe it using words"

Me: "Yes, that's exactly it, it's an understanding that just defies any attempt to communicate it to another using written or spoken words"

You: "I'm glad to see you've understood the same thing as I have."

 

[Buddy]

I think he gives a bit clue to this in 'Meetings'. He says that he was brought up by parents who had a correct/normal functioning conscience which, he says, allowed him to be "impartial". Which I can imagine is a very strong advantage indeed.

Now that you mention it, yes, I recall that conversation with those "unconditionally respected dollar-­holders" clearly. G had to mobilize all his energy to tell the full story of his life for a specific purpose and he accomplished that aim for sure!

 

[Buddy]

I don't yet have the level of knowledge of G's work being discussed here so please indulge me for a second. Reading this thread reminded me of a friend back in the eighties. She was reading one of G's books (and was a member of a G group in London) every spare moment she had. I had never heard of Gurdjieff and asked her what the book was about. She said it wasn't 'about' anything and that there was no linear journey or logic to it. One just had to read the words and changes would take place in the reader.

Thinking about that and reading these posts I come up with hidden (to the conscious mind) symbolism that is understood by the subconscious mind through linkage with the universal mind. Or some other non-conscious process of transformation?

Is this what RflctnOfU is referring to?

Or am I wide of the mark?

In a sense, yes. The 'symbolism' that transfers to the subconscious occurs as a result of the 'friction' of various associations created from struggle with the text (which includes reading it aloud).

Kris

Kris's response describes the process of occupying the "thinking machine" with semantic concerns while a payload which may not be consciously perceived until later gets passed to the 'subconscious', OSIT. The idea of 'incubation' comes to mind here.

A reader also needs to invest some energy in filling out the 'unsaids' in G's text as he goes along, because in my mind, the part where you say...

...hidden (to the conscious mind) symbolism that is understood by the subconscious mind through linkage with the universal mind...

...is a way of intuiting that All movement or momentum is a relational process of communication of one sort or another. Laura uses the phrase "Information field" and I think G understood the entire universe as a cognitive or communicative environment of some class or quality or another between all existents - organismal, semi-organismal, abstract(to us)-but-real, etc..

 

[Laura]

I have been vague not out of 'missing the point of the (Perceval's perceived) testimony of G's life...', on which, incidentally, I couldn't disagree with you more (missing the point of G's life), but rather that the inner experience of the results of putting the pieces of the puzzle together cannot be expressed in words. If you haven't had that experience for yourself, no amount of verbiage will convey the truth of the matter, and if I attempted to do so, it would lead to misunderstanding. I wish others the inner experience. But it takes work.

Don't you see a problem with this in that, if someone else were to do what you say and gain the insight you claim to have gained, there would never be a way for you and that other person to verify whether or not your understandings are the same since, as you claim, it "cannot be expressed in words". If any important teaching of G's could never be expressed in words, that suggests that his teaching was severely limited because, not only could he never tell it to anyone directly, despite the fact that his main method of teaching was through talking to others in groups, but he couldn't even write it down and disseminate it that way either.

Not only that, but what we have found is that it is only after YEARS of working with people directly, hands on, that many of the things that Gurdjieff said and wrote actually begin to make sense in complete context. I hope you listened to our podcast about Gurdjieff from some years back because I was only able to understand what he meant about his extraordinary experience that helped him formulate his ideas when I was able to put it in the context of actually working with people. That is, in the end, the key. And I don't JUST mean working with them in a public way as here on the forum and in groups, workshops, etc, but also in practical, every day living terms as he did with his adventurers in his search for truth.

So, tell us, how much work with other people do you do both publicly, withstanding attacks, and in your daily living experience under pressure?

 

[Buddy]

And it seems that no one takes this book as seriously as I do.
...
...which is why I feel saddened that, it seems, noone takes this book as seriously as I do.

Cheer up. I think it's not just the book you take seriously. Personally, I have loads of respect for G's work as I do for Mozart, Beethoven, Laura, Joe, obyvatel and anyone else who has made the quality of contributions to people and mankind that has moved and changed people for the better.

In fact, everytime G's work gets read, it's like that portion of his mind gets re-instantiated into our world - just like with those wonderful music composers. Such are the candidates for recurrence or immortality in some form or other as my current level of understanding seems to point to. Certain people, through their relational activities, do indeed seem to make themselves essential parts of any universe desiring to see itself as it is, no?

In any case, any levity I may personally display relates, not to G's work per se, but to my approach to the material. One needs a relaxed awareness due to the inverse relationship between content and meaning, or what understanding you can get from a concentrated focus on material and what meaning you can get from extending your awareness to the fringe of related associations. All is interconnected and exists at multiple scales, but makes up one unified picture as those octaves are intended to help show.

 

[Vic]

I don't yet have the level of knowledge of G's work being discussed here so please indulge me for a second. Reading this thread reminded me of a friend back in the eighties. She was reading one of G's books (and was a member of a G group in London) every spare moment she had. I had never heard of Gurdjieff and asked her what the book was about. She said it wasn't 'about' anything and that there was no linear journey or logic to it. One just had to read the words and changes would take place in the reader.

Thinking about that and reading these posts I come up with hidden (to the conscious mind) symbolism that is understood by the subconscious mind through linkage with the universal mind. Or some other non-conscious process of transformation?

Is this what RflctnOfU is referring to?

Or am I wide of the mark?

In a sense, yes. The 'symbolism' that transfers to the subconscious occurs as a result of the 'friction' of various associations created from struggle with the text (which includes reading it aloud).

Thanks for coming back to me, Kris. In terms of the friction of the 'various associations' you mention, are they the associations created in the individual through his/her life experiences and perceptions? If so how do the Truths, conveyed by archetypal symbols 'hidden' in Gs writings, arise from friction which must by definition be individualised? What mechanics or dynamics would be involved.

I may be barking up a non-existent tree here, but I am struggling with how the transmission of a universal truth to a person's subconscious mind can take place if it is dependent on, or results from, the friction of an individuals own associations, as the latter differ in everyone.

 

[Vic]

I don't yet have the level of knowledge of G's work being discussed here so please indulge me for a second. Reading this thread reminded me of a friend back in the eighties. She was reading one of G's books (and was a member of a G group in London) every spare moment she had. I had never heard of Gurdjieff and asked her what the book was about. She said it wasn't 'about' anything and that there was no linear journey or logic to it. One just had to read the words and changes would take place in the reader.

Thinking about that and reading these posts I come up with hidden (to the conscious mind) symbolism that is understood by the subconscious mind through linkage with the universal mind. Or some other non-conscious process of transformation?

Is this what RflctnOfU is referring to?

Or am I wide of the mark?

In a sense, yes. The 'symbolism' that transfers to the subconscious occurs as a result of the 'friction' of various associations created from struggle with the text (which includes reading it aloud).

Kris

Kris's response describes the process of occupying the "thinking machine" with semantic concerns while a payload which may not be consciously perceived until later gets passed to the 'subconscious', OSIT. The idea of 'incubation' comes to mind here.

A reader also needs to invest some energy in filling out the 'unsaids' in G's text as he goes along, because in my mind, the part where you say...

...hidden (to the conscious mind) symbolism that is understood by the subconscious mind through linkage with the universal mind...

...is a way of intuiting that All movement or momentum is a relational process of communication of one sort or another. Laura uses the phrase "Information field" and I think G understood the entire universe as a cognitive or communicative environment of some class or quality or another between all existents - organismal, semi-organismal, abstract(to us)-but-real, etc..

But what part do those semantic concerns play in the forming of the payload, Buddy?

Yes, Laura's information field explains a great deal in terms of, well, everything. As you say, to paraphrase (hopefully accurately) - communication is involved in everything. Access to the information field is an attractive prospect to say the least :)

I'm on a steep but rewarding learning curve here. I haven't quite got it with G, but I'm enjoying the attempt at getting it.

 

[Buddy]

But what part do those semantic concerns play in the forming of the payload, Buddy?

Distraction to some extent and at some points? But maybe not for all the semantic concerns. Try to read the material while paying attention to how you relate to the text on two levels. Example:

Have you ever read the Cinderella story to a child? Did you come away with the feeling that you had shared an inspirational story of overcoming the bad guys (or gals) with this child and maybe taught her something valuable? Would you be shocked to discover that on the non-verbal level of imagery-meaning, you had just brainwashed her to be the kind of good little girl who knows to 'shut up, do everything she is told, as she is told to do it, and she will grow up to marry her a prince?' Well, maybe you did and maybe you didn't, but the point is that a part of you also learns from visual imagery and signification that's not necessarily related to words and it would be a good idea to be aware of this - at least as a potential to have reverse or alternate meanings installed in you at that level that unconsciously motivates.

Watch that animated movie with no sound, editing out any stretches of no interaction between individuals and you'll see what I mean.

 

[Laura]

But what part do those semantic concerns play in the forming of the payload, Buddy?

Yes, Laura's information field explains a great deal in terms of, well, everything. As you say, to paraphrase (hopefully accurately) - communication is involved in everything. Access to the information field is an attractive prospect to say the least :)

I'm on a steep but rewarding learning curve here. I haven't quite got it with G, but I'm enjoying the attempt at getting it.

Just a note that Buddy is not a member of FOTCM and thus has not watched those lecture videos which are for FOTCM members.