How did you find the 4th Way?

JonnyRadar

JonnyRadar

The Living Force
I've been re-reading In Search of the Miraculous lately, and I came across this on pg. 48:

"The fourth way requires no retirement into the desert, does not require a man to give up and renounce everything by which he formerly lived. The fourth way begins much further on than the way of the yogi. This means that a man must be prepared for the fourth way and this preparation must be acquired in ordinary life and be a very serious one, embracing many different sides. Furthermore a man must be living in conditions favorable for work on the fourth way, or, in any case, in conditions which do not render it impossible. It must be understood that both in the inner and in the external life of a man there may be conditions which create insuperable barriers to the fourth way. Furthermore, the fourth way has no definite forms like the ways of the fakir, the monk, and the yogi. And, first of all, it has to be found."
Click to expand...

For my own part, I was living in a different state (in the US), "attempting" to make a living and not doing very well, all while chasing dragons in the forms of booze and other things. There was a great struggle in me, as I felt I was going to go "down the tubes" and end up like one of my gutter-punk acquaintances, chasing those dragons until it led to a pine box... One day my Dad called me, and asked if I would like to move home. They would help, I could live in a trailer by my sister's place, it might be long and hard but would I come with him? I said yes and two days later he was there with his truck.

After returning, it took me a while to get settled, and I was still drinking. Things came to a head with my sister and I went into the 12-step program, and at the time, it worked. Through a series of really bizarre synchronicities, I met a few people in the area (who are now dear friends) who were talking about this book, "The Wave." I read Wave 1, and it completely blew my mind. We all got together from time to time and eventually I was introduced to Ouspensky's Psychology of Man's Possible Evolution. From there, I took to the material like a fish to water...

Part of my reasoning for this post was thinking about the circumstances that led me to this material. G says "Furthermore a man must be living in conditions favorable for work on the fourth way, or, in any case, in conditions which do not render it impossible." At that time in my life, I was living alone in a trailer with nothing to do but physical labor and nothing else but time on my hands. I was also desperately seeking some sort of stability in my life, since it had been so chaotic the previous years. My family is quite heavily religious (Baptist), so I was attending bible studies and the like at the time, and going to church with them. Interestingly, or perhaps more fortunately, being in that religious environment - while at the same time reading the Wave and Ouspensky - only strengthened the desire in me to find the true meaning behind all of the gobbledey-gook.

I find myself, now in the present, with an extreme sense of gratitude and humility to the universe for that shift in my life. I still don't really know if I found the Work or if It found me.

So I'm curious, if anyone is down for some recapitulation, how did you find the 4th Way?
 
I found the 4th Way through the Cassiopaean website (cassiopaea.org). My coming to the material was entirely 'by chance', as one might say. I had never heard of Laura, the word Cassiopaea, Gurdjieff or anything/anybody of the like. No one I knew and no one I personally know today has ever mentioned anything of Cassiopaea, Laura, the 4th Way or any of the materials we delve into here on the Forum.
I was semi-bored one day, and so I opened up Wikipedia and started looking up astronomical terms and concepts for something to do. As my knowledge of such things, especially at the time, was somewhat minimal, I ended up doing as I do, opening up a seperate tab anytime I came across a word, idea or concept I was unfamiliar with and skimming that page. In that way, I did and often do end up with a good many tabs open at any one time! One of the tabs I opened up was the term 'binary star'. I browsed that page, thinking it was a nifty concept, and at the very bottom of the page was a link to the article "Binary Stars, Does Our Sun Have a Dark Companion" on the Cassiopaea website.
That article was beyond anything I had ever read up to that point in my life! The concepts and ideas freely discussed, Laura's writing style, the information being 'backed up'/cited and so on grabbed my attention and refused to let go. The rest was much like you in that I was as a fish to water. Although I was quite busy, all of my free time became devoted to reading a significant portion of the materials at Cassiopaea.org. I started with some of the more somewhat stand-alone articles, then ended up reading through The Wave series, the C's Hit List and on and on. I was like a kid in a candy shop. Religions didn't make much sense to me, science was always pretty interesting but when applied to such enormous ideas and concepts as Laura's works did it became 'epic' to me. The concepts of Densities made so much more sense to me than anything I had ever heard before that I simply couldn't stop reading. I had never realized, and at the time didn't even realize, but the way the materials grabbed my interest with such force and wouldn't let go eventually made me stop and realize that the questions that were being answered were and may have been for some time burning in my heart and mind! I've sometimes lamented at the fact that other than music, very, very few things in life stir a significant passion/interest in me. One day I found quite to my surprise that I had been reading the materials on the Cass.org site for over a month! Time had simply left my mind while I'd started reading the materials, and with much more to read, I understood that this was the beginning of an entirely new and significant point in my life. To finally answer the question directly, it was through Laura's references to Gurdjieff and Ouspensky that I came to learn of The 4th Way Work, and I ended up purchasing several of their books on the Work.

It was at least a month or more and I was through most of the Wave series before I had any idea that there was a forum connected to all of this. Repeat 'kid in a candy shop' syndrome. The materials seemed so 'on the fringe' to me that to find such an active forum with so many members simply blew my mind in a most wonderful way. I smiled and shed a few silent tears, which is exceedingly rare for me. Since then I've continued reading, joined the forum, began trying to understand the 4th Way's concepts and observe myself in my own life and generally made self-work as integral a part of my life as I can.

In regards to requiring an environment favorable to or at least allowing the Work, I think I was in a fairly good position. I was living with a real master (whether they are conscious of it or not) of passive-aggression and manipulation, and was still learning to protect myself from and constructively interact with another who can and at the time very strongly was exhibiting the same tendencies. Both had the ability to seriously set me off and drain me of all energy, as well as completely distract me through anxiety, depression and anger to the point where dealing with either and often both of them was nearly all I could handle in a given day. I was also learning to observe, recognize and modify undesirable behaviors in myself which were contributing to the often extreme environment and interactions. Add to that having my son full-time, being in college full-time and working the hours I could squeezed in around all that, and I'll say I was and still to some degree, in an environment offering plenty of challenges to which I could learn to apply the concepts I had recently come across! You might say at the same time I found myself in extremely challenging circumstances (through only my own fault) and came across entirely 'by accident' the tools which would eventually allow me to handle said circumstances. Along with you, I'm not sure if I came to the 4th Way Work or if the 4th Way came to me, but I am certainly grateful, as in many ways it has saved my life, quite often from myself! I was basically lost and wandering until I came to the 4th Way, as well as Laura's works. Both have been the light I so desperately needed to begin finding my way.



Thank you for sharing how you came to the 4th Way, and for opening it up for others to share as well. I didn't mean to get so long-winded, but that's quite characteristic of me (workin' on that..). I'm not sure exactly how rare it is to find others interested in any of all this, but with no one in my own 'real life' to relate any of this with, I can say honestly that I am very happy that you have others to discuss and share this stuff with!

Anyone else? How have you come to the 4th Way?
 
While I was studying at University I slowly started to lean towards Buddhism and the general concept of self observation and meditation. I was also reading quite 'magical' books such of the power of now that really got part of me excited, but in hindsight it was only temporary as it didn't have a definite aim.

At the time, I'd been learning about the diet from UltraMind Solution and PBPM, coming to many realizations that nearly the entire world was being poisoned without even being aware of it. After quite brief but intense feelings of doom I started to try out some forms of meditation and breathing exercises, quite unsuccessfully. I then asked one of my flatmates if they knew of any good exercises and he sent me a link to the EE page. After going back to it a few times I followed a few links and ended up at the Cassiopaea website. I was over the moon that I had discovered a group of people who were aligning their consciousness to find truly objective results! However I find myself questioning whether it was just a big mistake for me to find this site (and the fourth way) from my friends links.

I didn't even bother to read the Wave series for a few months as I was so fascinated by the research. However the odd terms I spotted on the forum inevitably lead me to the Wave, and when I first began to start reading the chapters, late at night, my computer suddenly crashed and I got the Blue Screen Of Death. Amusingly this also happened to my girlfriend once she began to read through the Wave, but you know what computers are like! ;) Anyway since then it seems like I've got more barriers than ever to overcome, and it truly is a struggle now I've broken free from the initial illusions.

Thanks Jonathan, this was indeed a nice recapitulation exercise.
 
In a nutshell, it was basically the following series of major influences over about 5 or 6 month:
-The Arrivals
-Illuminati Conspiracy
-Ra Material
-David Wilcock (aside: I tried typing "Wilcock" in using swype not realizing it wouldn't be in my phone's dictionary and it gave me Stopcock instead :lol: )
-New Age Drivel
-Project Avalon, activity on the forum led me to discover that what I really want is Truth, no matter what.
-"Omnisense/Omniverse", an individual who claims to be mind controlled and in communication by a "neutral" advanced AI under the control of both STO and STS "aliens" as well as what we call human Consortium members.
-An essay that the above-mentioned individual posted of Laura's on COINTELPRO.
-Cass'.org :cool:
 
I think I was reading through Osho books, and then I got Maurice Nicoll's commentaries and it followed from there.
 
I was going through the C's transcripts in 2005-ish, and ouspensky, gurdjieff, and mouravieff were mentioned. That, as they say, is That ;)

Kris
 
A brief list of my 'path' is as follows:Age 15 - Alex Jones, Loose change
Age 16 - Zeitgeist movie, David Icke
Age 17 - 'Magick', paranormal stuff, psi experiments, OBE experiments, 'The Secret' and others
Age 18 - Max Igan, secret history of humans, the Ra material, 'Hidden hand' dialogue on ATS
Age 19 - Drugs Drugs Drugs, Terence McKenna, Allan Watts, 2012 stuff, 'expanding consciousness'


I was getting pretty lost at this point until I reached a point of total bankruptcy, and did a long sincere prayer asking just what the hell am I doing here
Within about 15 minutes I found the "Love, reality and time of transition" video posted on a disinfo site. Nothing ever hit me as hard.
Then came the wave, I was reeling from that for quite a while. Then I couldn't hold off interacting with the forum any longer, that was the next big shock.


Almost 2 years since now, I'm coming back down to Earth and figuring out how to actually apply knowledge, slowly :)


That was pretty interesting, I think I may journal it in more depth. I guess those disinfo guys are good for something after all!
 
I read a lot and I was always fascinated with space and so-called "unknown". I look often to the night sky and read astronomy books. i was also interested in mythology and here I discover books from Erich von Daniken. In my former country we have a monthly newspaper called Galaksija and here I first find out a strange name of Gurdjieff. Then I discover esoteric books from Annie Bessant and Blavatsky. That lead me to David Icke and Lizzies. Finally I find on the forum Galaksija a "familiar" name Cassiopaea and here I am.
 
From a site called Higher reality or something like that I found a link to the Wave and couldn't stop reading that and the transcripts. Soon enough I found myself lurking on the forum trying to gather whatever I could but realized the laziness of it. And shortly after joining I kept reading relevant quotes from Gurdjieff and that's how I found the way.
 
I read "The Power Of Now" and found this website at nearly the same time. The book talked about presence and being here in the now this resinated with me. Directing mental energy/attention. On this site and other google research I found information about consciousness and presence in the Now. Kind of took off from there
 
I was given ISOTM when I was 17 and already very into 'spiritual' type things and the New Age movement by the headmaster of the school my mother works for - he is now akin to a spiritual mentor for me
 
Had read this thread days ago and I am not sure If I had found already the 4th Way yet? Although, memories came regarding In Search of the Miraculous, it was given by a friend to me like 3 or 4 years before I found this site, almost ten years ago. Curiously at the same time, another book was given to me, it was the Urantia book, when I began to read it, I was … puzzled. I did not finished that book, it was interesting but it was not understandable, I even subscribe to their spanish yahoo group with not much success (in understanding it) either. I remember reading Belcebu’s tales along with ISOTM, Belecebu’s tales was so much fun to read, more fun to see in other's people, thier reaction wile reading it’s tittle :lol:. I like Quino’s joke books, to me both books are somehow related, one with images and the other with words, both referring to human behaviours. Nowadays I am reading it again.

Around those times, I was in the process of detaching? myself from the rites of Catholic religion.

Edit: grammar
 
I was in my senior year of college. The stress of everything going on around me including exams and trying to find myself edged me towards reading new things. I knew that I was suppose to be happy about finally getting through college but I felt as though there was more to life than this or at the very least that there was something fishy going on. I became bored with mainstream academics and the dogmatic religion I was raised to believe whole-heartedly.

I think this was one of my initial moral bankruptcies. I began to google topics related to the ufo phenomenon and other "fringe" topics such as the possibility there being life on other planets. Somehow I came across the spiritscience videos, which at the the time I thought was really great, but in hindsight it is mostly love and light new-age disinfo. From there I went through The Ra Material, David Icke, and Wilcock.

Ironically enough I think I was on a forum pertaining to the Ra Material to which someone linked the Cassiopaean website. From there I read through the wave, joined the forum and subsequently found the works of gurdjieff, Ouspensky, and Mouravieff. It's been a whirlwind of experience and now that I look back on it I still cannot say how it all came about as I was raised to adhere to beliefs from the other end of the spectrum regarding philosophy and esoteric matters; materialism, linearity, and monotheistic dogma etc.
 
the beginning for me moving in a new direction of ideas (that led me to Gurdjieff) happened in one small moment that I can remember . I was at school when I was thinking that I am helpless in the face I life. Feeling bad about my life. and I thought that what if reincarnation is true, what if I am more than I am, and that I have somewhere the abilities to master my problems.

Then I looked online and there is lots of books and studies on reincarnation, which I read a few of. If i didn't have that thought, maybe I would not get here. but I think there definitely is a momentum that lead to that thought. before I had never considered any kind of thinking about what is religion, life-after-death, or reincarnation. It hadn't mattered to me enough until that one point I suppose.
 
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