Maurice Nicoll

[Anthony]

Hello. As I'm making my way through another reading of Maurice Nicoll's Psychological Commentaries on the Teaching of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky I wonder
why there is little mention of his work on this forums? I find him to be a more interesting read than Ouspensky or Mouravieff's account of how to practice the 4th way.

I'm new to this forum and I did a search and can't seem to find him mentioned. Is there a reason he isn't 'popular' here.

 

[Niall]

Welcome Anthony.

We invite all new members to introduce themselves on the Newbies board.

I'm new to this forum and I did a search and can't seem to find him mentioned.

Are you sure? I searched for 'Nicoll' and found 45 entries.

 

[Anthony]

Ah, I wrote 'Maruice' instead of Maurice so that's the problem.

Anyway thanks for clearing that up.

 

[Buddy]

Hi Anthony.

I'm familiar with Nicoll's Psychological Commentaries on the Teaching of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky. I can't speak for anyone else, but I've decided that I'd prefer to deal directly with the source of the teaching--G himself.

Commentaries are really words about words and if I didn't understand G in the first place, how would I be able to tell if Nicoll really understood and where Nicoll may have a 'miss' in his understanding?

And if the issue is 'trust', then why shouldn't I trust G's direct message and my eventual capacity to absorb it with all my being?

 

[Niall]

Incidentally, here's SOTT.net's Quote of the Day for today:

Consciousness means, literally, "knowing-together." A development of consciousness would therefore mean knowing "more together," and so it would bring about a new relationship to everything previously known. For to know more always means to see things differently.

- Maurice Nicoll

 

[Buddy]

Incidentally, here's SOTT.net's Quote of the Day for today:

Consciousness means, literally, "knowing-together." A development of consciousness would therefore mean knowing "more together," and so it would bring about a new relationship to everything previously known. For to know more always means to see things differently.

- Maurice Nicoll

Indeed, he does provide many quotable quotes. :)

 

[genero81]

Commentaries are really words about words and if I didn't understand G in the first place, how would I be able to tell if Nicoll really understood and where Nicoll may have a 'miss' in his understanding?

And if the issue is 'trust', then why shouldn't I trust G's direct message and my eventual capacity to absorb it with all my being?

I completely agree. I find that G is very precise in what he says. He says exactly what he means, at least what I am able to understand.

 

[Buddy]

I found that which I was trying to represent with the phrase "words about words". It was something anart said in a reply to me last year:

Gurdjieff is a strong signal - every step you take away from Gurdjieff the signal is weaker and if you take that weaker signal as truth, you necessarily lose portions of the truth. It can be a very subtle thing, but make no mistake, it does happen.

The impact that had on me was to make me a bit more critical in my reading of the Commentaries. One result from that critical bent concerns a metaphor Nicoll uses for self-remembering. Basically it's a pendulum whose opposing extremes represent the "yes and no" points in the 'struggle between yes and no'. Self-remembering is said to be done at the exact bottom of the swing--a point where there is no bias one way or another.

At the time, that metaphor appealed to my left-brain, linear, analytical way of understanding and made something in me feel good, but being a two-dimensional representation, it remained mostly a conceptual understanding.

I don't recall Gurdjieff's analogy, if he made one, but I feel his meaning in a more three-dimensional way; like a tether-ball swinging around and around and up and down a vertical axis where the axis, itself, represents the place of inner stillness and stability where remembering is easier.

 

[kenlee]

I don't recall Gurdjieff's analogy, if he made one, but I feel his meaning in a more three-dimensional way; like a tether-ball swinging around and around and up and down a vertical axis where the axis, itself, represents the place of inner stillness and stability where remembering is easier.

FWIW, this "inner stillness" might be representative of the development of the inner being body that is talked about in In Search Of The Miraculous. What I've found is that when things become very, very hectic and downright insane with what's going on in my own life along with the craziness of the world around me, I've been able to, in one breath alone, shift into an inner state or 'inner place' of total calm and be released of my identification with all the craziness, totally and completely. The result is that I can think clearly and my body is not reactive to all the goings on. It's very rare thorough, most of the time I'm reactive and identifying to greater and lesser degrees with all these goings on. But there are moments, rare moments, when this becomes possible for me.

I've attributed this mostly from doing the EE breathing over a very long period of time. But even then there are only moments of this for me. My guess is that this 'ableness' to move into this place of inner stillness while still interacting with the fast and intense hectic pace of everyday life is representative of the possibilities open from the growth of this inner body. It's an active state, an active stillness that becomes possible, for a moment, from constant efforts over a very long period of time, not a passive stillness that one might find in a hypnotized person.

 

[Anthony]

Hi Anthony.

I'm familiar with Nicoll's Psychological Commentaries on the Teaching of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky. I can't speak for anyone else, but I've decided that I'd prefer to deal directly with the source of the teaching--G himself.

Commentaries are really words about words and if I didn't understand G in the first place, how would I be able to tell if Nicoll really understood and where Nicoll may have a 'miss' in his understanding?

And if the issue is 'trust', then why shouldn't I trust G's direct message and my eventual capacity to absorb it with all my being?

Since G. teachings aren't really his, but borrowed from various schools - if I can use that term can we really say that he's the source?

But I do agree with you, and Nicoll does say that the commentaries are not the real deal but are mearly to be used to kind of think things through ourselves.

 

[Buddy]

Since G. teachings aren't really his, but borrowed from various schools - if I can use that term can we really say that he's the source?

If we want, we can say he is not the source; but, of course, that would increase the importance of the point about the signal, OSIT.

I don't want to leave a false impression though. I like reading Nicoll. He comes across as an intelligent, kind spiritual guy--which is why I approached his writing uncritically at first.

Thanks for the feedback. :)

 

[anart]

Hi Anthony.

I'm familiar with Nicoll's Psychological Commentaries on the Teaching of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky. I can't speak for anyone else, but I've decided that I'd prefer to deal directly with the source of the teaching--G himself.

Commentaries are really words about words and if I didn't understand G in the first place, how would I be able to tell if Nicoll really understood and where Nicoll may have a 'miss' in his understanding?

And if the issue is 'trust', then why shouldn't I trust G's direct message and my eventual capacity to absorb it with all my being?

Since G. teachings aren't really his, but borrowed from various schools - if I can use that term can we really say that he's the source?

He's the best we have at the moment and we work with what we have.

But I do agree with you, and Nicoll does say that the commentaries are not the real deal but are mearly to be used to kind of think things through ourselves.

It's a bit counter-intuitive to use another person's interpretations to "think things through ourselves" isn't it?

 

[Anthony]

Hi Anthony.

I'm familiar with Nicoll's Psychological Commentaries on the Teaching of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky. I can't speak for anyone else, but I've decided that I'd prefer to deal directly with the source of the teaching--G himself.

Commentaries are really words about words and if I didn't understand G in the first place, how would I be able to tell if Nicoll really understood and where Nicoll may have a 'miss' in his understanding?

And if the issue is 'trust', then why shouldn't I trust G's direct message and my eventual capacity to absorb it with all my being?

Since G. teachings aren't really his, but borrowed from various schools - if I can use that term can we really say that he's the source?

He's the best we have at the moment and we work with what we have.

But I do agree with you, and Nicoll does say that the commentaries are not the real deal but are mearly to be used to kind of think things through ourselves.

It's a bit counter-intuitive to use another person's interpretations to "think things through ourselves" isn't it?

I mean those basic concepts that appear in the 4th way like self-remembering, self-observation and so on. Not the comments he makes about them.