Show#94: Remembering Gurdjieff - Interview with William Patrick Patterson Part 2

[ggen]

After listening to the show a second time (and this may be confirmation bias), I noticed a 'slip' of sorts when Patterson is discussing his disinterest in history and how G "came to the complete sensation of himself". (Sound like how Patterson was describing himself towards the end of the show)?

Starting at roughly 1hr and 8 mins, Patterson mentions that a man like G doesn't come around but "once in a million years". BUT, he has to correct himself because he first says, "once in 100 years". Hmm. Could he subconsciously think he himself is the next 'Gurdjieff'?

I could be way off base but found it interesting nonetheless.

 

[Meechel17]

I've just finished the initial transcription of the show and noticed something strange. The student at the end, 'Mark from Baltimore' sounded almost exactly like William himself, (especially when the voice was slowed down a little) as if he was putting a slightly higher pitched voice on and calling in. He even said "right, right" and a few other things in the same way.

Maybe I've been transcribing for too long and this guy is a relative or just happens to sound a lot like William, but the similarity seemed uncanny.

I just listened to the second show in it's entirety again, and I hadn't read this discussion before, but I was thinking the exact same thing!! Perhaps it's a little of that "hero worship" thing going on where he is mimicking his teacher? But I thought it was uncanny - and I have an ear for voices.

On another note, I was stagnating in my approach to "The Work" - I hadn't been networking or reading much material as it relates to work on the self, and have been struggling even in my physical approach (giving in to cravings for nuts and fruit even though they are not appreciated in any way by my body, except for my taste buds). So after listening again to the the first WPP interview and about the first quarter of the second one, I went online to WPP's website and sent in a request to become a student, rationalizing that I needed someone to help keep me motivated.
Here is the response I got: "Thank you for your interest. The Online Fourth Way School is directed by William Patrick Patterson who has actively practiced the teaching for over 43 years. He leads groups throughout the United States and gives three public seminars a year based on Fourth Way themes. The School is in session for 10 months each year, September through June, and participants are asked to give a gift of $50 per month. Initial enrollment is three months in advance, $150, and $50/month thereafter. Studies are conducted through individually guided bi-monthly correspondence.

Please tell us about yourself and include your spiritual background and aspirations (ie., past and present spiritual paths, teachers, etc). Also include what you seek to learn from the teaching of The Fourth Way. We will then send you the next steps to register for study.

A copy of our School brochure may be viewed at:

http://www.gurdjiefflegacy.org/download/3er45ksrX/OFWS%20Brochure.pdf

Copy the link above and paste it into your browser address bar.

We look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

________________
Program Supervisor
The Online Fourth Way School"

Then I had time to listen to the rest of the interview and needless to say, I have changed my mind about joining. I think the C's with Laura and the gang's help are much more on the mark and I have to provide my own motivation without any outside help (with regards to motivation). After all, it IS my own soul I am growing!! I was really shocked by WPP's remarks about history and Putin and Hilary Clinton to say the least. I thought' "how could someone so "enlightened" be taken in by MSM's reading of the situation?" I mean, when you take away the rhetoric and the emotions, etc and study just the verifiable facts, I believe it seems very obvious what is really happening in the world. I thought he seemed very New Age-y in this interview and was completely turned off. But, for obvious reasons, I'm really glad I listened to the rest of the interview. It was a lesson for sure!! A very belated and sincere thank you to Niall and Joe for the shows!!

 

[Meg]

Then I had time to listen to the rest of the interview and needless to say, I have changed my mind about joining. I think the C's with Laura and the gang's help are much more on the mark and I have to provide my own motivation without any outside help (with regards to motivation). After all, it IS my own soul I am growing!! I was really shocked by WPP's remarks about history and Putin and Hilary Clinton to say the least. I thought' "how could someone so "enlightened" be taken in by MSM's reading of the situation?" I mean, when you take away the rhetoric and the emotions, etc and study just the verifiable facts, I believe it seems very obvious what is really happening in the world. I thought he seemed very New Age-y in this interview and was completely turned off. But, for obvious reasons, I'm really glad I listened to the rest of the interview. It was a lesson for sure!! A very belated and sincere thank you to Niall and Joe for the shows!!

Agreed. Having a ton of knowledgeable about Gurdjieff doesn't seem to have helped him much. I'm glad to hear you changed your mind about joining WPP's group and that you found some motivation within. :)

 

[Eboard10]

Then I had time to listen to the rest of the interview and needless to say, I have changed my mind about joining. I think the C's with Laura and the gang's help are much more on the mark and I have to provide my own motivation without any outside help (with regards to motivation). After all, it IS my own soul I am growing!! I was really shocked by WPP's remarks about history and Putin and Hilary Clinton to say the least. I thought' "how could someone so "enlightened" be taken in by MSM's reading of the situation?" I mean, when you take away the rhetoric and the emotions, etc and study just the verifiable facts, I believe it seems very obvious what is really happening in the world. I thought he seemed very New Age-y in this interview and was completely turned off. But, for obvious reasons, I'm really glad I listened to the rest of the interview. It was a lesson for sure!! A very belated and sincere thank you to Niall and Joe for the shows!!

Agreed. Having a ton of knowledgeable about Gurdjieff doesn't seem to have helped him much. I'm glad to hear you changed your mind about joining WPP's group and that you found some motivation within. :)

Second that! That last interview with WPP made me realise that having all that knowledge about the Self doesn't really make you more enlightened if you just keep it theoretical and don't apply it to your every day life and to understand things around you. I think it really comes down to what the Cs were saying about the need to use the information gathered and network which then leads to awareness. In the end, having all that knowledge but not applying it is the same as having no knowledge at all.

 

[Keyhole]

Second that! That last interview with WPP made me realise that having all that knowledge about the Self doesn't really make you more enlightened if you just keep it theoretical and don't apply it to your every day life and to understand things around you. I think it really comes down to what the Cs were saying about the need to use the information gathered and network which then leads to awareness. In the end, having all that knowledge but not applying it is the same as having no knowledge at all.

Could be wrong, but I would say that having a large amount of knowledge and not applying it is actually worse than having none at all. Simply because a certain level of knowledge brings with it a certain level of individual responsibility. If you theoretically understand what you should do, and then choose not to actually Do it, then you could say that this is consciously making the choice to align yourself with sleep/Non-being/STS.

 

[Meechel17]

Second that! That last interview with WPP made me realise that having all that knowledge about the Self doesn't really make you more enlightened if you just keep it theoretical and don't apply it to your every day life and to understand things around you. I think it really comes down to what the Cs were saying about the need to use the information gathered and network which then leads to awareness. In the end, having all that knowledge but not applying it is the same as having no knowledge at all.

Could be wrong, but I would say that having a large amount of knowledge and not applying it is actually worse than having none at all. Simply because a certain level of knowledge brings with it a certain level of individual responsibility. If you theoretically understand what you should do, and then choose not to actually Do it, then you could say that this is consciously making the choice to align yourself with sleep/Non-being/STS.

Good point, Keyhole, I think you're absolutely right!!! Makes one shiver when you look at yourself and see complacency. Good motivational thought

 

[Turgon]

Second that! That last interview with WPP made me realise that having all that knowledge about the Self doesn't really make you more enlightened if you just keep it theoretical and don't apply it to your every day life and to understand things around you. I think it really comes down to what the Cs were saying about the need to use the information gathered and network which then leads to awareness. In the end, having all that knowledge but not applying it is the same as having no knowledge at all.

Could be wrong, but I would say that having a large amount of knowledge and not applying it is actually worse than having none at all. Simply because a certain level of knowledge brings with it a certain level of individual responsibility. If you theoretically understand what you should do, and then choose not to actually Do it, then you could say that this is consciously making the choice to align yourself with sleep/Non-being/STS.

Considering the C's have said that application is knowledge, you could say if WPP hasn't applied it, he isn't a very knowledgeable person. But from what I remember from the interview, it sounded like he was self-focused on the body, his ideas of the Work and Gurdjieff, so he wasn't that interested in what was going on in the world around him, which does sound a lot like non-being.

 

[striveforselflessness]

I thought Patterson in this show and the first part was more impressive than in Eating the I, Patterson's autobiography which is the only one I read from him so far. Yet still the the disinterest in history/world events (through which we can glimpse the real world, much like smaller-scale interpersonal dynamics), and the "Of course!" were eyebrow-raising.

His example of what it feels like to have a 'complete sensation' of oneself was reminiscent of his book, had a more dreamy 'flavor' to it than anything (seems 'deep' but in a navel-gazing way as explicated here - how much is really learned by it?). Not being there but recognizing he is not there, I guess a reference to material/metaphysical duality - actually makes me think of recent discussions on theosophy, people forgetting that they are in a body. I'm not saying that's right or wrong, I am not as familiar with the concepts. But it may or may not be quite consistent with Gurdjieff.

All that said his understanding of self-observation reminds me a little of Ogden, Levine, etc. in some respects. The link between identification and the narcissistic drives behind little i's became more clear to me for a second there, when he gave the example people associating others with aspects of themselves (which could easily lead to acting out narcissistic dramas). It was like a click in my mind, calling back to last year. I know that should be clear but I have a tendency to forget basic things when it's been as little as a few months (all my little i's have gone through too many mechanical/reactive experiences in the meantime, I would guess).

It is clear, when he says "what is the next step ... join the teaching," the audience are an "abstraction," the hosts are not on the road because they said they are "not awake," he was certainly referring to the hosts, and he only realized his mistake after he left and the hosts mentioned they do have a group and weren't forthcoming. That said Patterson seems like a nice person, albeit with a slight preference for new age/has an eastern religious bent to his understanding, unfamiliar with the work at sott/cass as mentioned, and not likely to purposefully seek to offend, which was all the reason for his apology.

In any case the sott podcast linked on page 4 (also on youtube) from years ago blew me away. I have much to learn, as always.

 

[Voyageur]

I still receive emails from Patterson's website and one came the other day stating:

William Patrick Patterson set out on a spiritual pilgrimage to Gyumri, Armenia, to visit, as Mr. Gurdjieff asked, the grave of his father, Ashokh Adash. Finding the grave in disrepair, Patterson had it beautified. However, within weeks the gravesite was desecrated, its prayer plaques removed, and so it remains today {it was recently checked again}.

Narrated and directed by Mary Ellen Korman, author of A Woman's Work with Gurdjieff, Ramana Maharshi, Krishnamurti, Anandamayi Ma & Pak Subuh.

Video < 6min.

http://<iframe width="853" height="...Sw" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

While looking something else up I had also come across a reference to G in terms of people who his books represented great importance. Of this, the name Steve Jobs is brought up and a list of his top 14 books. On the list was Meetings with Remarkable Men. http://time.com/4125709/books-inspired-steve-jobs/

Here is a picture of Ashokh Adash.

 

[Deleted member 11729]

Sunday November 30th, 2014: Remembering Georges Gurdjieff - Interview with William Patrick Patterson, part 2

This week on SOTT Talk Radio we were joined again by William Patrick Patterson. Listeners can hear the first part of our interview with Mr. Patterson here. After many years as a student of The Fourth Way and discovering no answer to the question that had gradually formed in him—what is the 'self' in self-remembering?

Mr. Patterson is the founder/director of The Gurdjieff Studies Program and has led groups, as well as given seminars and talks, throughout the United States for many years. He has written nine books on the teaching, including Struggle of the Magicians, and has directed, written and narrated the award-winning video trilogy The Life & Significance of George Ivanovitch Gurdjieff, and the just-released video Introduction to Gurdjieff's Fourth Way: From Selves to Individual Self to The Self. Mr. Patterson's latest book is Georgi Ivanovitch Gurdjieff: The Man, The Teaching, His Mission.

Just listening this interview ... and at about 1:00:36 interesting part starts about Laura been dreaming ( and Peterson said channeling ) G., and actually answering on Peterson question who is teaching her G. teachings, she answered G. by himself ( with a certain modulation of her voice like, don't really want to talk about that much ) ... so just was wandering to ask is there a more info about that experience? Thanks.

 

[Palinurus]

so just was wandering to ask is there a more info about that experience?

Hi solarmind,

I'm not sure the following would be the only instant where something like what you asked for has been shared, but this topic is very revealing IMO: The Cs and Gurdjieff, especially Reply #17 by Laura.

Here's a snippet from that post but you'll need to read the topic as a whole for context:

I like talking about Gurdjieff. Heck, I love him. After we had been working with groups for a few years, I went back and started re-reading ISOTM. It was actually on the train to Paris and I opened it at a random page which happened to be Chapter 11... Anyway, this second reading (in the intervening years I was reading a lot of other stuff) was SUCH a revelation. I could see that he had experienced the same dynamics with people that we faced daily, and I could "be" (small b) inside his skin.

So, we scanned the book, converted it to a file, and I started doing text searches for key words and assembling topical excerpts. I found that almost every time a problem came up in QFS, Gurdjieff had some experience and had given very wise advice.

Later, I even had dreams about him giving me comfort and advice when I faced a difficult situation that required careful handling. He also gave me courage to be firm when needed. I also realized, in a startling way, based on his description and experiences, that what we were doing - what the whole Cs thing was about - was a 4th Way work. Our aim is not exactly the same as his - but it is close.

You could try to use the search function to find more, or others might chime in with more details from elsewhere.

Hope this helps a bit. :)

 

[Deleted member 11729]

so just was wandering to ask is there a more info about that experience?

Hi solarmind,

I'm not sure the following would be the only instant where something like what you asked for has been shared, but this topic is very revealing IMO: The Cs and Gurdjieff, especially Reply #17 by Laura.

thank you Palinurus!