Sorrow, Comon Father and Paying For Our Arising

[LIMIT]

This thread has been created from an initial discussion in Session 12 December 2010 « Reply #339 on: Yesterday at 04:30:02 PM »

I hope for a discussion on this as it may help me straighten out come elbows in my thinking and provide food for thought to others. May I just apologise for the abnormal quote format, but this is the best? I could do moving rom one thread to another. It starts:

“Thank you Endymion for this. I'd just like to dwell on this particular segment of your quote form Mr Gurdjieff.”

The fourth is the striving from the beginning of our existence to pay for our arising and our individuality as quickly as possible, in order afterwards to be free to lighten as much as possible the SORROW OF OUR COMMON FATHER.

Re: Session 12 December 2010
« Reply #342 on: Yesterday at 09:41:58 PM »

from: LIMIT on Yesterday at 04:30:02 PM
“One: pay for our arising.
Eye am not aware of any contract to pay for my arising. To my mind, any arising that has and is occurring to me, is due to the loving guidance of an infinite current which i do not comprehend, but of which i am now aware, that i have made my choice to align with the creative names of DCM.”

quote from Approaching Infinity
“Perhaps this, from the "first initiation" will clarify:”
“Your attitude toward the world and toward life is the attitude of one who has the right to make demands and to take, who has no need to pay or to earn. You believe that all things are your due, simply because it is you! All your blindness is there!”

Yes, but my attitude is changed from this – also it describes the attitude of one who is either an automatism or one who has dedicated themselves to STS alignment. From my perspective it has no relevance except in a past tense. But your response still does not address the idea that there is some kind of 'payment' for our arising which i have yet to understand as something which i am responsible for. How can an automatism be responsible for its own creation?

from LIMIT
“Two: Sorrow.
Sorrow belongs to the same vibratory construct as joy. They are opposites on a continuous scale of sensation. Perhaps Mr Gurdjieff was referring to the state of a limited point of DCM's awareness (which we each are) aligning itself to the illusion of ego and worship of physicality. That is, service to self - as opposed to the infinite joy of preparing oneself and channelling the creative forces that currently project us into 3rd density. That is, service to others.”

quote from Approaching Infinity
“STO is founded in Conscience. Can you think of how sorrow might relate to conscience?”

I am unable to find the Cassiopaean glossary but i would be interested to see what it says regarding conscience. The only idea i have come up with so far is that conscience is an attribute of awareness, and that there is nothing REAL except awareness, that is, the awareness of DCM.

from LIMIT
“Three. Our common father.
That we share a common creator there is no doubt. But to infer that our creator is male is mere patriarchal thinking. What of our common mother? To ascribe gender to the Absolute Void is misleading to say the least. We know that Absolute is intelligent (mind), is self congruent (love), and embodies identity (self). We know that each of us is a unit of its awareness, and that in that sense limited. We also know that these points of limit are infinite in terms of themselves, as a microcosmic models of the macrocosm – As above, so below.”

from Approaching Infinity
“I think you've got a point, there. But also consider that Gurdjieff was very precise in his use of gender: masculine/active, feminine/passive, and of course, between mother and father comes the child, or neutralising force. What might our 'common father' represent?”

Mr Gurdjieff was also 'precise' at making things more hard to understand than necessary e.g. “Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson” which is neither easy to read, easy to hold and very difficult to comprehend; which to my mind is not an example of external considering but an example of bad design.

The term “our common father” is a meaningless relic from patriarchal conditioning and to my mind has no relevance in modern cosmology. From my current understanding of cosmology there indeed appear to be the three forces described as positive, negative and neutral, and these may correspond to void, love and identity and other trinities in esoterica. Who knows, they are just models of something greater than us that we try to understand with a language that is imprecise and conditioned by the predator.

In modern cosmology, the idea of a child coming from a union of active and passive is also meaningless, in that all existents are 'dream' states of DCM. We already know that DCM of itself is indivisible, infinite and unknowable in its essence. How then can we reconcile a “common father” as opposed to a common mother or any proposed progeny from these. All existents are points of awareness of the All - the Absolute and Infinite, Self-Congruent Void of no thing coming to itself in awareness as limited foci of awareness or consciousness units – wave reading devices. If we were to have a common parent then DCM is it.

I remain unconvinced that gender comes into the equation and suggest that Mr Gurdjieffs work be read with filters in a similar manner with which we read generally.

I welcome discussion. Thank you all. :)

 

[shijing]

I am unable to find the Cassiopaean glossary but i would be interested to see what it says regarding conscience.

You should be able to find it here.

 

[go2]

But your response still does not address the idea that there is some kind of 'payment' for our arising which i have yet to understand as something which i am responsible for. How can an automatism be responsible for its own creation?

An automaton is not responsible for its own creation, it's creation is automatic. However, the automatism will automatically pay for its arising with its life and death. We have the gift of the possibility to become responsible for the means of payment for our existence.

Mr Gurdjieff was also 'precise' at making things more hard to understand than necessary e.g. “Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson” which is neither easy to read, easy to hold and very difficult to comprehend; which to my mind is not an example of external considering but an example of bad design.

You have to pay to understand the Tales. The payment is attention and patient effort to arrive at the 'gist' of Mr. Gurdjieff's gift to us. The Tales is an external consideration of the Truth, that we are automatons. You will not be transformed by 'easy' reading. It will only feed your automatic imagination.

The term “our common father” is a meaningless relic from patriarchal conditioning and to my mind has no relevance in modern cosmology. From my current understanding of cosmology there indeed appear to be the three forces described as positive, negative and neutral, and these may correspond to void, love and identity and other trinities in esoterica. Who knows, they are just models of something greater than us that we try to understand with a language that is imprecise and conditioned by the predator.

'Our common father' is a precise metaphor, which can be understood by anyone, now and far into the future. Perhaps, your politically correct mind filter is the predator.

 

[Approaching Infinity]

quote from Approaching Infinity
“Perhaps this, from the "first initiation" will clarify:”
“Your attitude toward the world and toward life is the attitude of one who has the right to make demands and to take, who has no need to pay or to earn. You believe that all things are your due, simply because it is you! All your blindness is there!”

Yes, but my attitude is changed from this – also it describes the attitude of one who is either an automatism or one who has dedicated themselves to STS alignment. From my perspective it has no relevance except in a past tense. But your response still does not address the idea that there is some kind of 'payment' for our arising which i have yet to understand as something which i am responsible for. How can an automatism be responsible for its own creation?

Hubris comes before the fall. Are you not STS? Are you not an automaton? As go2 pointed out, you're right on one point, an automaton is not responsible for his or her existence, and their suffering and death is their payment to the universe. But for those who strive to become something more than automatons, it is necessary to pay, to become responsible, to realize that life doesn't exist for us to simply 'enjoy'; it is a school, and a tough one at that. There is no such thing as free lunch.

I am unable to find the Cassiopaean glossary but i would be interested to see what it says regarding conscience. The only idea i have come up with so far is that conscience is an attribute of awareness, and that there is nothing REAL except awareness, that is, the awareness of DCM.

Awareness is too general and applies to too many phenomena. I can be aware of external objects, people, events, pain, sadness, thinking. Conscience is an EMOTIONAL concept. It has to do with empathy and feeling true emotion, the ability to feel what another person feels and to consider them accordingly. Again, how might suffering fit in there?

The term “our common father” is a meaningless relic from patriarchal conditioning and to my mind has no relevance in modern cosmology. From my current understanding of cosmology there indeed appear to be the three forces described as positive, negative and neutral, and these may correspond to void, love and identity and other trinities in esoterica. Who knows, they are just models of something greater than us that we try to understand with a language that is imprecise and conditioned by the predator.

Yeah, they're just models. But what can we learn from them? We are 3D, that is, limited in awareness. At our state we cannot know things in themselves, as they are. There are certain things that can only be approached via analogy, by reading the common essence behind the words or the surface appearances. As above, so below. As such, by observing instances of the three forces in the things of nature, we can come to know something about those things which we can't fully know, as yet. Why is the image of a father and mother any less valid than that between the Sun and the Moon, or any other pair of opposites? The fact that psychopaths have corrupted the idea of "patriarchy" to the degree that they have does not diminish the image and symbol of Father any more than schizoid feminists have diminished the image and symbol of the divine "Feminine", OSIT.

In modern cosmology, the idea of a child coming from a union of active and passive is also meaningless, in that all existents are 'dream' states of DCM. We already know that DCM of itself is indivisible, infinite and unknowable in its essence.

I don't think it's that simple. Have you read the FOTCM statement of principles? If our view of cosmology is anywhere near correct then EVERYTHING is DCM in one of its many aspects. Perhaps 7D is indivisible, but within and from it, there is division. Spirit (active - consciousness) moves on the infinite waters (passive - the ocean of uncreated potential) to give birth to the world (neutralizing - creation). We are the 'child' between two 'parents'. Above is 'father', below is 'mother'. Both are DCM, as are we. The metaphors are malleable. If you view a 4D being as the "child", then passive humanity would be the passive material from which it is born, and the actualizing impulse that comes from above would be positive. Within an individual person, our level of emotional development (neutralizing) lies between our biological/potential substrate (passive) and our active Will, higher self, etc.

Just curious, do you have the same reaction to the term Mother Nature? Should Nature be genderless? Or is the name a reflection of a relationship within DCM that is useful?

 

[LIMIT]

I am unable to find the Cassiopaean glossary but i would be interested to see what it says regarding conscience.

You should be able to find it here.

Thank you Shijing for the link. Now i begin to see the relationship of STO to conscience. :)

An automaton is not responsible for its own creation, it's creation is automatic. However, the automatism will automatically pay for its arising with its life and death. We have the gift of the possibility to become responsible for the means of payment for our existence.

Yes, i see and begin to understand. :)

You have to pay to understand the Tales. The payment is attention and patient effort to arrive at the 'gist' of Mr. Gurdjieff's gift to us. The Tales is an external consideration of the Truth, that we are automatons. You will not be transformed by 'easy' reading. It will only feed your automatic imagination.

I have heard this argument before, but it fails to convince me that Gurdjieff was externally considerate in this matter. But perhaps he thought/knew that those with learning disorders, clumsy hands or other learning impediments had no opportunity to achieve an understanding of his 'tale'. As for 'easy' reading, I have had great insights and comprehension from the works of more considerate authors, e.g. Laura, Mouravieff, Stout, Lobaczewski, Capra, Wilson and al-'Arabi' amongst others. I include films like Tin Man - Beyond Yellow Brick Road, Avatar, and our very well liked Star Wars and The Lord of the Rings. Incidentally, i have read the 'tales' and would like to see it simplified into film for those who are visual learners. Poor book design is poor book design in spite of those overtly identified with Gurdjieff crying out that easy reading is somehow inferior to difficult reading. :(

'Our common father' is a precise metaphor, which can be understood by anyone, now and far into the future. Perhaps, your politically correct mind filter is the predator.

Yes it is likely that my 'politically correct' mind is affected by the predator, given that it lives in an STS world. Also, you may be right about 'Our Common Father' being an enduring metaphor - time will tell. Personally, i remain of the mind that gender has no place in modern cosmology and that patriarchy and matriarchy are impediments to understanding based on objective analysis; i think that they embody the prolongation of confusion and have only a limited place in the Work.

Thank you for your input go2. :)

Thank you also Approaching Infinity, I am working through your helpful input now and will post soon. for now.

 

[Stevie Argyl]

I have heard this argument before, but it fails to convince me that Gurdjieff was externally considerate in this matter. But perhaps he thought/knew that those with learning disorders, clumsy hands or other learning impediments had no opportunity to achieve an understanding of his 'tale'. As for 'easy' reading, I have had great insights and comprehension from the works of more considerate authors, e.g. Laura, Mouravieff, Stout, Lobaczewski, Capra, Wilson and al-'Arabi' amongst others. I include films like Tin Man - Beyond Yellow Brick Road, Avatar, and our very well liked Star Wars and The Lord of the Rings. Incidentally, i have read the 'tales' and would like to see it simplified into film for those who are visual learners. Poor book design is poor book design in spite of those overtly identified with Gurdjieff crying out that easy reading is somehow inferior to difficult reading.

Limit
Have you read Gurdjieffs own explanation of why he wrote the tales in the manner he did?
To bypass our 'false consciousness' , to bypass this imagination that we have of ourselves that we call ourself and to prevent the knowledge just being more food for the formatory mind which takes information and calls it understanding. So his years of writing,testing,re-writing could actually be a demonstration of external consideration.

If you are interested in his explanations you might want to go back and reread the Arousing of Thought and the chapter on Hypnotism were these are discussed.

 

[anart]

Limit
Have you read Gurdjieffs own explanation of why he wrote the tales in the manner he did?
To bypass our 'false consciousness' , to bypass this imagination that we have of ourselves that we call ourself and to prevent the knowledge just being more food for the formatory mind which takes information and calls it understanding. So his years of writing,testing,re-writing could actually be a demonstration of external consideration.

If you are interested in his explanations you might want to go back and reread the Arousing of Thought and the chapter on Hypnotism were these are discussed.

This is true. Also,

Personally, i remain of the mind that gender has no place in modern cosmology and that patriarchy and matriarchy are impediments to understanding based on objective analysis; i think that they embody the prolongation of confusion and have only a limited place in the Work.

It is only an impediment if one makes it an impediment. Such references are metaphorical and quite useful considering the reality of our current environment. Duality (of which one manifestation is male/female) is reality in this environment, thus, such metaphorical references are very useful in order to get higher themes across. Perhaps if you tried to take them less literally, it might help?

 

[Buddy]

LIMIT, FWIW, I agree with Stevie Argyll and anart. Also, I'm a visual learner myself, but I 'see' the physical models as a means to an end - the superficial structures of the more important patterns existing on finer, more subtle levels.

Regarding Gurdjieff's "Tales", I only see lack of external consideration when I view it from inside the boundary of the 'ego' which contains the cultural and linguistic bias' of previous education and conditionings and which also consists of all the concrete models and concepts of duality. However, all these biases - even the 'ego' that contains them, can be recognized as just attachments which prevent the growth of knowledge and being, OSIT.

If you can dissolve the 'ego', or step outside it temporarily, or adopt a more unstructured or formless or flexible approach to the material, you might see "Tales" and Gurdjieff differently.

Think about it from G's point of view. If you going to expend all that thinking and effort in creating that book, you must have something important you want to say, right? Well, if you really - fully - put yourself in the reader's shoes, then you could see all the counter-productive linguistic biases and prejudices that would block your message from being comprehended. What better way would show that you made the effort to understand bias in the reader than to create previously undefined words and concepts that the reader must understand in context with all the rest of the material?

Gurdjieff did indeed, understand his readers in my estimation, and did what he ought to have done to serve his purpose. But it is aggravating to the ego which doesn't want to let go of anything, isn't it?

 

[LIMIT]

quote from Approaching Infinity
“Perhaps this, from the "first initiation" will clarify:”
“Your attitude toward the world and toward life is the attitude of one who has the right to make demands and to take, who has no need to pay or to earn. You believe that all things are your due, simply because it is you! All your blindness is there!”

Yes, but my attitude is changed from this – also it describes the attitude of one who is either an automatism or one who has dedicated themselves to STS alignment. From my perspective it has no relevance except in a past tense. But your response still does not address the idea that there is some kind of 'payment' for our arising which i have yet to understand as something which i am responsible for. How can an automatism be responsible for its own creation?

Hubris comes before the fall. Are you not STS? Are you not an automaton? As go2 pointed out, you're right on one point, an automaton is not responsible for his or her existence, and their suffering and death is their payment to the universe. But for those who strive to become something more than automatons, it is necessary to pay, to become responsible, to realize that life doesn't exist for us to simply 'enjoy'; it is a school, and a tough one at that. There is no such thing as free lunch.

One does not pay for what belongs to oneself except by accepting the lie that one does not own it. A responsive horse has learned to love, trust and accept its rider through the considerate intent of the rider. Love and trust are the natural response to the loving action of higher awareness, not by wildness desiring to be tamed, nor by the ill-intent of a self serving master. Some learning is not easy, i totally agree, but nor is it something I have to purchase the right to have. And there are free lunches. Call them gifts. The responsibility lies in using them for what they are intended.

I am unable to find the Cassiopaean glossary but i would be interested to see what it says regarding conscience. The only idea i have come up with so far is that conscience is an attribute of awareness, and that there is nothing REAL except awareness, that is, the awareness of DCM.

Awareness is too general and applies to too many phenomena. I can be aware of external objects, people, events, pain, sadness, thinking. Conscience is an EMOTIONAL concept. It has to do with empathy and feeling true emotion, the ability to feel what another person feels and to consider them accordingly. Again, how might suffering fit in there?

Awareness being a quality of the Absolute, is absolute. Conscience is an attribute of self awareness and expresses itself ever more subtly as ones self awareness becomes more truly that of DCM. That is, as one opens oneself to that which projects its existence – DCM.
A fragrance does not arise by its own efforts, but by the Nutrition provide by the flower's inherent nature, cosmic forces, and within conditions conducive to the flower's growth. Fragrance brings both sorrow and joy, depending on who or what it interacts with. Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder.
Sorrow comes to one only who has known joy. To one who understands that division is both illusion and reality, sorrow is experienced only by entertaining division. That is, when one is aligned to STS, in which case sorrow of another is the only joy it can know.

The term “our common father” is a meaningless relic from patriarchal conditioning and to my mind has no relevance in modern cosmology. From my current understanding of cosmology there indeed appear to be the three forces described as positive, negative and neutral, and these may correspond to void, love and identity and other trinities in esoterica. Who knows, they are just models of something greater than us that we try to understand with a language that is imprecise and conditioned by the predator.

Yeah, they're just models. But what can we learn from them? We are 3D, that is, limited in awareness. At our state we cannot know things in themselves, as they are. There are certain things that can only be approached via analogy, by reading the common essence behind the words or the surface appearances. As above, so below. As such, by observing instances of the three forces in the things of nature, we can come to know something about those things which we can't fully know, as yet. Why is the image of a father and mother any less valid than that between the Sun and the Moon, or any other pair of opposites? The fact that psychopaths have corrupted the idea of "patriarchy" to the degree that they have does not diminish the image and symbol of Father any more than schizoid feminists have diminished the image and symbol of the divine "Feminine", OSIT.

The disturbing thing about using gender to describe forces that create divisions of sex, is the inevitable suffering of one at the expense of the other. Neither active or passive hold absolute sway in any created or potential thing, due to their dynamic existence under observation by Awareness.
Any man who has known the love of a woman, knows how deeply penetrating and active that love is. Conversely, any woman who has known the love of a man, knows how sensitive and nurturing his love is. Where then is the value of gender in understanding cosmology.
To attribute our beloved planet with passivity and nurturing and attribute the heavens as active and penetrating is to deny their inherent interdependence as a matrix for learning by awareness coming to itself and thereby creating the so called individuated I.
To the heavens the planets are penetrating, to the planets the heavens are passive. Nature inheres in both and the interplay of fragrance ensures awareness comes to itself according to destiny or 'weight' as i currently understand it.
Active, passive, neutral; all three of these dynamic divisions are perspectives and forces of an indivisible Whole, which seems compelled by its very nature to accommodate limit in verifying its condition as All. It appears that this natural production of limit results in limitless thought forms; dreamed up, as it were in the mind stuff of Void.

There is no requirement for knowledge to be difficult, only that it be developed.
There is no requirement for the arbitrary administration of shock from a grandiose sense of 'mission' and lack of psychological knowledge.
Human psychology allows growth of knowledge where ponerised conditions do not exist.
Growth of human knowledge is like the production of fragrance. It is entirely natural and comes about when conditions are right.
True knowledge, like true love, is not transferred by strong words or by physical abuse.
No horse by suffering abuse from from a heartless or ponerised trainer will perform to its optimum.
Scary stories are for slaves and monsters.
DCM draws (no pun intended) us gently, as a caring and loving force of allowance and unobtrusive unity.​

In modern cosmology, the idea of a child coming from a union of active and passive is also meaningless, in that all existents are 'dream' states of DCM. We already know that DCM of itself is indivisible, infinite and unknowable in its essence.

I don't think it's that simple. Have you read the FOTCM statement of principles? If our view of cosmology is anywhere near correct then EVERYTHING is DCM in one of its many aspects. Perhaps 7D is indivisible, but within and from it, there is division. Spirit (active - consciousness) moves on the infinite waters (passive - the ocean of uncreated potential) to give birth to the world (neutralizing - creation). We are the 'child' between two 'parents'. Above is 'father', below is 'mother'. Both are DCM, as are we. The metaphors are malleable. If you view a 4D being as the "child", then passive humanity would be the passive material from which it is born, and the actualizing impulse that comes from above would be positive. Within an individual person, our level of emotional development (neutralizing) lies between our biological/potential substrate (passive) and our active Will, higher self, etc.

And yes I did read the FOTCM statement of principals thank you. However, i do not see how my perception compromises those ideas, except for the very limited use of gender for the education of 'children'. Even then, I shy away from it knowing the damage it has caused in our past.

Just curious, do you have the same reaction to the term Mother Nature? Should Nature be genderless? Or is the name a reflection of a relationship within DCM that is useful?

Yes, I did see in those terms of gender, until my awareness expanded thanks to the efforts of this forum and its founders to provide objective knowledge. I now prefer the ideas of yin/yang/void; passive/active/neutral/; mind/love/identity.

In response to Bud, Anart and Stevie Argyll, there is more than one way to 'skin a cat' or 'bypass an ego'. And there are more ways to suffer and strive than to read incomprehensible books. But networking and honest sharing are essential. Thank you all. You have at least my honesty. :)

 

[Buddy]

In response to Bud, Anart and Stevie Argyll, there is more than one way to 'skin a cat' or 'bypass an ego'. And there are more ways to suffer and strive than to read incomprehensible books.

Gotcha, but FWIW, I didn't find the book incomprehensible. I found it confirming...partly of what I already knew or suspected and partly from what I've learned in the Wave and from personal neuro-science studies.

If all this discussion is coming from this:

The fourth is the striving from the beginning of our existence to pay for our arising and our individuality as quickly as possible, in order afterwards to be free to lighten as much as possible the SORROW OF OUR COMMON FATHER.

...and you have a different interpretation of it based on your external consideration and knowledge of Gurdjieff, then please consider yourself invited to share it.

One interpretation of the above quote could be that we need to get all our mental faculties back by doing whatever Work we can do, as quickly as we can get it done, so that we can choose to Work to help relieve Karmic debt created by our past ancestors who passed on the infection of predator's mind. In this scenario, "our common father" would mean the original source of the limitations that prevent us from jumping on humanity's problems and getting them solved.

But I don't know for sure, so is this basically a discussion of metaphor meanings as you see it, or am I way off?

 

[Psalehesost]

Hubris comes before the fall. Are you not STS? Are you not an automaton? As go2 pointed out, you're right on one point, an automaton is not responsible for his or her existence, and their suffering and death is their payment to the universe. But for those who strive to become something more than automatons, it is necessary to pay, to become responsible, to realize that life doesn't exist for us to simply 'enjoy'; it is a school, and a tough one at that. There is no such thing as free lunch.

One does not pay for what belongs to oneself except by accepting the lie that one does not own it. A responsive horse has learned to love, trust and accept its rider through the considerate intent of the rider. Love and trust are the natural response to the loving action of higher awareness, not by wildness desiring to be tamed, nor by the ill-intent of a self serving master. Some learning is not easy, i totally agree, but nor is it something I have to purchase the right to have. And there are free lunches. Call them gifts. The responsibility lies in using them for what they are intended.

Who are you to own anything? In fact, there is no one to own anything; there is just machinery - there is no "you" at this point, so how can "you" own anything?

There is a great piece from an old journal of Ark in the Wave (online chapter 12e) touching this issue. It can be painful at first to really take seriously, to both think it and feel it and recognize it as completely true.

This part is very significant: I am an energy transformer and a converter. That is the essence of my existence. [...] "What "I" do, that is "I-Personality," is self-will. What acts through me is not self-will. Thus I wish to allow "that which can act through me" that is not self-will. For this end I need to eliminate self-will. [...] What originates in me does not count. The only thing I can do is to allow something more powerful to speak through me. To allow something more knowledgeable to talk to me and through me. To allow something more powerful to act through me. To allow something more powerful to use me. I am just a shell, I am a machine. I am a device. I am a means to an end. I am a possibility for something more powerful to be in me and to act through me. I am a place that waits to be filled. I am a carriage without a driver and without a master. True, there is brain, there are body members, there are senses. But I am just a carriage. With no driver and no master. A personality that pretends to have rights."

Does an empty carriage own anything? Is an empty carriage even a "someone" rather than just a "something"?

As "lower selves", we are only tools - nothing more. Tools either of Being or Non-being, this the only choice.

OSIT.

 

[go2]

The difference between knowledge and understanding becomes clear when we realize the knowledge may be the function of one center. Understanding, however, is the function of three centers. Thus the thinking apparatus may know something. But understanding appears only when a man feels and senses what is connected with it.

LIMIT, it is my impression that you have knowledge, but it feels disembodied. It feels like the knowledge of the thinking center. The thinking center knowledge is enough for the lazy man, but if you wish to connect and balance the three brains, it requires attention and effort beyond the needs of the automatic life. Beelzebub's Tales requires effort of the instinctive-motor, feeling, and thinking centers to transform knowledge into understanding. It takes Work on Being and Knowledge to pay for Understanding. You can find an exploration of the difference between knowledge and understanding in Chapter Four of In Search of the Miraculous.

If you have understanding, gender is not an obstacle to Work. The union of lovers is a delightful metaphor for the Law of Three. By the way, the design of Beelzebub's Tales is an elegant enneagramatic expression of the Law of Three and the Law of Seven of Gurdjieff’s cosmology, perfectly describing the universe and the flow of life within the automatic man and the points of shock necessary to reverse the automatic flow.

“As a result of this conviction of mine which as yet doubtlessly seems to you the fruit of the fantasies of an afflicted mind, I cannot now, as you yourself see, disregard this second consciousness and, compelled by my essence, am obliged to construct the general exposition even of this first chapter of my writings, namely, the chapter which should be the preface for everything further, calculating that it should reach, and in the manner required for my aim “ruffle,” the perceptions accumulated in both these consciousnesses of yours”

LIMIT, you seem “ruffled” by Beelzebub’s Tales. It might be fruitful to ask yourself, “Why am I ‘ruffled’ by Beelzebub's Tales?”

 

[Approaching Infinity]

The difference between knowledge and understanding becomes clear when we realize the knowledge may be the function of one center. Understanding, however, is the function of three centers. Thus the thinking apparatus may know something. But understanding appears only when a man feels and senses what is connected with it.

LIMIT, it is my impression that you have knowledge, but it feels disembodied. It feels like the knowledge of the thinking center. The thinking center knowledge is enough for the lazy man, but if you wish to connect and balance the three brains, it requires attention and effort beyond the needs of the automatic life. Beelzebub's Tales requires effort of the instinctive-motor, feeling, and thinking centers to transform knowledge into understanding. It takes Work on Being and Knowledge to pay for Understanding. You can find an exploration of the difference between knowledge and understanding in Chapter Four of In Search of the Miraculous.

I also detect a hint of the "Pauper's Fallacy". From the Oragean Version:

It is necessary only to state that real situation clearly and definitely in order to be assailed from all sides by the Pauper’s Denial. “Of course we have Free Will,” cry these voices, some shrill and angry, others merely astonished that so obvious a matter can be called into question. And so it is, until they look at it; indeed they are the very protagonists of the Pauper’s Parable. . . . Once there lived a man so disreputably clad and starving that others came to him saying, “Alas, that thou art bereft of all wealth to this extent! For thy bones stick through thy skin and thy cloak is more holes and patches than good wool. Behold now, bestir thyself, for coin is to be had through the efforts thou canst make and with that coin thy dire needs may be remedied.” To which the pauper answered: “Begone, ye fools! Are ye so dull of wit ye cannot see one of great possessions before ye, who needeth not to make an undignified scrambling after thy petty coins? Begone, for here small patience shall reward sophistries and thy twistings of words!” So then those others left him; and not long later his emaciated body was found beside the roadway, a testimony to the starvation he had denied. . . . By this story it is intended to be shown that no poor man can become wealthy, if, in advance of his efforts to do so, he is deluded by the notion that he is already a millionaire. It is the same with Will. Arguments regarding its possible attainment are bootless in the cases of those who confuse it with the delusion of voluntarism; and since they imagine that they already possess it, ipso facto they are prevented from taking the first step toward it. A recognition of importance is the obligatory first step toward strength.

Same with free lunch. Yes, there are gifts. But the attitude with which one receives a gift tells something about the receiver. A person given the gift of life on Earth, of existence, may have the attitude, "Well, gee, thanks God! This body's really fun, look at all the cool things I can do with it!" Or they can struggle to understand the aim and purpose of existence, and perhaps come to the difficult conclusion that life does not exist for the taking. There is responsibility involved. Our function is to be debugging units of the universe, not freeloaders (of course, freeloaders do serve another purpose). And our life will reflect how much willingness we have to pay for our arising. To make up for all the hedonism, false sense of worth, and suffering we have caused others. Only then, once we're free of this (call it karma, perhaps), can we begin the work of further debugging the universe and lightening the load of the evolutionary half of creation. To do that requires conscience, and I think sorrow, and empathizing with the sorrow of others, is a necessary part of that. Seems to me an essential part of what Needleman called 'ontological love'. If we have conscience, how can we not experience sorrow when seeing that through ignorance and slavery humanity is on the brink of being aborted? That people suffer needlessly at the hands of ruthless individuals? I think to not experience sorrow in such a situation is self-calming.

'Life is religion. Life experiences reflect how one interacts with God. Those who are asleep are those of little faith in terms of their interaction with the creation. Some people think that the world exists for them to overcome or ignore or shut out. For those individuals, the world will cease. They will become exactly what they give to life. They will become merely a dream in the 'past.' People who pay strict attention to objective reality right and left, become the reality of the 'Future.' '

 

[Stevie Argyl]

Limit

Have you ever considered getting an MP3 version of the Tales of which to my knowledge there are two recordings available? Listening to the tales is quite a different experience to reading them.

 

[Laura]

I also detect a hint of the "Pauper's Fallacy". From the Oragean Version:

It is necessary only to state that real situation clearly and definitely in order to be assailed from all sides by the Pauper’s Denial. “Of course we have Free Will,” cry these voices, some shrill and angry, others merely astonished that so obvious a matter can be called into question. And so it is, until they look at it; indeed they are the very protagonists of the Pauper’s Parable. . . . Once there lived a man so disreputably clad and starving that others came to him saying, “Alas, that thou art bereft of all wealth to this extent! For thy bones stick through thy skin and thy cloak is more holes and patches than good wool. Behold now, bestir thyself, for coin is to be had through the efforts thou canst make and with that coin thy dire needs may be remedied.” To which the pauper answered: “Begone, ye fools! Are ye so dull of wit ye cannot see one of great possessions before ye, who needeth not to make an undignified scrambling after thy petty coins? Begone, for here small patience shall reward sophistries and thy twistings of words!” So then those others left him; and not long later his emaciated body was found beside the roadway, a testimony to the starvation he had denied. . . . By this story it is intended to be shown that no poor man can become wealthy, if, in advance of his efforts to do so, he is deluded by the notion that he is already a millionaire. It is the same with Will. Arguments regarding its possible attainment are bootless in the cases of those who confuse it with the delusion of voluntarism; and since they imagine that they already possess it, ipso facto they are prevented from taking the first step toward it. A recognition of importance is the obligatory first step toward strength.

Same with free lunch. Yes, there are gifts. But the attitude with which one receives a gift tells something about the receiver. A person given the gift of life on Earth, of existence, may have the attitude, "Well, gee, thanks God! This body's really fun, look at all the cool things I can do with it!" Or they can struggle to understand the aim and purpose of existence, and perhaps come to the difficult conclusion that life does not exist for the taking. There is responsibility involved. Our function is to be debugging units of the universe, not freeloaders (of course, freeloaders do serve another purpose). And our life will reflect how much willingness we have to pay for our arising. To make up for all the hedonism, false sense of worth, and suffering we have caused others. Only then, once we're free of this (call it karma, perhaps), can we begin the work of further debugging the universe and lightening the load of the evolutionary half of creation. To do that requires conscience, and I think sorrow, and empathizing with the sorrow of others, is a necessary part of that. Seems to me an essential part of what Needleman called 'ontological love'. If we have conscience, how can we not experience sorrow when seeing that through ignorance and slavery humanity is on the brink of being aborted? That people suffer needlessly at the hands of ruthless individuals? I think to not experience sorrow in such a situation is self-calming.

'Life is religion. Life experiences reflect how one interacts with God. Those who are asleep are those of little faith in terms of their interaction with the creation. Some people think that the world exists for them to overcome or ignore or shut out. For those individuals, the world will cease. They will become exactly what they give to life. They will become merely a dream in the 'past.' People who pay strict attention to objective reality right and left, become the reality of the 'Future.' '

That's it, AI. The Pauper's Fallacy is declaimed loudly in the New Age sewage.

As for why my books might be easier to read, consider what price I have paid for writing them. Gurdjieff certainly paid and learned, eventually, that in order to do what he had to do, he had to protect the ideas. Maybe I'm learning the same lesson the hard way? Though I may be more stubborn? Or stupid, sometimes it's hard to tell which.