​

 

In addition to the centrality of effort, three additional reasons can be the cause of this silence about Grace. First one is that inner and outer silence is the safest response against the danger of diluting and short-changing the impact of related experiences of a higher kind.[1] Secondly, in contrast to effort’s practicality, one does not have any amount of control over Grace, also little understanding about it. The last additional reason of this silence might be due to implications of a general problem of the human condition; ‘suggestibility’ which makes higher experiences some tricky subject to navigate -hence the following Warning! 

 

According to Gurdjieff ‘suggestibility’ is a human feature that ‘causes them to fall easily under the influence of “mass-hypnosis”,’ leading to various ills that gradually worsens the already unbecoming conditions of Life on Earth.[2] In the Tales through the voice of Beelzebub, Gurdjieff informs more about the workings of those ‘influencers’ who themselves are under influences:

 

And indeed, my boy, at the present time, these three brained beings who please you, must already as separate persons as well as entire large and small groupings, infallibly ‘influence’ or find themselves under ‘influence’ of others.[3]

 

Joseph Azize suggests suggestibility is related with ‘imagination.’[4] Echoing Gurdjieff, Azize notes that ‘imagination’ is a double-edged sword that have a negative character but also can be used as an aid to self-perfecting.[5] That is, ‘imagination’ has constructive possibilities but is also perilous because it can end up in merely self-suggestion, self-calming and self-deception, without producing objective results.

 

Azize also brings forth ‘Ouspensky’s explicit disavowal of trances as “higher sleep”:’[6]

 

Bringing oneself into a trance means creation of imagination in higher emotional centre. And this is a blind alley. ... The idea is to control imagination. If, instead of that, by certain methods, you transform it into imagination in higher emotional centre, you get bliss, happiness, but it is, after all, only sleep on a higher level. [my italics]   

 

Shortly, the Work is anti-trance. However, this anti-trance position does not mean higher experiences are ruled out in the Work cosmology. 

 

In Gurdjieff’s transformed-contemplation exercises ‘which appears to have the intent of an ascending process,’ this problem of ‘“getting off” on the exercise’ is seemed to be overcome by making ‘the exercise seem like shovelling coal!,’ due to structured and constant demands, as Anthony Blake puts it.[7]

 

In a recent dialogue between these two second-generation pupils (Azize via George Adie and Blake via J.G. Bennett) sensation’s indispensability during Quiet Work, as a touchstone of reality, is also highlighted. Blake says:

 

The very important thing about the basic exercises is because it gives you this touchstone of reality. The first thing about sensation is: Well, I can’t actually doubt that here is my hand! And no matter what fancies I have, it’s got to be compared with that for reality, and that really sticks into it. Then you can venture into the unknown, because you have got this kind of touchstone. You know it could be an idea, a feeling, God, the Angels, whatever, it doesn’t matter. You have got that touchstone. Is it like my flesh?[8]

​

Although Ouspensky does not talk about sensation, in the Gurdjieff Work, the efforts to develop an evenly distributed and stable whole-body sensation is an indispensable part of the first step in self-study. Because it establishes an organic contact between our centres. Jean Vaysse in his Towards Awakening writes:

​

The first step in self- study - inner quiet, relaxation, sensation of oneself, and the attempt to remember oneself. … If our aim is eventually to develop a stable presence in ourselves, the sensation of our physical being is an inherent part of this. It is the most concrete and easily controlled part. … In order to know and observe ourselves and to study our body and later to support our work, we need to have this sensation. This calls for a new relationship to come into existence in me: I-conscious of-my sensation. Actually much more than just a new connection is involved. … What we need immediately is a stable sensation; that is, we need to develop a more steady and longer lasting consciousness of our body and its situation.[9]

 

For a ten minutes practice to integrate all three presences of body, heart, and mind (moving, emotional and intellectual centers) please visit:

http://www.innerfrontier.org/Practices/3-Centered%20Presence%20Meditation.htm

​

For other three-centered Quiet Work guidance from Joseph Naft:

http://www.innerfrontier.org/Practices/Meditation.htm

​

​

​

[1] I hereby thank to Prof. David Seamon (Anderson/Bennett/Collin lines) for his excellent formulation.

[2] Gurdjieff, G.I., Life is Real Only Then, When ‘I Am’: All and Everything the Third Series (London: Penguin Arkana, 1978 [1975]) pp. 27

[3] Gurdjieff, G.I., Beelzebub’s Tales to His Grandson: All and Everything the First Series (Oregon: Two Rivers Press, 1993 [1950]) pp. 644.

[4] Joseph Azize. 2015. ‘The Practice of Contemplation in the Work of Gurdjieff,’ International Journal for the Study of New Religions. 6, 2, pp. 153. [hereafter ‘Contemplation’]

[5] Gurdjieff, G.I., Life is Real Only Then, When ‘I Am’: All and Everything the Third Series (London: Penguin Arkana, 1978 [1975]) pp. 132-133; Azize. 2015. ‘Contemplation,’ pp. 153-154.

[6] P.D. Ouspensky, A Further Record (London: Arkana, 1992 [1986]) pp. 127 quoted in Azize. 2015. ‘Contemplation,’ pp. 148.

[7] Anthony Blake, ‘Possible Foundations of Inner Exercises,’ The DuVersity https://www.duversity.org/foundationexercises.htm [accessed 27.02.2021]

[8] Conversation between Anthony Blake and Joseph Azize https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvkxgi2t1JA&t=3315s [accessed 27.02.2021] starting from (54.40)

[9] Jean Vaysse, Towards Awakening (Harper & Row, 1982) pp. 157, 161.

​

​

​