Topic: Curious State

[Endless Whisper]

This is from Psychological Commentaries on the Teaching of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky by Maurice Nicoll:


“Tonight I wish to speak about acceptance. Acceptance comes after the work of the uncritical Observing ‘I.’ Self-observation is not acceptance but what self-observation does it to present you with a fuller consciousness of yourself and, through the new material that is has collected in its special memory, you have to come to the question of acceptance that all these things are true of you. There is however a curious state in us all owing to which we do not accept ourselves. It is a curious state because we may know something about ourselves but will not admit it to ourselves. It does not belong to our general estimate if ourselves, to what we accept about ourselves, and one reason for this is that the action of False Personality with its picture of what we pretend we are like prevents this clear insighted acceptance from taking place. This is part of our hypnotic sleep. Here comes in the activity of self-justifying. But at the root of the whole problem lies this question of the hypnotic sleep of Man, which is kept up by buffers. Buffers prevent us from seeing contradictions and so prevent us from awakening from sleep. Buffers replace Real Consciousness. If we had Real Consciousness we would see and feel all sides of ourselves together. Such a state would completely destroy False Personality and all forms of imagination that contribute to its strength.

We would become simpler, nicer. We all have buffers in every part of a centre but do not see them. Buffers take the place of Conscience, of Consciousness. As long as we are well-buffered we get through life fairly easily and have a good sense of our worth. Yet if buffers were suddenly destroyed in us we would go mad. Now it is only through the new memory that forms itself around Observing ‘I’ that we can begin gradually to see contradictions and become simpler. I spoke some time ago about the dark side of us, the side we do not properly admit into our consciousness and both know about and do not. Mr. O. once said: “We see only one half of things.” We have to accept this dark side. It does not seem to correspond to our estimate of ourselves. 

Self-observation is compared, as wel all know, with a ray of light let into our inner darkness. So we gradually find that we are not what we thought or imagined. This is the beginning of self-change. We gradually find the Imaginary ‘I’ does not fit us properly. We are trying to be something that we are not and this produces a psychological inner strain. We do not correspond to ourselves. Here the idea of False Personalit comes in. You say, for example, “Thank God, I am not like that publican.” You may remember the parable. If you say this you are lying to yourself through the action of False personality which always lies to you and always seeks to be superior to others. You are like that publican. You are no better and no worse than that publican.

How can a person gain any peace, any inner balance, if all the time he is saying in so many words, “God I thank thee, I am not like the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican. I fast twice in the week; I give tithes of all that I get”? And imagine, calling in God who is defined as “living and active, and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing even to the dividing of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and quick to discern the thoughts and intents of the heart. (Heb. IV 12.) Whatever we may understand by God, we may be quite sure that we can hide nothing from this supreme force of consciousness and that all our buffers, all our pictures, our pretences, all our inner lies, and everything to do with False personality, all this is nothing but so much dirt.

As we are, we live on one side of a circle. We live in the front or the back. So we cannot walk round the full circle of Being. We only admit part of our being at a time. Mr. O. said we must see both sides together. Because we live in a half-circle of ourselves, and the other half is buffered off and not accepted  in consciousness, we are easily upset.  Do you think there is anything that we can be accused of that is not to some extent true? I cannot believe that a man who has become conscious of the full circle of himself would lose anything save the valueless things of False Personality. Would not this give such a man a greater inner stability? Such a man would no longer have buffers- and let me remind you here that once a buffer is destroyed it can never reform itself. I fancy that such a man would never be rendered useless by anything that was said to him, that might in another man offend his self-love, his vanity, his pride, and produce endless hatreds and recriminations and jealousies."

[Endless Whisper]

There's a reason that 'circles' have always been a very powerful medium in magic. They are a great protector from outside forces which can be harmful. They can also get one to center their centre. But we can also center in, what we're trying to seek out, examine, 'trap' for lack of a better word, and examine. So when dealing with the darker aspects of ourselves, we have to be open to face all of it. But like the quote says, piece by piece, cause no one could probably survive, seeing the whole 'circle' in all its complexities at once. Its like a pie thats been cut up, sliced and diced all over, spread out, and we're getting all of the pieces of the pie back together, so we can examine it, and make it 'whole.'

We may even go so far as to question God at times like these, when we're examining 'the world.' You know, 'the world and why is it the way it is.' But what we're really doing, from within our inner selves, is questioning why 'we are the way we are,' as individuals, in the whole of it all.

When we thing of some of the worst of beings who committed total harm in the world, some names may come to mind. Hitler, Stalin, or the mythological Judas, for example (I almost typed 'examine,' funny that). We see these atrocities and are quick to shun them, and also, say "Im not like that person." Actually, as we all have buddha nature - that spiritual nature within, we still have another nature, which has the capability of being atrocious too. While very few would ever, get to the level of such a being like Hitler, Stalin, Judas, it doesnt mean, that we dont carry something within us, that has some form of nature too, like that. So we have to honestly examine whatever in us, has those elements. If we can do it honestly, and examine the whole 'circle of being,' then such crap within, wont have power over us. If, however, we attempt to live from one side of the circle, then it would only give the 'other side' power over us, through our own denial, through us turning a blind eye at it. And then there is no honest integration, no Jungian individuation. It will sneak up on us. So we have to be honest with ourselves, and it does take centering.

At the end of The Silent Flute, Cord says: "I wish neither to possess nor be possessed." If we continue to attempt to possess anything, we will be possessed by something. That within us which continually attaches, which doesnt know how to let go, eventually that, will possess us. And if we dont wish to be possessed, or at the mercy of another half of ourselves, we have to be willing to accept the whole of ourselves, the whole gamut of the circle. Then, "I no longer covet paradise, more important, I no longer fear hell." Once we let go of desiring paradise, paradise comes, but as we all deny another half of ourselves, in turn we create a hell in lieu of it. We discover the other half, by venturing into hell, our own individual, and the world hell, and examine and find, not where our differences lie between 'myself and others' but our similarities. Then maybe, we can get to a point, we dont judge the judge, somehow. The remedy to suffering, comes with acceptance, the more we can accept others - then we can accept ourselves.

[Endless Whisper]

"Happiness is good for the body, but sorrow strengthens the spirit." ~Bruce Lee