Soma

Tools of the Path => Gurdjieff [Public] => Topic started by: Zamurito on December 23, 2007, 10:25:28 AM

Title: Effort and demands
Post by: Zamurito on December 23, 2007, 10:25:28 AM
"Here is something you must bear in mind.  Every effort a man makes increases the demands made upon him.  So long as a man has not made any serious efforts the demands made upon him are very small, but his efforts immediately increase the demands made upon him.  And the greater the efforts that are made, the greater the new demands.

"At this stage people very often make a mistake that is constantly made.  They think that the efforts they have previously made, their former merits, so to speak, give them some kind of rights or advantages, diminish the demands to be made upon them, and constitute as it were an excuse should they not work or should they afterwards  do something wrong.  This, of course, is most profoundly false.  Nothing that a man did yesterday excuses him today.  Quite the reverse, if a man did nothing yesterday, no demands are made upon him today; if he did anything yesterday, it means that he must do more today.  This certainly does not mean that it is better to do nothing.  Whoever does nothing receives nothing.

G. I. Gurdjieff comments to Ouspensky in:
In Search of the Miraculous
P.D. Ouspensky
P. 229-230 
Title: Re: Effort and demands
Post by: Jahn on December 23, 2007, 07:09:13 PM
What a pity, I thought it was the reversed.

(Joke ;D )
Title: Re: Effort and demands
Post by: Michael on December 23, 2007, 09:26:35 PM
as i say to people's horror,

it never gets any easier
Title: Re: Effort and demands
Post by: Jahn on December 23, 2007, 09:53:45 PM
as i say to people's horror,

it never gets any easier

Well regarding "the energetic rule" that Zam quoted, it is exactly that that bothers me.
Title: Re: Effort and demands
Post by: Michael on December 23, 2007, 10:12:06 PM
buckle up viking!
girt thy loins,
the road has been a cruise so far.
now we get into the steep part. ;)
Title: Re: Effort and demands
Post by: Jahn on December 24, 2007, 01:28:50 AM

And
"For whomever that exalt himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted"  Luke 14:11

"But many who are first will be the last, and the last first" Mark 10:31

New King James version
Title: Re: Effort and demands
Post by: kaycee on December 24, 2007, 04:42:43 AM
it never gets any easier

Okay, I agree ... but  :-\

I also find that the adventure and the rewards make that effort less a toil and the demands then become my intention to keep those "AHA" moments coming.

I've discovered that I fell alot into a self generated trap of self-important martyrdom when I allowed myself to believe that I had to struggle through hardship before I could "win". 

Luv, K