[tmbchr]™

Gurdjieff on the Teacher



Funny how things tie together sometimes. The stuff I’m reading on Gurdjieff has everything to do with what we talked about a few days ago with the “shamanic initiation fantasy“. This is from a page of Gurdjieff’s material.

Perhaps the only positive result of all wanderings in the winding paths and tracks of occult research will be that, if a man preserves the capacity for sound judgment and thought, he will evolve that special faculty of discrimination which can be called flair. […]

And it is here that a man’s flair is more important than anywhere else. He chooses a guide for himself. It is of course an indispensable condition that he choose as a guide a man who knows, or else all meaning of choice is lost. Who can tell where a guide who does not know may lead a man?

Every seeker dreams of a guide who knows, dreams about him but seldom asks himself objectively and sincerely–is he worthy of being guided? Is he ready to follow the way?

Ah, this seems like a real goldmine of highly useful and relevant information. Expect lots more postings on Gurdjieff in the near future. Another really interesting piece:

As has been said before, no one can ascend onto a higher step until he places another man in his own place. What a man is received he must immediately give back; only then can he receive more. Otherwise from him will be taken even what he has already been given.

Sort of like the idea of the Bodhisattva applied to every step of the game. You can’t move forward until somebody else comes up to take your spot. Kinda like a relay race.







3 Reader Responses

  1. David Bruce Hughes Says:
    August 26th, 2005 at 7:09 pm

    Two really excellent points. However, no one can choose a teacher without being deceived. This is the greatest test on the path of knowledge, and it is where the student attains either subsequent success or failure.

    By definition, the student does not know, so how can he recognize the teacher who knows? If one’s knowledge is limited to ordinary states of consciousness, he cannot comprehend a higher state of consciousness. Therefore if he tries to choose a teacher, he will choose one that appeals to his defective, limited knowledge, and thus choose wrongly.

    The solution is to have faith in a higher power, and to pray for a teacher, having faith that God will reveal the actual Teacher from the many false ones. “When the student is ready, the Teacher appears.” Thus the success or failure of the esoteric student is dependent on the purity of his desire and faith.

  2. Tim Boucher Says:
    August 26th, 2005 at 7:48 pm

    But is choosing the wrong teacher always bad for you?

    I dealt with this issue a lot when I dropped out of art school. I decided that college had an artificialness to it that I didn’t want, because you can choose the classroom, and maybe even the teacher, but you can’t choose what you’re going to learn. So why not give up also on choosing the classroom and the teacher as well? Just let them come to you. It seemed like as much of a crapshoot as anything.

    And I’ve been doing that for a while now, I guess. But the negative aspect of it is that it can turn into a kind of aimless floating. Or rather, it feels aimless while it’s happening. But looking back, it’s usually got a pretty consistent direction all on it’s own. But that doesn’t make it feel any better.

    I guess the question I’m asking though is not how do you make it feel better… Or wait, maybe that really is the question I’m asking. Now I’m not sure. Hehe. Oh well. Sorry, I think I just cooked part of my brain.

    I guess where I’m going with this is just what you suggested: to pray and have faith and purify my desire.

  3. alistair Says:
    August 27th, 2005 at 4:31 pm

    but once you begin to pray (i prefer to refer to the process as meditation.) then you open yourself to the same process as the teacher and eventually gain access to “enlightenment” yourself. or certainly become less interested in religion and politics,which is “enlightening”in and of it`sself.



SURROUND YOURSELF WITH STRENGTH.