Ouspensky’s tragic mistake

Introduction added in 2019

During the two years since this article was published, a number of readers have posted comments below accusing me of misunderstanding Ouspensky.

To those readers: this article is my reaction to a section of one of Ouspensky’s books which you can read for free at this link:

Self Remembering by Ouspensky from In Search of the Miraculous

To future commenters: before you accuse me of misunderstanding, please follow that link and read that part of Ouspensky’s book. It’s a beautiful piece of writing and it deserves to be read for its own sake. Please notice in particular that the black arrows which appear in the article below are copied from Ouspensky’s book. I didn’t invent them. He did. They are his illustrations of his ideas.

Second note: When I say “beyond the mind” I mean beyond all mental activity of every kind. I’m using those words the way they are used by followers of Indian traditions. Judging from the comments that have been written here by followers of Gurdjieff, “beyond the mind” means something entirely different in Gurdjieff’s teachings.

The Original 2017 Article

P.D. Ouspensky and George Gurdjieff came very close to discovering Ramana’s method of Self-enquiry. They even gave their discovery a similar name: Self-remembering. But their method doesn’t work because they made a tragic mistake.

I mentioned this the other day in passing, but it deserves to be emphasized in a post by itself.

Their mistake was that they tried (or at least Ouspensky did) to be aware simultaneously of objects and of themselves.

This doesn’t work. They were trying to hold onto objects and sink into the Self simultaneously. That’s like a circus acrobat who tries to clutch the trapeze and fall to the net at the same time. Not possible! If you want to fall you must let go.

In order to practice Self-enquiry successfully — in order to drown the mind permanently in the Self — we need to stop paying attention to objects and instead pay attention only to ourselves. We must let go of objects.

Ouspensky’s and Gurdjieff’s followers call their idea “divided attention.” They are still giving themselves this advice today.

For example, Robert Earl Burton, a contemporary Fourth Way teacher, wrote in his book Self-Remembering in 1995:

Divided attention is Self-remembering.

The idea originated with Gurdjieff, who wrote:

There are moments when you become aware not only of what you are doing but also of yourself doing it. You see both ‘I’ and the ‘here’ of ‘I am here’ — both the anger and the ‘I’ that is angry. Call this self-remembering if you like. (Views From the Real World)

Even though the idea originated with Gurdjieff I call it Ouspensky’s tragic mistake because I don’t think Gurdjieff practiced his own teachings. Of the two men, I suspect only Ouspensky practiced them. Therefore I call the mistake tragic for Ouspensky but not Gurdjieff.

Ouspensky explained this idea in his book In Search of the Miraculous: Fragments of an Unknown Teaching. Here’s a link to a free copy of that part of the book.

What a wonderful book title. One of the greatest titles of all time. Such a briliant mind, such a tragedy.

The short section of the book to which I’ve linked is a magnificent description of the lost-in-thought state, probably the best ever written. In my opinion, this section is one of the most important pieces of spiritual writing of all time. Everyone talks about waking up spiritually but almost nobody explains the sense in which we are asleep. What is it we are trying to wake from? In what sense is our ordinary state “sleep”? Ouspensky answered these questions with extraordinary clarity and accuracy.

Ouspensky said our attention is almost always directed exclusively outward toward objects. He illustrated this with a single-headed arrow. The arrow represents our attention. It points to objects (to things of which we are aware other than ourselves).

We are on the left; the things we see are on the right.

I copied that arrow from Ouspensky’s book. It’s his diagram of the ordinary state, which I call the lost-in-thought state.

Ouspensky said we should replace this arrow with one that points to both objects and ourself. In other words, we should pay attention to both simultaneously. We should divide our attention between them.

Once again, I copied that arrow from Ouspensky’s book. It’s his diagram of the advice he gave people. The arrow is Ouspensky’s own illustration of his teaching. I didn’t invent it. He did.

What he should have said, but didn’t, is that we should turn the first arrow around so it points only at ourselves. If he had done this, he would have discovered Ramana’s method of Self-enquiry instead of the Gurdjieff-Ouspensky method of Self-remembering. But he didn’t.

The red arrow is my picture, not Ouspensky’s. It represents Ramana’s teaching. In Ramana’s method, attention is not divided. It points only one way: towards ourself.

After showing the two black arrows in his book, Ouspensky wrote:

Having defined this I saw that the problem consisted in directing attention on oneself without weakening or obliterating the attention directed on something else.

Arghhhh! No, Peter, that’s not the problem. The problem is that you are trying to do the impossible by holding onto objects and sinking into the Self simultaneously. You’re like a circus acrobat who tries to grasp the trapeze and fall to the net at the same time. It doesn’t work that way!

To see what Ramana Maharshi thought about this, read this very nice article by Michael James. I linked to this same article a few days ago. It could be extremely helpful for many people.

24 thoughts to “Ouspensky’s tragic mistake”

    1. Are these 2 different things? Gergy of claims that the spirit, actually there are 2 higher being bodies as it were, our material objects just like the rest of the universe. He seems to claim that the physical body is the birthplace or perhaps a placenta of the higher being bodies. He seems to be instructing us to hang on to the reality of the physical world so that we don’t just make up pretty stories and delightful fantasies that are indeed comforting but nonetheless not shared with reality. That appears to be the reason why the viewer must look at their body as well as their activity as CO occurring at the same time period the thing that is viewing the body is not the spirit, it appears to be some mechanism inside that we can turn on just like we can look at our hand. The actual spiritual being, assuming we have such, cannot see itselfe. This gergy have stated pretty clearly according to records from his students. The other method being recommended here, is different. It unhinges or unhooks or and anchors the meditator from the burdens of the physical body. I personally don’t want know where this leads, I have tried it kotla and have found so far a good feeling, and inner card of sorts. I’m not sure I have gotten anything else yet.

    1. I’m an American in New York. “Yam” is a pseudonym. I chose the name as a joking way to say “I am.” Later, when it was too late, I realized nobody would get the joke and I was going to mislead everybody into thinking I’m Chinese. Am I the only person here old enough to remember this:

      1. Dear Freddie,
        My very naive 2 cents to this is: Gurdjieff’s method – divided attention is the possibility only after one achieves the other stages such as self remembering, non identification etc. and not as the primary step towards enlightenment.
        Ramana Maharshi said the same thing but he didn’t address his audience in scientific way. Most Indian teachings are esoteric in nature, except Osho of course. But once you reach Samadhi, you don’t need no guidance, so, esoteric but never incomplete. Just like the Buddha said, there will be no pain after enlightenment, but never said anything like bliss, God etc.
        If you refer Upanishads, they also talk about the consciousness as 2 birds sitting on 2 branches – the concept resembles G’s divided attention.
        Maybe I am wrong, but I see, theory does matter to get the thirsty to the river and once water is seen, who cares for steps to drink it.

  1. Thank you Freddie for this thought-provoking article (pun very much intended 😉

    As I read it I was wondering if Ouspensky’s view (dividing the attention between self and object) and yours (attention only on the self) is meant for different situations? Ouspensky seemed to be talking about situations in which we interact with the external world (e.g. taking a walk, or having dinner, talking to my dog etc.). If our attention is only on the self during such interactions, how can we possibly function coherently in the external world? Is it even possible? Do self-realised people do this all the time? Your view seems to be relevant more when we are meditating with this purpose alone (i.e. when you are deliberately NOT attentive on external objects).

    1. Hi Moksha. Your comment on realization.org got forwarded to me but I’m glad you tracked me down here. I’ll try to respond to your questions as exactly as I can. But first I want to say two other things.

      First, the method you call my method is not my method. It’s Ramana Maharshi’s method. However, I practiced it and can testify from my own experience that the main thing that Ramana said about it is true, namely, if you focus all your attention on “I”, the “I” sinks into its source. That’s the basic idea. The basic idea is not a situation. The basic idea is a mechanism. The basic idea is, “If you do this particular thing, something unbelievably wonderful happens.”

      Second, both these methods are being taught to achieve enlightenment. In both cases, the teachers are saying, “Do this in order to become enlightened.”

      If a teaching can’t do that — if one of these teachings cannot help a person become enlightened — wouldn’t it be a waste of time to practice it in any situation?

      Now for your question about situations. Ramana’s method can be practiced in different ways. When you practice it very intensely, you can’t do anything else. In fact that practice can put you into samadhi (deep meditative states) and then you really can’t do anything else. But Ramana’s method can also be practiced in a less intense way during daily activities.

      Ouspensky presents his method as something to be practiced during daily life, but I don’t believe that his method is a practical one. In my opinion, his method is an attempt to use the mind in an unnatural way and the mind rebels. All this method can do is make the mind tired.

      Please note that in Ouspensky’s famous description of his attempt to practice his method while walking through St. Petersburg, his attempt is unsuccessful.

      When I say “unsuccessful”, I don’t mean that it doesn’t achieve the desired result. I mean that he isn’t able to do the practice.

      Enlightenment cannot be reached through any use of the mind. We have to go beyond the mind. The Ouspensky-Gurdjieff method does not go beyond the mind.

      The Ouspensky-Gurdjieff method cannot go beyond the mind because the attention keeps holding onto external objects. It’s the mind that sees external objects. As long as the attention stays on external objects, the mind is being kept activated.

      Ramana’s method makes the “I” sink into the Beyond-the-Mind. This can happen with Ramana’s method because the attention lets go of the mind’s objects.

      You also asked, “Do self-realised people do this all the time?” No. This is a practice that can help lead a person to Self-realization. But Self-realized people don’t do this.

      You also asked, “If our attention is only on the self during such interactions, how can we possibly function coherently in the external world? Is it even possible?”

      For the answer to that question, and deeper answers to your other questions, I recommend this book to you:
      No Mind — I Am the Self by David Godman.

      1. Hi Freddie,

        Thanks for explaining this in a simple and clear manner. Having read your other articles as well, I believe I understand what you are saying. Sorry for replying a little late – I was on a holiday. However during this time I also got around to buying and reading the book you recommended (thank you).

        So as I understand it, the key to this method is the focus on the ‘I’ instead of external objects (by which I assume you to be also including internal phenomena such as breath, thoughts etc.).

        I was thinking about this in the last month since reading your response, and it seems to me that:
        – Fundamental is placing the attention consistently on something for a particular period of time. This leads to increased awareness.
        – The placing of attention seems to be in two forms – any object (internal and external), or directly on the perceiver or the ‘I’. I have seen these two forms also being called meditation with seed (i.e any object), and meditation without seed. The former method has endless variations but the same common pattern. The latter method is a ‘non-method’ making it also hard to describe.

        So now on to my questions, if you would be kind enough to answer them 🙂

        1. Do you recommend ordinary people start directly with ‘focusing on the I’ techique? It seems to be very difficult to do this without first acheving a certain level of concentration done with objects.

        2. I’d like your take on Kriya yoga techniques vs. the Ramana technique.
        Specifically the techniques that focus on raising the kundalini (e.g. SRF foundation, Sadhguru Isha yoga etc.). It seems to me that the raising of the kundalini achieves the same result, but in a more step-by-step manner as the different energy centers (or chakras ) are ‘opened’ and the self is realised. It usually starts with the spinal breathing method, or third eye meditation and then proceeds from there. Perhaps there is more achieved in this method, but I don’t understand it fully.

        3. What would be the difference between a person realising the self using the Ramana method vs. one who used the Kriya yoga techniques? Are there different ‘degrees’ of self-realisation that is achieved ? Words are failing me here, but I hope you get the gist of my query. (p.s. I have also read your article on your attempt to raise your kundalini too).

        Look forward to your response.

        1. Hi Moksha,

          You wrote, “Fundamental is placing the attention consistently on something for a particular period of time. This leads to increased awareness.”

          Placing attention on something does not create awareness. All that happens is that the mind focuses on something. Awareness is entirely different from placing attention on something. You cannot create awareness by focusing the mind on something because awareness is not a function of the mind. In fact usually when you focus the attention on something, awareness lessens. This is why people become lost in thought (relatively unconscious) when they think.

          Awareness has to be discovered and cultivated directly, not as a byproduct of something you do with the mind. You cannot notice it as a result of mental activity because it is not produced by mental activity.

          What I just said is the subject of my article on the home page on this website, How to Stop Thoughts. Despite the title of that article, it isn’t really about stopping thoughts. It’s about how to discover awareness so you can begin to increase it.

          I suggest reading that article. You might also want to read Susan Blackmore’s article Am I Conscious Now? which is reproduced on realization.org.

          You asked, “1. Do you recommend ordinary people start directly with ‘focusing on the I’ techique?”

          No, I recommend that people start either by noticing what it means to be conscious or by abiding in love. Both consciousness and love are beyond the mind. You have to get some sort of toehold beyond the mind before you really begin on the spiritual path. Finding or noticing something beyond the mind is the first step. Until that happens, sadhana is just an ineffectual mental activity.

          For many people, consciousness is an easier starting point than love. For those people, I recommend that they start by noticing that they are normally unconscious (lost in thought). Once they notice this, they can begin to strive to become more conscious. Once they know what it feels like to be conscious, then and only then can they benefit from focusing on “I”. If they try to focus on “I” before they know what it means to be conscious, before they can strive to be conscious, it will be a purely mental activity and it will be a waste of time.

          You asked, “2. I’d like your take on Kriya yoga techniques vs. the Ramana technique.
          Specifically the techniques that focus on raising the kundalini (e.g. SRF foundation, Sadhguru Isha yoga etc.).”

          I think Kundalini yoga is useful but I don’t think it’s a substitute for the Ramana technique. I’m basing this answer on my personal experience with both.

          My Kundalini became active in 1998 as a result of deliberate yoga practice. This led eventually to wonderful things including the conviction that everything is God and the universe is essentially benevolent. This conviction is a wonderful thing, and some people might call it a kind of enlightenment, but it’s not Self-realization.

          In my opinion energy practices can be helpful and desirable. Consciousness and energy are related. In my experience all spiritual growth has been accompanied by changes in the non-physical body and/or energy fields. Many conscious phenomena have energetic correlates. However, I don’t think Kundalini and consciousness are exactly the same, and I don’t think active Kundalini will necessarily make you conscious, and I don’t think Kundalini is a substitute for the Ramana technique.

          The ultimate goal of the Ramana technique is to make the I-thought sink into the Heart and dissolve there permanently. This is very different from the yoga idea of Kundalini moving up to the crown chakra. Based on my experience I don’t think Kundalini by itself (or any energetic phenomena) can bring about the dissolution of the I-thought in the Heart. For that you need to do what Ramana recommended.

          You asked, “3. What would be the difference between a person realising the self using the Ramana method vs. one who used the Kriya yoga techniques?”

          Ramana defines Self-realization as manonasha, i.e., the permanent destruction of the ego, of the sense of a personal self.

          If you want to get an idea of what it’s like to be in that state, you can read Bernadette Roberts book, “The Experience of No-Self,” or look at photos of Ramana Maharshi’s face.

          In that state of Self-realization, of manonasha, there’s no “me” that wants to impress anybody. There’s no “me” that wants to hire professional photographers to take pictures of “my” face so other people will think “I” am handsome. There’s no “me” that wants money or a big organization or that dresses “myself” up in theatrical costumes so “I” will look impressive. There’s no “me” that plasters the Internet with videos of myself so people will see “me, me, me”.

          A person without an ego does not and cannot care what other people think of “him” or “her” because there is no “him” or “her.”

          One of the main characteristics of the ego is that it cares intensely about what other people think of it. In some people this takes the form of wanting to be famous.

          Without an ego, there can be no desire to be famous.

          You mention Sadhguru. Does he seem to you like somebody who doesn’t have an ego?

          Recognizing that somebody is not Self-realized is often very easy because the ego is usually very obvious and easy to see. It usually demands attention from other people very loudly and shines like a thousand-watt bulb.

          Manonasha is not the only desirable state that can be achieved through spiritual practice. For example, there is a state of knowing at a gut level that everything is God, which I mentioned above. People sometimes use the name “Self-realization” for those states but I do not. I follow Ramana’s example and use the name “Self-realization” only for manonasha, for the state in which the ego no longer exists. The other states are sometimes wonderful, and they sometimes make people charismatic, energetically powerful, loving, generous, etc. However, since these states are not manonasha, people can attain them and still be nasty people. They can even be sociopaths.

          Many spiritual teachers are sociopaths. Being a spiritual teacher is a dream job for sociopaths, therefore sociopaths are attracted to that profession. A person can be enlightened to some degree and be a sociopath, but somebody who is in a state of manonasha cannot be a sociopath because the essence of sociopathy is that the person gratifies his or her ego at the expense of other people.

        2. P.S. I should probably add a few words of warning. Although I think energy yoga and active Kundalini can be good things, I don’t subscribe to the idea of moving large amounts of energy to the head. I think that can be dangerous and I am skeptical whether it leads to any sort of enlightenment. A good friend of mine became psychotic as a result of doing Kundalini yoga, and I think this happened because lots of energy moved to her head. I’m not sure it’s really a good idea to make efforts to open the crown chakra or increase the amount of energy that moves in or out of it. I usually tell people who want to bring energy to the crown, “If I can’t talk you out of it, I urge you to develop the lower part of your body first, particularly the root chakra.”

          I think that when you are energetically open and conscious at the bottom of the body (everything from the heart downward but especially the belly and root and, if you can notice what lies below the root, that-which-is-below-the-root, you are safer and healthier and less likely to suffer ill effects from energy in the head.

          By the way there are many kinds of energy. There is a blue cold kind that moves in sheets through the outside world and through our bodies. I found that very helpful for many years. It sometimes descends from above. When it descends from above it doesn’t enter though a chakra. It can move through any part of the body.

          My girlfriend’s body is surrounded by a vortex of white energy which, on close inspection, is made of millions of tiny silver particles. There was no energy of that kind in or near my body until she “inoculated” me with it.

          Energy stuff is way more complicated than Kundalini moving up and opening chakras.

  2. Your assessment of Ouspensky and Gurdjieff is based on a superficial understanding of their writings. Yet their “work” is essentially an oral transmission, and attempts to bring one to a balanced state between the mind, the feelings and the body.

    We live in the external world, and we must be “conscious” of it. We also have an inner world, and must learn how to be “conscious” of it. We live in two worlds simultaneously, and must become aware of both as they interact.

    Submersion or absorption in the “self” ignores the physical world as a “grounding” or touchstone for seeing the reality of both worlds. Otherwise the “self” is immersed in illusion and fantasy.

    1. Just wondering if you’ve read in search of the miraculous? I believe all your problems with Gurdjieff’s system would be answered if you do. I believe there are many paths to god/consciousness. The method you describe is what Gurdjieff would have referred to as one of the first 3 ways, all of which require the participant to be removed from society. These first 3 methods the way of the yogi, fakir, and the monk are not practical for those of us raising families and having other obligations which require us to continue to be a member of society. I disagree with your assessment that Gurdjieff method cannot go beyond the mind. Through self observation and eventually self remembering his method allows us to connect with the “I” and use that to guide lower mechanical centers of movement, emotion, and thought. Attention is not as you describe divided. Namaste!

      1. Hi Melissa. I think you and I mean different things when we say “go beyond the mind.”

        As for whether I’ve read In Search of the Miraculous — in the article above, to which you’re replying, I cite that book, link to an excerpt from that book, talk about that book, and copy illustrations from the book (the black arrows).

        As for divided attention, the above article links to an excerpt from In Search of the Miraculous in which Ouspensky recommends divided attention. Here’s the link again:

        Self-Remembering

  3. Freddie said: “Their mistake was that they tried (or at least Ouspensky did) to be aware simultaneously of objects and of themselves. This doesn’t work. They were trying to hold onto objects and sink into the Self simultaneously. That’s like a circus acrobat who tries to clutch the trapeze and fall to the net at the same time. Not possible! If you want to fall you must let go.”

    This is a rather narrow and cerebral interpretation of Fourth Way self-observation technique. Too much emphasis is laid on abstract particulars and not enough on organic processes which are integral to self-observation. For one thing the movements and other techniques are important adjuncts. The process itself was never presented in the form of a clinical blueprint of the how-to-do-it-right variety.

    You say “I don’t think Gurdjieff practiced his own teachings.”

    With all due respect, how can you possibly make this off-hand judgment? Close associates such as A.R. Orage, Madame de Hartmann, John G. Bennett and many others who knew Gurdjieff intimately and had a deep understanding of The System took quite a different view.

    1. Hi Aidan. You obviously know more than I do about Fourth Way teachings so let me ask you: Are you saying that I’m mistaken in believing that Self-remembering involves divided attention?

      My main point above is that as a result of attending simultaneously to consciousness and “I” on the one hand, and mental representations on the other, it is very unlikely that a state will arise that destroys vasanas and leads to what is called manonasha and nirvana in the Indian traditions.

      I don’t see anything abstract or conceptual about that main point. The reader can make sense of it only by attempting to match it empirically to his or her own experience, and the truth of it depends on empirical fact, not logic or arguments.

      The arrows in the article are invitations to the reader to try these things and see what happens.

      With all due respect, how can you possibly make this off-hand judgment?

      “Offhand”, yes, but I wouldn’t say “judgment.” It’s a casual opinion which I noticed as I wrote the article and I mentioned it in passing because I thought somebody might find it interesting. This is a blog not a textbook. I try to write interesting things. Maybe that comment was too interesting and it annoyed you. If so, I thank you for your polite, judicious tone. 🙂

      I wasn’t asserting the opinion as a fact. I introduced the statement with the words “I think…” I didn’t argue for it and I wasn’t trying to convince anybody that it’s true.

      With that said, let me answer your question. One of the reasons why I hold this opinion is that I think I know experientially what Gurdjieff was trying to evoke in other people by some of his methods. This makes me think that Gurdjieff knew those states quite well. But I don’t think these methods are likely to evoke these states. This makes me think Gurdjieff got to where he was by some other path.

      I don’t think this is unusual. I think it’s true of many spiritual traditions. I think the traditions are full of methods that are unlikely to get anybody to the state of the people who invented the methods.

  4. Hello Freddie –

    You use the term “self-remembering.” In Gurdjieffian circles the term “self-observation” is usually preferred. There are subtle but important distinctions. Remembering can be construed as defined and task related… at one remove from the more organic process of observation.

    The split you infer between consciousness of “I” on one hand and “mental representations” on the other is a somewhat artificial division in the context of Fourth Way self-observation. In practice the method is composite, organic… drawing as it does on the energies of different centers. It strengthens the foundational “I am”… not just in mind, but in being. No analysis and no judgement is involved, simply the act of observation. The mere process of observing the personality shifts, patterns of desire, internal flaws and weaknesses etc confers self-knowledge in and of itself.

    The practice has something in common with Jesus’ injunction to “watch and pray” and his call to “awaken.” It works against patterns of ingrained identification and the quasi-hypnotic state which G often typifies as “the machine”… conditioned, automatic and unable “to do.” Moreover since it is Fourth Way work it can be practiced in the course of everyday life.

    I would add that the role of conscience is also important since it relates to higher energies that can heighten the force of the practice. G spoke about his work as the vehicle to become a Christian in the fullest sense of that term. In the initial stages higher breakthroughs of this sort may be fleeting, temporary… but with work and consistency it is possible to create the groundwork for a more realized state of being.

    I’m not sure what you mean in your last paragraph when you say that Gurdjieff’s methods “are unlikely to evoke these states” since you don’t clarify what states you are referring to. The System as presented by Ouspensky in his Fourth Way and Tertium Organum lays out in some detail the thinking and practices involved in the work and discusses its results, including related cosmological factors. A number of books detailing the experiences of students of Gurdjieff also provide considerable insight into how the methods work in practice.

    1. Hi Aidan,

      I think our conversation has drifted away from the topic of the article above. This is my fault, not yours, because I asked you a question about Fourth Way teachings in general.

      The article above is about Ouspensky not Fourth Way teachings in general. Maybe I confused things by slapping a prolog on the article which mentions Gurdjieff, Burton, etc. But the meat of the article, its main point, the part that matches the title (“Ouspensky’s Tragic Mistake”) is based on what Ouspensky says in his well-known book In Search of the Miraculous. The article quotes the book and links to an excerpt. The article reprints the black arrows from Ouspensky’s book. Ouspensky drew those arrows. I only copied them. He drew those arrows because they depict his ideas extremely well. Those are his ideas and his arrows. Here’s the link again to the excerpt:

      Self-Remembering

      I think Ouspensky’s writing is extraordinarily clear, and I think my article accurately describes what he wrote.

      Sometimes the forest is more important than the trees, and in this case, it’s Ouspensky himself who is describing the forest. The arrows show the forest, that is to say, they show the main idea, the heart of the matter.

      Ouspensky says in the excerpt that the problem that he is addressing is the fact that most people are unconscious nearly all the time. I agree with him that this is an extremely important problem. I created this website to help people solve that problem. The trouble with Ouspensky’s ideas is that they tend to make that problem worse instead of fixing it.

      The heart of the matter — the forest — is that most people are unconscious nearly all the time, and this problem is caused by getting lost in the mind, and the problem can only be solved by destroying vasanas and looking away from the mind, but Ouspensky mistakenly believes that it can be solved by simultaneously looking at the mind and away from the mind. He’s wrong.

      As soon as a person discovers what it feels like to be conscious and becomes a little bit comfortable in that state, what I just said becomes a visible plain fact. But it cannot be seen until a person reaches that point. It cannot be learned from books or proved or disproved by books.

      Until a person gets to that point, he or she can’t have a meaningful opinion on this question, just as somebody who has never tasted lemongrass cannot know what lemongrass tastes like.

      Nobody can be convinced of this fact — that our unconsciousness is due to mental activity — by words. All words can do is encourage people to make the effort that is required to see for themselves whether the words are true.

      Here’s how Annamalai Swami expressed this fact.

      In the same way, mind is just a self-inflicted area of darkness in which the light of the Self has been deliberately shut out.

      For more about that quote, click here.

      You use the term “self-remembering.” In Gurdjieffian circles the term “self-observation” is usually preferred.

      I used it because of the quotation from Gurdjieff in the article above, which includes the sentence, “Call this self-remembering if you like.” And also because Ouspensky uses the term repeatedly. Incidentally, the rest of that quotation makes clear that Ouspensky’s double-arrow illustrates Gurdjieff’s understanding and not just his own.

  5. Thanks for your considered response Freddie.

    Your use of the term “self-remembering” is not incorrect but mainly refers to a perception, a realization, that a central “I” is lacking. The process of working on changing that divided condition is usually referred in The Work as self-observation (although I do realize there are writers who use “self-remembering” in a process oriented context). So to some degree it is a semantic distinction.

    The functional difference between the two terms is captured in the following comment by Ouspensky:

    “Self-observation brings a man to the realization of the fact that he does not remember himself.”

    Ouspensky’s In Search of the Miraculous rehashes this understanding again and again… for example:

    “Self-study and self-observation. if rightly conducted, brings a man to the realization that something is wrong with his machine and with his functions in their ordinary state. A man realizes that it is precisely because he is asleep that he lives and works in small part of himself… Self-observation brings man to the necessity for self-change.”

    The quotation by G that you reference is similarly a recognition… a point of insight or realization as in “Call this self-remembering if you like.”

    When speaking of Ouspensky’s “tragic mistake” is it very hard to divide the man from Fourth Way teachings because it defined who Ouspensky was. He was the living embodiment of The System. If anything his gravest mistake was to overestimate his level of accomplishment as a teacher. Gurdjieff criticized him harshly on that point, even going so far as to propose that Ouspensky stop teaching altogether and return to his former role of pupil. The difficult relationship between the two is explored in some detail in James Moore’s biography of Gurdjieff.

  6. Are these 2 different things? Gurdjieff claims that the spirit, actually there are 2 higher bodies as it were, are material objects just like the rest of the universe. He seems to claim that the physical body is the birthplace or perhaps a placenta of the higher bodies. He seems to be instructing us to hang on to the reality of the physical world so that we don’t just make up pretty stories and delightful fantasies that are indeed comforting but nonetheless no more than that, not part and parcel of reality, merely subjectve dreams. That appears to be the reason why the viewer must look at their body as well as their activity as CO occurring at the same time. The thing that is viewing the body is not the ‘spirit’ in this line of investigation; it implictly appears to be some mechanism inside that we can put to use, just like we can look at our body with our eyes and touch. In practice I have found that I can listen to myself talk and talk at the same time period I can also look to see the thoughts coming up and tried to see the mechanism that produces the speech all at the same time period it does not appear to be interleaving in my own investigation of my own inner experience. I of course would be intrested in what others observed.
    The actual spiritual being, assuming we have such, cannot see itselfe. This principle Gurdjieff stated pretty clearly according to records from his students. (I myself have tried to discern the color of my eyeball lenses, or the three distinct nerve sources in my own color vision, withou yet prospects of success. Even one step removed to detecting colored lenses after 8 hours is about impossible, though pixels on computer screens are detectable in my experience.) The other method being recommended here, (as given in the blog) is different. It unhinges or unhooks or and anchors the meditator from the burdens of the physical body, like in dreaming. I peesonally do not know where this eventually leads, I have tried it, and have found so far a good feeling, and inner calm of sorts. I’m not sure I have gotten anything else yet.

    1. Are you asking whether Gurdjieff and Ouspensky’s teachings on the one hand, and Ramana’s teachings on the other, are two different things?

      Yes, entirely different.

      People sometimes think that all spiritual teachings aim at the same goal. This isn’t the case.

      Ramana is concerned with Self-realization (liberation, manonasha). Gurjieff and Ouspensky are concerned with other things such as those which you describe here. It’s like comparing a cooking teacher with a piano teacher. They teach different subjects.

      In this article, I tried to show the difference in a simple way.

  7. That is correct. Consciousness or Self looks back at itself while ignoring everything else: objects, thoughts. How else can it recognize it-self, remember it-self, Be it-self? Looking back is another way of saying looking inside instead of outside. The word looking is paramount here. It’s a Shift in the way I sees. literally as well as metaphorically. It takes a lot of practice though..

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