You can only imagine yourself to be a ‘somebody’
when you compare yourself to others those
that are thought of as being more or less smart,
tall, rich, knowledgeable, talented, loving, strong
etc. Your biggest DISLIKE is appearing deficient,
a ‘nobody’.
That is why what you LIKE most is your own
thinking, whereby and only whereby you can
maintain a picture of being a ‘somebody’.
There is not one thought that passes through you
that you cannot but put a question mark beside.
You can only really think, when you are relaxed. You can think clearly only when you’re not in anxiety, not afraid! But if all your life and everything around you says ’danger danger danger’, and you’ve already learnt a few tricks of how to survive in it - can that change?
Thinking from the Work and thinking from life - are two very different things. To really know the difference you have to experience the results of Work effort. In life we have a lot of habits, and make sort of mechanical efforts. We must have some observation of that, of what generally moves us, and what the results are.
But you must also experience the results that come from another kind of activity - what is referred to in the Work as ‘conscious effort’. It’s useful to think deeply about this. You have made certain Work efforts, and if they were made with sincerity, you should by now have the ‘taste’.
One is an effort in Being - the other is effort in everything else!
YOU CAN’T THINK - IT’S A TOTAL ILLUSION !
That goes for our usual thinking, yeah. It’s emphasized in the Work that: ”the only thing you can really call thinking, is ’thinking from anidea’.” That could take ten lifetimes for it to become clear to you, but it’s the absolute truth. You can’t really think without basic Work ideas. All the rest is random associations, mixed with... everything!
Many Work People have put in their blood, sweat and tears, working for YOU! What Gurfjieff didn’t have to go through. What energy and effort to experience, and then write what he did. What Nicoll and Ouspensky didn’t go through. What thousands of hours of activity and struggle and work.
People throughout the ages have been making incredible efforts. They’ve learned through others, then worked to keep the truth ALIVE. Because, if it dies completely, this world would dissolve.
Someone recently used the word ’initiative’. Don’t take your vocabulary too for granted. ’Initiation’ in the Work - is Self-Initiation. A foot soldier, who has initiative, does his job. He doesn’t resent the position of the General or the Corporal or the Sargent or the person who’s in charge of the kitchen. That would be egomaniacal bulshit! Initiative has to be intelligent and comprehensive.
Life is short and your soul is much bigger than this life. Being here was meant to benefit your soul.
’WORKING FOR LIFE AND WORKING FOR DEATH IS THE SAME THING’
A Higher Neutralizing Force
sets things right !
The Work is aiming at self-knowledge, self-remembering, presence! The usual movements, within the body, the emotions, the mind, with the money, the family, with the this and that - are all disconnected pieces! A lot of irritation and a lot of frustration and a lot of everything which we call ‘life’. And that is happening at a particular energy level - full of anxiety, for instance.
Work is aimed at deepening your sense of yourself, to a place that it is more real. To get you back to what is called ‘Real I’, which, it is said, is just behind ‘Observing I’. Yeah! From Real I, there’s a different vibration, a different level of laws functioning!
Look what The Work has to face! Everyone wants to feel better, to be happy. People want to be stronger - but from their natural conditioning they see that, basically, only as being stronger in ‘life’. Getting what you want, more, increasing! Becoming more clever, more popular, more rich, more admired, whatever. That’s ‘happy’ from a ‘life’ point of view. But, it’s not stable, it’s not reliable!
There is something really reliable - but it’s in a totally different direction. You can’t be busy trying to be ‘somebody’ and at the same time be a true ‘something’ - your Essential Self!
"THERE IS NO CREDIT IN THE WORK."
You are not given credit for what you 'want'. Credit for an, as yet, unsuccessful (incomplete) effort would be a sin.
The prize is yours when you have it, not before.