pulsar, the first time I came across Ouspenski was with his, "The Forth Way."  Although I was impressed with it, I felt it lacked something, which in reality was more likely coming from my own lacking.  I came across his, "In Search of the Miraculous" which I know came before the former, and yet seems to be similar to movies in a way, ie., the first is better than the second.  In otherwords, I loved "In Search of the Miraculous" it was a great book.  He spoke of octaves and this confused me a great deal.  It was not until I studied lokas and the septenary aspect of man that I grasped a bit more understanding of octaves in relation to humanity and the planets and everything else in the universe.  Which is still very incomplete.

He spoke of hydrogens as food, and impressions in sort of the same way.   Higher ideas, or thoughts of a nature more fine, nurture that which we would want to become.  These many (i's) might make themselves known if a person happens to become aware of the fact that he is having many and varied thoughts taking up one's attention.  I'm told I have autonomy over what I direct my attention to.  I am also told I have seven aspects or even nine or twelve.  I usually speak of only seven.  Each one of the seven has seven aspects. 

I want to go on, but I have been home from work three hours and must siht, svhae, and sohewr. 

i love to write arrogant responses when gurdjieff is named so here goes!

Antaeus, in response to the first question of where REAL emotions come from, i think the best question you could ask yourself(s) within a g. paradigm is:

which "i" is manifesting the emotions within me that i feel right now, at this very moment in time?

from what i've experienced, the greatest contribution by g.i.g. was the idea that there are many many multiplural "i"'s within ourselves, moment by moment.  i believe that the denial of REAL emotions, at first, is to help one to buffer the impact of those emotions on our other centers until we can understand where the emotions are coming from and which of our "i"'s is the culprit.  while i agree with montauk about the cold, metallic result of some of the more academic g.i.g. schools (i.e. ouspensky), there are also teachings like The Movements that are designed to truly bring about genuine emotions and PASSIONS (titmouse) through a combination of music, thought, and movement.

i attended several of these retreats in several places and i have to say the feelings and clarity they evoke are stunning.  instead of becoming cold, i found myself crying, emotional and upset many many times.  each time this happened, my fellow Seekers reminded me one way or another to turn my gaze on myself and figure out "who" those emotions belonged to.  i discovered that there were many many "pulsars" and they all reacted differently in different experiential configurations.  i would say that strictly following the teachings written about "The Fourth Way" (ouspensky's phrasing) can be the most devastating impact on your higher emotional development.  if you look into the biographies of g.i.g. and his students (a great one is struggle of the magicians by william patterson, plus others), you may come to see that g.i.g himself was highly emotional!!  he raged at people all the time, he loved greatly, he lived large--drinking alcohol, coffee, and smoking quite a bit.  i think the main point was that these outward emotions were always proceeding from one Center within himself.  he decided to express those emotions to specifically generate counter-emotions in others to force them to see themselves as beings controlled by plural and lesser selves!!

so, every emotion you feel is real.  no one can convince you otherwise i hope!  the main thing is qualitatively differentiating is where that emotion comes from and in response to what external stimuli.  for me, g.i.g. has brought forth a font of internal revelations, but one must always remember that the main thing he would stress over and over again (see beelzebub's tales to his grandson):  never take anything he says as truth, one must continue to seek the truth in one's own life.

a complicated man and never to be understood from books entirely (he loathed books, personally, and only wrote them after his car accident when he knew he would not have time enough on earth to reach his goals in life).  i would encourage seekers to look for classes where one can experience the Movements or at least d/l some of his music composed with thomas deHartmann.  these were his highest accomplishments (he referred to himself as a teacher of dance, at his height) and should be delved before one gets too heady on the texts.  ouspensky can suck the life out of you, but has an amazing rational mind and the vocabulary you get to discuss and share ideas of your everyday life are invaluable!

in my own seeking, i have found that i can have higher glimpses of the higher functionings alluded to in the fourth way by ouspensky.  that is where this whole thought-geist fails for me.  there are shortcuts, but the key is always to REMEMBER what you learn there and the feelings that well up inside you.  my test is to see how long i can hold the "high" from getting stoned, LSD, DMT, etc.!!!

well, that wasn't so bad was it? 

peace,
pulsar

What a truly deep poem, Antaeus. Thank you for sharing it

What was that anime called? Sounds fascinating!

To know the path
you walk the path
and the path that you walk becomes your way

am really not making the exact sense and its ofcourse not the exact words of that saying but it does make sense to what it is trying to express. which is to say you leave  things the way they are and just be yourself and those things follow you.~~~~~~~~~~~~

Brought this to mind: 
Francis Thompson, says:

All things by immortal power
Near or far
Hiddenly
To each other linked are,
That thou canst not stir a flower
Without troubling of a star

Over the years, I realized the only reason I used drugs or alcohol was because I wanted to.  If I said it was for any other reason, and actually believed that crap, I would've never stopped.  It is easy to make sure those reasons don't go away, and I can always count on other crappy situations to pop up in my life, if the current reasons leave.  Don't pay my big mouth any attention, you'll decide for yourself in time. 

That poem is describing how even a little beautiful flower has a link with divinity.  In fact, its own personal inner god just like we have.  Ours is simply more evolved.

I think you start possessing that centre when you have faith that it exists within the world, and the knowledge that it's within the energy systems that permeate  our reality. Yes, you can work to become a master over a lifetime, but you can't let that grand journey inhibit your baby steps. In fact, when you start living and being from that future self, you merge the timeline and accelerate your development. As always, patience, respect and humility are in the cards for its healthy unfoldment.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

That first sentence is excellent M_M.  I imagine your reference to that "future self" is the Divine Aspect within us.  I haven't really wanted to bounce those idea's of my having a future self I can communicate with.  It seemed a little too outside the box for me.  However, if I am imagining what divinity is capable of, this concept might not be so far fetched after all.  I like watching Japanese animated movies and one of them involves a story-line concerning countless bifurcating timelines and entities involved in trying to oversee certain events in the past to keep certain people on a beneficient timeline.  It was complicated and I really didn't follow it easily.

Since, I don't have the diary with me but I will try to pull it out as much as I can recall...I understood that my feelings came from what defined the state of my mind. I am sad because there was something that hurt my believe sytem. Now, when I use the word believe system it should imply to what makes me. We all are different I believe and have different personalities a product of what we are happy to carry out with and what not. And the sum of our personality and the world that we have learnt so far is what makes our believe system which of course includes how you have learnt to feel. When we were born thats when we were pure and felt what we felt and cried out of all the bad vibrations we felt from the world. But as we grew up what made us is a different emotional system based on understanding and acceptance of what we grasped even if it was taught to you how someone cried and how someone acted when they got happy and everyones expression was different to produce their feelings but we cling to what felt good to us and carried out and the sum of all that made our emotional system.

Now, a world where lies and deception plays the highest role to supress one another there are manythings that mislead to become a dummy feeling machine and I believe they choosed heart that is the point to head for to put someones whole effort and thought power so they are weak to take out easily..thats why most of the spiritual people or the most of the strong mind person dies from. And by doing so we put ourselve into two situation one we are very vulnerable to our emotional center not realizing the bigger picture and thinking inside the box instead of outside the box and we end up doing what we end up doing. Second would be to think from the outside of the box and know what best suits to that box...you don't want to  nail a cardboard box to make it strong you will only make it weak...and thats what the human kind is weak at. they carry in those boxes that is just burden cuz they don't know who and how they are filling this box but they are being played by the matrix.

but the conclusion is simple your truest feelings should come in the light of the ONE in the highest of one's knowledge and with respect, humbleness and love. To end this you are the product of your emotional (etherical) plane because thats what drives you and that is what guides you and now with only knowledge and awareness could we fight to be truely oneself and set a state of mind with love and clarity to patiently play what we are here to play. I like the taoist phrase it says

To know the path
you walk the path
and the path that you walk becomes your way

am really not making the exact sense and its ofcourse not the exact words of that saying but it does make sense to what it is trying to express. which is to say you leave  things the way they are and just be yourself and those things follow you.

On a personal note I wanted to ask a question. I have had very hard time feeling and everytime i truly feel its all pain and sufferings that i feel behind those smiles and laughs and cries that i have produced in a life of deception where I realize the purpose of evreyone around me was to make me feel and be one of'em emotional driven blind folded inside the box ants and i didn't like the idea. But yeah I feel something moves in my body. like my veins and my eyes the whole left side belongs to her everytime i listen to love songs or anything it moves but at the same time i don't know what it is... it probably could be my kundalini energy or i don't know my soul?? am really confused I do intent and will to a inner surrender but I don't like the idea of me surrendeing to anyone outside of me.

I have hard time fighting this sometimes the only thing that hurts me is her opinion moving inside of me I treat that feeling like my assumptious g/f who is with me and who I shall love to in future but sometimes that movment is something that upsets me on my thoughts that are not even wrong or anything and I end up stupid things like drinking or smoking pot...and today I smoked pot cuz I was upset on a emotional level with that feeling and senation in my veins which sounds stupid but I thought she was the only hope for me that moves inside of me and could be my true guidance and I guess she might not be or what she wants is what i don't want to..but this whole idea might sound stupid but ir eally do'nt care but thats just my honesty of revealing something too personal ...only cuz i don't fear anything and anytime of manipulation outside of that range I don't get upset if i loose anything or people piss me off outside of me and i take it as some characters acting stupid to steal energy and thats the matter of the fact but now I don't want to be weak from inside to is that a worth taking step to be strong from inside too. And strong doesn't mean that I will become hitler and take other's life or torture anyone I just want to make it big in life and be someone in my own eyes to look upto which don't involve being rich or having 70 wifes as promised in islam its just that a good person with a good vision and a good feeling for everyone regardless of their purpose and everything I make it to the one who projected me here.

Actually, when playing with that idea, I have had an image of a lion come to mind.  Lunging on its prey fiercely to kill it and eat it.  But, it still didn't dismiss the notion.  I'm talking about simply carrying a goal through to its realization without being distracted by fear or collateral thought processes.  If I'm under the sway of passion, I'm in a storm that can easily change direction.   So, even if I am under a passion and follow through reaching the realization of my goal, I probably did a lot of actions along the way that I strongly regret.  I'm not suggesting that I am capable of acting in this manner, I'm weak and get led by emotion often.  Its simply an idea that I have liked toying with for a long time.  It seems like something a person better than me is capable of. 

There is always that possibility of admiring a certain behavior could eventually lead to my actually learning to operate that way.

I gotta go to work now, I have weird hours.  10 am to 6 pm.

lyra wrote:

Antaeus wrote:

I'm enjoying the pictures of how you might be reacting to the eigth word in second paragraph.

Then you must be enjoying imaginary pictures, 'cause I'm sitting 10 feet from him and trust me, he's not reacting to you.  He's heating up dinner while simultaneously working on an experiment in the back room.  Seems to not be too concerned with whatever you wrote here.       

Interesting too that you overlooked the ironic contradiction in presuming that Montalk of all people - the guy least likely to have an emotional reaction to anything written on this forum - would have a reaction to your assertation that he's presuming.

Maybe you need to take more time to read his posts and articles and actually know the person you're talking to, in order to avoid foot-in-mouth presumptions such as this?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I only said it in a light-hearted manner.  I did insert in my reply to him, concepts that he is not even guilty of suggesting.  Its not so much that I am bad, but rather from people of quality I'm attempting get a reply that adds depth.  I know it is wrong.  I should not have tried that tactic. 

titmouse, I'm really not sure of the difference between passion and enthusiasm.  Without my going and checking it out, I would say that enthusiasm might simply be passion at a slightly lower energy, and thus easier to control.  From more than one source, I have had it presented to me that we are utilizing elementals when we let very strong emotions well up in us.  So then the question would be, "do I want passions I am unsure I can control welling up in me?"  I like fierceness, it is not anger, hatred, or aggression.  It is simply unwavering will.  I would not like the thought of being guilty of causing harm or injury due to anger, hatred or blind aggression.  As a matter of fact, I think I can blend humility with fierceness.  I can have an unwavoring will while remembering my relative unimportance in the overall scheme of things.

Are you suggesting like a lion, or the mouse_ that roared?

Antaeus wrote:

I'm enjoying the pictures of how you might be reacting to the eigth word in second paragraph.

Then you must be enjoying imaginary pictures, 'cause I'm sitting 10 feet from him and trust me, he's not reacting to you.  He's heating up dinner while simultaneously working on an experiment in the back room.  Seems to not be too concerned with whatever you wrote here.       

Interesting too that you overlooked the ironic contradiction in presuming that Montalk of all people - the guy least likely to have an emotional reaction to anything written on this forum - would have a reaction to your assertation that he's presuming.

Maybe you need to take more time to read his posts and articles and actually know the person you're talking to, in order to avoid foot-in-mouth presumptions such as this?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I only said it in a light-hearted manner.  I did insert in my reply to him, concepts that he is not even guilty of suggesting.  Its not so much that I am bad, but rather from people of quality I'm attempting get a reply that adds depth.  I know it is wrong.  I should not have tried that tactic. 

titmouse, I'm really not sure of the difference between passion and enthusiasm.  Without my going and checking it out, I would say that enthusiasm might simply be passion at a slightly lower energy, and thus easier to control.  From more than one source, I have had it presented to me that we are utilizing elementals when we let very strong emotions well up in us.  So then the question would be, "do I want passions I am unsure I can control welling up in me?"  I like fierceness, it is not anger, hatred, or aggression.  It is simply unwavering will.  I would not like the thought of being guilty of causing harm or injury due to anger, hatred or blind aggression.  As a matter of fact, I think I can blend humility with fierceness.  I can have an unwavoring will while remembering my relative unimportance in the overall scheme of things.

He's heating up dinner while simultaneously working on an experiment in the back room.

An experiment? I'm interested. What might this experiment be about?

He's heating up dinner while simultaneously working on an experiment in the back room.

That reminds me, I haven't used the microwave.. I learned to cook with the pan - I feel great, and the food tastes a lot better!

I'm enjoying the pictures of how you might be reacting to the eigth word in second paragraph.

Then you must be enjoying imaginary pictures, 'cause I'm sitting 10 feet from him and trust me, he's not reacting to you.  He's heating up dinner while simultaneously working on an experiment in the back room.  Seems to not be too concerned with whatever you wrote here.       

Interesting too that you overlooked the ironic contradiction in presuming that Montalk of all people - the guy least likely to have an emotional reaction to anything written on this forum - would have a reaction to your assertation that he's presuming.

Maybe you need to take more time to read his posts and articles and actually know the person you're talking to, in order to avoid foot-in-mouth presumptions such as this?

titmouse, is enthusiasm different than passion?

The reason I brought up the word "enthusiasm" is because twice now in the past 6 years friends who were raised in the Jewish faith have refered to me as having much enthusiam.  I have felt a great passion for life and have never called it enthusiasm, myself, so I was wishing for some here at KR to give me a bit more background from their perspective.  I see enthusiasm as a shallower form of passion; something not as deep as what I think of when I think of the word "passion".  My enthusiasm I can control, but the deep sense of passion for life I can not. Words may be interpretted differently by different people, so I am interested in what others think about this word "enthusiasm".

A side note:  I was talking to a friend today, the one who mentioned "enthusiasm". I came home and posted a comment about passion on another board because the topic was on my mind; then came directly over to NR and saw this new thread at the top of the list and posted my enquiry about "enthusism" (as it directly relates to passion).  Another synchronicity is appears.  Thanks!

Now you bring up Anthropo-sophy.  Ahrimanic forces are mentioned as well.  Elementals are not evil forces.  It would be like saying all humans are evil.  I tried to study Anthroposophy but it is an exhaustive study, and Theo-sophy is also.  I'm unable to devote myself to Theosophy and Anthroposophy.  The former was first, so I'm sticking with it.  I've seen the name Ahriman in old writings describing the polar opposite of another whose name I fail to recall.  It struck me as simply one person who was involved in Initiation.  Ahriman was one aspect of a whole person who was struggling with himself within the venue of Initiation.  So I feel reluctant to associate his name with the personification of evil. 

One way I can side with your presumption to point out error in Gurjieff's writings is the particular times we are living in, and the increasing speed in which events and even personal growth are occurring within individuals.  We are losing incrementally and increasingly, the luxory of being able to take in information and chew on it at a leisurely pace.  We are being forced in way, to accept things intuitively.  I would say, in regard to my first post that we might hesitate before letting passion intensify emotion.

I'm enjoying the pictures of how you might be reacting to the eigth word in second paragraph. 

titmouse, is enthusiasm different than passion?