S02/E32: "Higher Centres" - Already Complete

Before going further, try something with me.

Eyes open is fine.

This works anywhere.

Let attention point two ways at once.

One arrow goes out towards these words as they arrive.

The other turns back towards whoever is hearing them.

The body, the breath, whatever stirs in response.

Ouspensky drew it as a single arrow with two heads.

listen like that line by line notice the small reaction each sentence produces agreement doubt a flicker of boredom distraction then notice the pause between one line and the next that pause is the same gap Gurdjieff left an aphorism on the wall at the Prieur.

The energy spent on active inner work is then and there transformed into a fresh supply.

But that spent on passive work is lost forever.

Listening this way is active work.

It will slip.

When it does, come back.

already complete.

Most people come to inner work carrying a picture of a ladder.

Climb earn build rung by rung towards a higher state that will one day arrive as a reward.

Gurdjieff offers a different picture.

In Uspensky's record of his early teaching, the higher emotional center and the higher thinking center are already present in us.

They are fully developed and working all the time.

Their work fails to reach our ordinary consciousness.

The trouble lies with our lower centers, which are too undeveloped to connect with them.

In later years, Uspensky was more cautious He offered three descriptions.

Higher centres working but unconnected, fully developed but idle, or asleep for lack of fuel.

All three, he said, come to the same thing.