Documentary on Gurdjieff's Life

[ulli]

I'm starting this thread to share a bit about my pre-UFO path which prepared me well for the disclosure and paradigm shift.

So I thought I'd share this great documentary on the life and times of Gurdjieff.
Narrative is in Russian, with English subtitles.
Anyone who is a seeker for higher knowledge, and especially self-knowledge, will undoubtedly enjoy the many gems found here.

Gurdjieff left this world in the year I was born. I met his doctor, a French Canadian MD, in London, via pure synchronicity, within days of seeing the 1978 Peter Brooks movie "Meetings with Remarkable Men" about the early years of Gurdjieff.
All these synchronicities were arranged by my subconscious mind, or higher self. Nothing back then was consciously manifested, the way I later learnt to do.
The hidden part of the self cannot be overestimated in how it arranges the unfoldment of the spiritual self.

So getting involved with Gurdjieff's teachings soon made me a better seeker. Within the year synchronicities guided me to astrology, when an eager sales person convinced me to buy a coffee table book on how to teach oneself astrology, (by Derek and Julia Parker), and soon after that an even keener sales person insisted that I bought "Autobiography of a Yogi" by Yogananda.
And soon after that Pluto arrived like a tsunami by making a right angle to my natal sun, and swept me out of England and landed me plus my book collection on the shores of Barbados, where I thought I would never find any more interesting teachings.

Surprise, surprise...destiny can catch up in the most remote desert island. Soon I was studying meditation with a group of Selfrealization Fellowship fellows, which in no time led me to the Baha'i community. And all the while the Gurdjieff engines were running in the hull of the ship of my life, to this day.

Not saying that Gurdjieff was my only spiritual roots. Before Confirmation at age fourteen I had a strong dose of Lutheran Christianity, and no matter what some here say about all religious programs being evil....I still find many nuggets in Christian teachings which a very nurturing.

Actually, Gurdjieff called his teachings Esoteric Christianity, just as the astrology I practice is called esoteric (inner) astrology.
Oh, and since I'm doing a list of my earlier influences, I mustn't forget C. G. Jung, nor Fritz Perls, founder of Gestalt Therapy. And after several UFO sightings fate guided me to the Wingmakers materials. Then David Wilcock's Divine Cosmos. From there to Project Camelot, and finally made my home here at Avalon.
How about that for a quest? So, what is next?

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=3nljcpS62cg

[dianna]

Posted by ulli (here)
So, what is next?

Personally, I find myself here, always ends up here ...

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=P6Scz7_k0Gg

I maintain that Truth is a pathless land, and you cannot approach it by any path whatsoever, by any religion, by any sect. That is my point of view, and I adhere to that absolutely and unconditionally. Truth, being limitless, unconditioned, unapproachable by any path whatsoever, cannot be organized; nor should any organization be formed to lead or to coerce people along any particular path. If you first understand that, then you will see how impossible it is to organize a belief. A belief is purely an individual matter, and you cannot and must not organize it. If you do, it becomes dead, crystallized; it becomes a creed, a sect, a religion, to be imposed on others. This is what everyone throughout the world is attempting to do. Truth is narrowed down and made a plaything for those who are weak, for those who are only momentarily discontented. Truth cannot be brought down, rather the individual must make the effort to ascend to it. You cannot bring the mountain-top to the valley. If you would attain to the mountain-top you must pass through the valley, climb the steeps, unafraid of the dangerous precipices. (J. Krishnamurti)

[ulli]

Posted by dianna (here)

Posted by ulli (here)
So, what is next?

Personally, I find myself here, always ends up here ...

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=P6Scz7_k0Gg

I maintain that Truth is a pathless land, and you cannot approach it by any path whatsoever, by any religion, by any sect. That is my point of view, and I adhere to that absolutely and unconditionally. Truth, being limitless, unconditioned, unapproachable by any path whatsoever, cannot be organized; nor should any organization be formed to lead or to coerce people along any particular path. If you first understand that, then you will see how impossible it is to organize a belief. A belief is purely an individual matter, and you cannot and must not organize it. If you do, it becomes dead, crystallized; it becomes a creed, a sect, a religion, to be imposed on others. This is what everyone throughout the world is attempting to do. Truth is narrowed down and made a plaything for those who are weak, for those who are only momentarily discontented. Truth cannot be brought down, rather the individual must make the effort to ascend to it. You cannot bring the mountain-top to the valley. If you would attain to the mountain-top you must pass through the valley, climb the steeps, unafraid of the dangerous precipices. (J. Krishnamurti)

OMG, Dianna, how could I have forgotten Krishnamurti???
I even met him, in person, at his place in Sussex, on September 5th, 1980, one day before the unexpected death of my father. This meeting charged my batteries unlike any other, all in preparation for the big change that was to come.
Because of the energy imparted by. J. K. I could help my mother with her shock, and the funeral drama.

[dianna]

Posted by ulli (here)

OMG, Dianna, how could I have forgotten Krishnamurti???
I even met him, in person, at his place in Sussex, on September 5th, 1980, one day before the unexpected death of my father. This meeting charged my batteries unlike any other, all in preparation for the big change that was to come.
Because of the energy imparted by. J. K. I could help my mother with her shock, and the funeral drama.

Wow … could you share what you talked about with him? (I don't mean to pry if its too personal, just think it it sounds like an amazing story)

[heyokah]

In a thread about Gurdjieff belongs the Russian mathematician and philosopher P. D. Ouspensky

"In Search of the Miraculous: Fragments of an Unknown Teaching" recounts his meeting and subsequent association with G.I. Gurdjieff.

The book begins with Ouspensky returning home to St. Petersburg from his recent excursion to the East, where he journeyed "in search of the miraculous", as he put it. He soon meets a mysterious man, a certain "G.", who has all the answers to which Ouspensky has been so arduously searching for all his life. He immediately joins Mr. Gurdjieff's esoteric school, and begins learning a certain system of self-development which originated in the East, allegedly during the most remote antiquity, possibly millennia before recorded history.

Ouspensky recounts his trials learning this new system, which he later refers to as the Fourth Way, often recollecting entire lectures, or parts of lectures, which Mr. Gurdjieff gave to his disciples in St. Petersburg and Moscow from 1915-1917. He describes many of his experiences, particularly concerning the "art of self-remembering", and he recounts some of the methods and various exercises which comprised Gurdjieff's system.

The book concludes with his experiences during the Bolshevik Revolution and his and Mr. Gurdjieff's eventual escape to the West, where they continued to teach Mr. Gurdjieff's system to many followers until their respective deaths in 1947 and 1949. The latter part of the book also describes the author's feelings and motives behind his eventual decision to teach the system independently, not under the direct supervision of his teacher, Mr. Gurdjieff, which he formally announced to his students in London in early 1924.

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=CpWpYk_aBUk

[ulli]

Posted by dianna (here)

Posted by ulli (here)

OMG, Dianna, how could I have forgotten Krishnamurti???
I even met him, in person, at his place in Sussex, on September 5th, 1980, one day before the unexpected death of my father. This meeting charged my batteries unlike any other, all in preparation for the big change that was to come.
Because of the energy imparted by. J. K. I could help my mother with her shock, and the funeral drama.

Wow … could you share what you talked about with him? (I don't mean to pry if its too personal, just think it it sounds like an amazing story)

To be honest I didn't even know who he was. I went with three friends who did, however. I sat quietly like a mouse, absorbing everything. It was the first time that I really learnt how fearing external objects puts us outside the Oneness mode, into separation. Something inside me clicked. So I bought several of his books and started reading. Many years later reconnecting via Youtube, and realising how much I owed to him and his teachings.

[ulli]

Posted by heyokah (here)
In a thread about Gourdjieff belongs the Russian mathematician and philosopher P. D. Ouspensky

"In Search of the Miraculous: Fragments of an Unknown Teaching" recounts his meeting and subsequent association with G.I. Gurdjieff.

The book begins with Ouspensky returning home to St. Petersburg from his recent excursion to the East, where he journeyed "in search of the miraculous", as he put it. He soon meets a mysterious man, a certain "G.", who has all the answers to which Ouspensky has been so arduously searching for all his life. He immediately joins Mr. Gurdjieff's esoteric school, and begins learning a certain system of self-development which originated in the East, allegedly during the most remote antiquity, possibly millennia before recorded history.

Ouspensky recounts his trials learning this new system, which he later refers to as the Fourth Way, often recollecting entire lectures, or parts of lectures, which Mr. Gurdjieff gave to his disciples in St. Petersburg and Moscow from 1915-1917. He describes many of his experiences, particularly concerning the "art of self-remembering", and he recounts some of the methods and various exercises which comprised Gurdjieff's system.

The book concludes with his experiences during the Bolshevik Revolution and his and Mr. Gurdjieff's eventual escape to the West, where they continued to teach Mr. Gurdjieff's system to many followers until their respective deaths in 1947 and 1949. The latter part of the book also describes the author's feelings and motives behind his eventual decision to teach the system independently, not under the direct supervision of his teacher, Mr. Gurdjieff, which he formally announced to his students in London in early 1924.

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=CpWpYk_aBUk

Thanks, heyokah. The book was my first introduction to the Work, and later I bought the Fourth Way and many others.
Even his pre-Gurdjieff works.
Even James Webb's The Harmonious Circle, which was an outsiders view.
Here is a PDF copy of my Gurdjieff Bible...Ouspensky's "In Search of the Miraculous".

http://www.gurdjieff.am/in-search/index.pdf

[Meggings]

Ulli, I watched the Gurdjieff video you put up. As a school girl I read his and Ouspensky's work - since most of us here are seekers after truth.
I did not know he had been interactive with both Stalin and Hitler.
This is a quote from the video by Gurdjieff:

"Understanding you will not get from books and you will not borrow it from people. It occurs as a result of the whole personal experience that the man realizes himself, about everything that is experienced, thought, felt, and suffered."

[ulli]

Posted by Meggings (here)
Ulli, I watched the Gurdjieff video you put up. As a school girl I read his and Ouspensky's work - since most of us here are seekers after truth.
I did not know he had been interactive with both Stalin and Hitler.
This is a quote from the video by Gurdjieff:

"Understanding you will not get from books and you will not borrow it from people. It occurs as a result of the whole personal experience that the man realizes himself, about everything that is experienced, thought, felt, and suffered."

I know that he did not support Hitler nor Stalin. He also interacted with Alisteir Crowley, who visited his center in France, and came to him with some kind of proposal. G. drove him out, in quite a rude manner, and told him never to return.

The Stalin connection might have been even mor indirect. James Webb in his book "the Harmonious Circle" investigated a theory that Gurdjieff and the spy Dordiev were one and the same person. So there are quite a few stories floating around which simply are not true.
Dr. Bernard Courtenay-Mayers who was Gurdjieff's pupil and one of the doctors who attended him at the end of his life, was a decorated member of the French Resistance against the Nazis, and even risked his life, like many others in the Work.

[ulli]

Here is a Gurdjieff quote which holds a lot of truth where he speaks about the collective.
During the nineties I spent quite a bit of time going to Fourth Way meetings and also to Baha'i meetings.
One movement deals with the development of individuals and the other with the development of communities.

Both movement founders spoke and wrote about both aspects but the followers distorted those teachings.
The Gurdjieff people ought to be seeking the Baha'is and the Baha'is ought to spend some time in Gurdjieff groups.
The combination of these two groups would really help this planet to make the necessary leap forward.
There are only two entities here...the individual and the collective. Both must be in harmony. As the individual needs to follow strict protocols to develop towards higher states of being, and away from fragmented personality, so does the collective.


"All the religious revelations failed to create the New Type of Man needed to fill the enlarging gap. Warned Gurdjieff, "Humanity is at a standstill, and from a standstill there is a straight path to downfall and degeneration. There is nothing that points to evolution proceeding. On the contrary when we compare humanity with a man we quite clearly see a growth of personality at the cost of essence, that is, a growth of the artificial, the unreal, and what is foreign, at the cost of the natural, the real, and what is one's own. Contemporary culture requires automatons. And people are undoubtedly losing their acquired habits of independence and turning into automatons, into parts of machines. Man is becoming a willing slave. He no longer needs chains. He begins to grow fond of his slavery, to be proud of it. And this is the most terrible thing that can happen to a man."

[dan33]

Thanks, Ulli for the thread.

Love this book from OUSPENSKY.

http://holybooks.lichtenbergpress.ne...-Ouspensky.pdf

[animovado]

Hi Ulli,

this book came to my mind while reading this thread. Maybe it's of interest for you, if you don't know it already?

The Gnostic Circle - A Synthesis in the Harmonies of the Cosmos
by Patrizia Norelli-Bachelet

[ulli]

I just wrote an intricate reply to animovado and accidentally lost it. Must have been a bit too obscure, so I won't try too hard to recreate it.
Anyway, to keep it simple...many thanks for sharing this book. And no, I had not heard of it before.
But anything that examines the nine-pointed star, or harmonious circle, or enneagram, (whether the Gurdjieff version or the Jesuit version), or novile aspects (in astrology) or participation in a Baha'i Local Spiritual Assembly, will definitely help in the unfoldment of one's spiritual potential. Because the number Nine is the highest number there is before entering the vortex to the next layer. Size doesn't matter in an infinite universe. Only movement matters, and a transformation which leads to rebalancing.

[Chester]

Posted by ulli (here)
I'm starting this thread to share a bit about my pre-UFO path which prepared me well for the disclosure and paradigm shift.

So I thought I'd share this great documentary on the life and times of Gurdjieff.
Narrative is in Russian, with English subtitles.
Anyone who is a seeker for higher knowledge, and especially self-knowledge, will undoubtedly enjoy the many gems found here.

Gurdjieff left this world in the year I was born. I met his doctor, a French Canadian MD, in London, via pure synchronicity, within days of seeing the 1978 Peter Brooks movie "Meetings with Remarkable Men" about the early years of Gurdjieff.
All these synchronicities were arranged by my subconscious mind, or higher self. Nothing back then was consciously manifested, the way I later learnt to do.
The hidden part of the self cannot be overestimated in how it arranges the unfoldment of the spiritual self.

So getting involved with Gurdjieff's teachings soon made me a better seeker. Within the year synchronicities guided me to astrology, when an eager sales person convinced me to buy a coffee table book on how to teach oneself astrology, (by Derek and Julia Parker), and soon after that an even keener sales person insisted that I bought "Autobiography of a Yogi" by Yogananda.
And soon after that Pluto arrived like a tsunami by making a right angle to my natal sun, and swept me out of England and landed me plus my book collection on the shores of Barbados, where I thought I would never find any more interesting teachings.

Surprise, surprise...destiny can catch up in the most remote desert island. Soon I was studying meditation with a group of Selfrealization Fellowship fellows, which in no time led me to the Baha'i community. And all the while the Gurdjieff engines were running in the hull of the ship of my life, to this day.

Not saying that Gurdjieff was my only spiritual roots. Before Confirmation at age fourteen I had a strong dose of Lutheran Christianity, and no matter what some here say about all religious programs being evil....I still find many nuggets in Christian teachings which a very nurturing.

Actually, Gurdjieff called his teachings Esoteric Christianity, just as the astrology I practice is called esoteric (inner) astrology.
Oh, and since I'm doing a list of my earlier influences, I mustn't forget C. G. Jung, nor Fritz Perls, founder of Gestalt Therapy. And after several UFO sightings fate guided me to the Wingmakers materials. Then David Wilcock's Divine Cosmos. From there to Project Camelot, and finally made my home here at Avalon.
How about that for a quest? So, what is next?

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=3nljcpS62cg

Gurdjieff's 4th Way "generally presents a picture in complete harmony with those of the left hand path." ~ Dr. Stephen Edred Flowers

Note: there are those who achieve status above "animal" and a massive proportion of humanity that does not... even cannot, according to Gurdjieff.

Note his last words on his deathbed were, "I'm leaving you all in a fine mess!"

Note also the many, many "lovers" he enjoyed along the way.

Gurdjieff is one of my heroes.

[Violet]

Ah, the old camera, where has it gone.

I am reminded again of the beauty of Russian literature, or how to describe things in a form that is both aesthetically appealing and mind activating.