Thursday, July 23, 2009
THE FOURTH WAY
Like so many people concerned with Gurdjieff, I became acquainted with the 'ideas' through his more prominent exponent, one famous before G, as to which Gurdjieff was often referred, namely P>D> Ouspensky. It was in 1957, the year before I graduated from the University of New Hampshire where I was somewhat majoring in the minimum courses of Psychology when I came across a book in the college library that arrested my attention every time I passed by the new acquisitions shelves. Every time I looked at the hardcover volume I was drawn by the photo of Ouspensky on the back bookcover and thumbing through its table of contents,etc. I eventually and finally took it out and read it. Needless to say, this book,entitled THE FOURTH WAY changed nearly all my views on not only psychology and mankind but on certain aspects of life and the Universe and probably this same book has done so for many others around the world where English is spoken and read.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
I started a part II on the FOURTH WAY but unfortunately my fingers hit some keys that deleted the material typed before it could be saved but I shall try to recapture it some time in the future.
ReplyDeleteFOUND MONEY: I posted this on the FACE BOOK SITE entitled: FOURTH WAY,LA, and received some responses, much better than I had expected from these two words. I will now reiterate a few things about how I became aware of THE FOURTH WAY itself as presented in the book THE FOURTH WAY, P.D. OUSPENKSY..a compilations of various talks,etc. and my impressions of the book,its influence, and other things... I was always going to the University Library,which at that time was THE HAMILTON LIBRARY BUILDING, but later the books,etc. were transferred to a newly constructed one that opened in the '60's. My memory of the day, the exact date I cannot recall, was that I began looking at the books in the 'new arrivals' or acquisitions, section before going into the stacks as we were allowed to journey into the stacks, which, for me, were always an expedition and search and adventure. I was, and still am,a voracious reader, a book work, bibliophile, and so on, preferring books to other things, and both fiction and non-fiction of certain types and genres,etc. more important to me than the subjects I was studying at the time, that is, usually....I recall picking up that 'hardback' book THE FOURTH WAY and being drawn by the photo of P.D. OUSPENSKY on the back cover jacket but I did not take it out at the time, but glanced at its chapters as outlined in the table of contents, and skimmed through some of the chapters,etc. I kept coming back to the library and looking at this book.possibly for several days, until I actually succumbed to this impulse, desire, attraction,etc. and took it out and from that time since, my life has changed a number of times as a result. It changed my views on my major: psychology and some other things, but not entirely, as I did not acquire the actual book for myself until much later, years later, but did discuss the ideas as I thought about them and considered them at the time with several others. I only found one person, also a major in psychology, who had heard of OUSPENSKY but had only read, A NEW MODEL OF THE UNIVERSE, which I had not read and did not read until many years later...However, taking that book in my hands and gazing at that picture of Mr. Ouspensky and then eventually consuming it page by page, until I learned about G,his teacher, who I found out later was MR. GURDJIEFF, and then encountered off and on, books in English by Mr. Gurdjieff and a few others....Oddly enough, THE OUTSIDER by Colin Wilson had made its inroads and exerted influence on readers around that time, which my roomate at the time wanted me to read as he was taken up with the book(and later with some of Gurdjieff's materiel,etc.) and despite his urgings to read it I did not until years later and then read other of Wilson's works....Of course, I had resisted reading HUXLEY'S BRAVE NEW WORLD and a few other hot-books and best-sellers, prefering to let the 'sounds and the furies','the sands and flurries' die down or peter out before I took a good read of them and that also included,SALINGER'S,THE CATCHER IN THE RYE, etc. I had read Huxley's Time Must Have a Stop and probably a few others....but I did not really do anything other than consider OUSPENKY'S THE FOURTH WAY until years later, nor did I try to contact any of the various groups around for some reason...BUT, the weight of the book, its jacket, its contents,etc. I can still feel, taste, sense, and renew that feeling and thoughts and emotions it evoked in me from that time since, when I pick it up, despite sometimes falling asleep with it when I do return to it for some 'clarification'
ReplyDeleteThe other book that made an impression on me and now I am finding of much value and use is Mr. Ouspenkii's THE PSYCHOLOGY OF MAN'S POSSIBLE EVOLUTION, which I have discussed in art in my other blog, THE FOURTH WAY.... The study of Psychology as it was intended to be, is more than a discussion or analysis of theories and the like but a way to approach life, science, and the occult in ways that usually done in this manner....and certainly not that of evolution by most.
ReplyDelete