A different perception of Levels 1, 2 and 3: Three dimensions
Part IV
One does not step into one region/level and then step out of that level/region into another region. Rather the three levels are without boundaries, mixed one within another, chaotic, exploding in a brilliant display of sensations
Part IV
One does not step into one region/level and then step out of that level/region into another region. Rather the three levels are without boundaries, mixed one within another, chaotic, exploding in a brilliant display of sensations
One often hears the question: The physical, the physical, the physical is that all there is? Am I simply a machine?
If there were only the physical there would not be seven levels or as we now understand seven regions of human experience, there would only be three and that would be the end of this work.
But this work deals with the seven levels of human experience and this chapter presents the levels as regions which in turn will help the investigation of level 4, region 4, help us more readily understand not only what level/region 4 is but more readily understand how to access region/level 4.
Seeking a higher level is not in fact going upward but going laterally. Seeking level 4 is in fact simply stepping out of a region of sensory input, region/level 1, stepping out of a region of emotional turmoil, region/level 2 and stepping out of a region of mental frustration, region/level 3, and stepping into a region of silence.
Seeking a ‘higher level’, however, is not enough if one does know understand what ‘seeking a higher level’ entails. If one understands what one is seeking one has a much greater potential to succeed in one’s quest.
Seeking blindly, seeking without understanding what it is one is seeking almost inevitably results in failure, if not failure due to the lack of ‘finding’ then failure through having found what one seeks but not recognizing that one has found what it is one seeks since one was blindly seeking in the first place.
"Without knowing what I want, I will not make any effort. I will sleep. Without wishing for a different quality in myself, to turn toward my higher possibilities; I will have nothing to lean on, nothing to support work. I must always, again and again, come back to this question: What do I wish? It must become the most important question of my life. Yet this wish for a different quality has no force at all if it comes from my ordinary “I”. It must be related to something completely different from my ordinary “I” and free from the desire for a result. I must not forget why I wish. This must be for me really a question of life or death – I wish to be, to live in a certain way. "
The Reality of Being, The Fourth Way of Gurdjieff, Jeanne De Salzmann, Shambhala, 2010, p 19.
Some would suggest one can only step into region/level 4 through one’s own efforts.
They are correct, for one can only experience region/level 4 by ‘going’ there just as an individual standing on the East side of the Appalachian Mountains can experience the West side of the Appalachian Mountains only by going to the West side of the mountain range.
If there were only the physical there would not be seven levels or as we now understand seven regions of human experience, there would only be three and that would be the end of this work.
But this work deals with the seven levels of human experience and this chapter presents the levels as regions which in turn will help the investigation of level 4, region 4, help us more readily understand not only what level/region 4 is but more readily understand how to access region/level 4.
Seeking a higher level is not in fact going upward but going laterally. Seeking level 4 is in fact simply stepping out of a region of sensory input, region/level 1, stepping out of a region of emotional turmoil, region/level 2 and stepping out of a region of mental frustration, region/level 3, and stepping into a region of silence.
Seeking a ‘higher level’, however, is not enough if one does know understand what ‘seeking a higher level’ entails. If one understands what one is seeking one has a much greater potential to succeed in one’s quest.
Seeking blindly, seeking without understanding what it is one is seeking almost inevitably results in failure, if not failure due to the lack of ‘finding’ then failure through having found what one seeks but not recognizing that one has found what it is one seeks since one was blindly seeking in the first place.
"Without knowing what I want, I will not make any effort. I will sleep. Without wishing for a different quality in myself, to turn toward my higher possibilities; I will have nothing to lean on, nothing to support work. I must always, again and again, come back to this question: What do I wish? It must become the most important question of my life. Yet this wish for a different quality has no force at all if it comes from my ordinary “I”. It must be related to something completely different from my ordinary “I” and free from the desire for a result. I must not forget why I wish. This must be for me really a question of life or death – I wish to be, to live in a certain way. "
The Reality of Being, The Fourth Way of Gurdjieff, Jeanne De Salzmann, Shambhala, 2010, p 19.
Some would suggest one can only step into region/level 4 through one’s own efforts.
They are correct, for one can only experience region/level 4 by ‘going’ there just as an individual standing on the East side of the Appalachian Mountains can experience the West side of the Appalachian Mountains only by going to the West side of the mountain range.
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