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1. Maybe others are right. Maybe someone else has a better idea. Maybe others will learn for themselves. Maybe I’ve done all that can be done.
2. Maybe I could let someone else do this. Maybe this person is actually already showing me love in his own way. Maybe I could do something good for myself, too.
3. Maybe I don’t have to be the best. Maybe people will accept me just the way I am. Maybe others’ opinions of me aren’t so important.
4 Maybe there’s nothing wrong with me. Maybe others do understand me and are supporting me. Maybe I’m not the only one who feels this way.
5. Maybe I can trust people and let them know what I need. Maybe I can live happily in the world. Maybe my future will be okay.
6. Maybe this will work out fine. Maybe I don’t have to foresee every possible problem. Maybe I can trust myself and my own judgments.
7. Maybe what I already have is enough. Maybe there’s nowhere else I need to be right now. Maybe I’m not missing out on anything worthwhile.
8. Maybe this person isn’t out to take advantage of me. Maybe I can let down my guard a little more. Maybe I could let my heart be touched more deeply.
9. Maybe I can make a difference. Maybe I need to get energized and be involved. Maybe I am more powerful than I realize.
The body is extremely important for Inner Work, because it is a reliable reality check in ways that our minds and emotions (the other two centers) cannot be.
distinguish between “monkey mind”—inner chatter, worry, aimless imagination, visualizing future scenarios, or reliving past ones—and quiet mind, the mysterious space from which our knowing arises.
when our minds become more still and silent, our intelligence becomes aligned with a greater intelligence that understands our situation objectively and sees exactly what we need to do or not do.
One of the main tools for entering into the vivid immediacy of quiet mind is “not knowing.”
We imagine that we really know people or even what they are thinking.
Change and transformation do not—and cannot—occur without emotional transformation, without the heart being touched.
“Your mind cannot possibly understand God. Your heart already knows. Minds were designed for carrying out the orders of the heart.” EMMANUEL
Shutting out our real pain also renders us unable to feel joy, compassion, love, or any of the other capacities of the heart.
Spiritual work is not designed to make us masochists: the idea is to transform our suffering, not to prolong it.
Compassion is not the same as sentimentality or sympathy or self-pity. Rather, it is an aspect of Divine love that melts all defenses and resistance when anyone’s suffering is really seen.
forgiveness arises from our Essential nature and comes from a deeper understanding of the truth of our situation.
I am willing to be willing to forgive those who have hurt me.2 I am willing to forgive those who have hurt me. I forgive those who have hurt me. I see the hurt I have suffered as an opportunity to learn compassion. I thank life for giving me a spirit that is forgiving and compassionate.
I am willing to be willing to let go of the limitations of my past. I am willing to let go of the limitations of my past. I let go of the limitations of my past. I see my past as what needed to happen for me to become me. I thank life for allowing me to be me through my past.
Gurdjieff said something strange and paradoxical—that the last thing human beings will let go of is their suffering.
our suffering is familiar. It is what we know, and it therefore feels safer than some other unknown condition.
Much of our identity comes from holding on to our suffering, from all the complaints, tensions, conflicts, blaming, drama, rationalizations, projections, justifications, and “energy” that it allows. We could even say that it is the root of our personality.
Nothing in life can fulfill us if we have not opened our hearts to our true nature, but if we have opened our hearts, then everything fulfills us. We then experience the world as an expression of infinite love.
The Instinctive Triad (Types Eight, Nine, and One): “If I let down my guard and relax into the flow of life, I will disappear. The familiar ‘I’ will cease to exist. I cannot protect my sense of self if I am truly open. If I really let the world in and allow it to affect me, I will be overwhelmed and lose my freedom and independence. I will be annihilated.”
The Feeling Triad (Types Two, Three, and Four): “If I stop identifying with this image of myself, my worthlessness will be revealed and I will lose the possibility of experiencing love. Deep down, I suspect that I am a horrible, unlovable person, so only by maintaining this ego project do I have any hope of being welcomed into the world or of feeling good about myself.”
The Thinking Triad (Types Five, Six, and Seven): “If I stop this strategy, if I stop figuring out what I need to do, the ‘ground’ will not be there to support me. The world cannot be trusted—without my mental activity I will be left vulnerable. Everything will fall to pieces—I will fall and be lost. If my mind does not keep ‘swimming,’ I will sink.”
Generally speaking, 99 percent of the time life is benign and supportive. The ego leads us to fixate on the 1 percent when it is painful, dark, or tragic—although even in these times, it is usually only painful and tragic to us.
The universe is much more generous than most of us have ever recognized or acknowledged,
when we open ourselves to the present moment, everything becomes our teacher because everything in life supports our presence and our growth.
the three “master emotions” of the ego: anger, shame, and fear, which govern the Instinctive, Feeling, and Thinking Triads, respectively.
There are no good guys and bad guys, and therefore there is no one to blame for one’s state.
Strata 1 through 3 are primarily psychological. Strata 4 through 6 include elements that are psychological (especially from depth psychology) but also elements that we would more generally place in the spiritual category. They are psycho-spiritual; our progress through them requires an integrated approach that uses both psychology and spirituality. We can see that strata 7 through 9 are concerned mainly with the realms of the spirit.
What we must learn is to stop running away from ourselves. When we see ourselves as we really are—our truth and our falseness—we begin a process of unlearning the habit of abandoning ourselves and of living in illusions, reactions, and defenses.
your Essence already exists entirely and perfectly.
Spiritual work is therefore a matter of subtraction, of letting go; rather than of adding anything to what is already present.
Raising a child is as close as most people get to being in a spiritual school, because parenting is bound to bring up all of one’s own childhood issues.
