A Record of Meetings held by P.D. Ouspensky - HolyBooks.com

Wednesday. June 18th 1947. (Colet Gardens.)DR. R. [Reading.] One question is: The reason I forget and fail most ofthe time is because my will is too weak. How can I make it stronger?MR. O. That is all we [? are]—weakness, weakness.DR. R. [Reading.] How can we sharpen the memory of the mistakeswe made in the past so that we do not repeat them?MR. O. We may come to it.MR. D. In the past we used to be subject to certain rules in connectionwith your teaching. Do these rules still exist?MR. O. No, nothing exists. They could not be used.MR. D. Do I understand rightly that the rules do not exist any more?MR. O. I don't know what means rules. In any case all that could becalled rules never [? could or did] exist for a long time.Question is what you want.MR. L. I want to know myself.MR. O. Well, that is one. Everybody will want it.MISS D. Life and the laws of life interfere with inner development. Is itpossible in one short span to get free of them?MR. O. Nothing can be in a short time. [To Miss Q.] Have you gotmaterial?MISS Q. People don't seem to know how to approach this matter ofremembering which is so apart from their usual way of living.MR. O. We have to begin. If it is more difficult to begin, how can it beeasier?DR. R. I wonder whether a number of people who wanted the samething could achieve something that one person alone cannot.MR. O. More material. I mean it is necessary to have more material.MR. R. Is there anything one can do at any given moment now tomake sure that one will remember that moment later?MR. O. No, we have nothing of that kind—no help in that way. Eachone must find chief thing for himself—why one cannot remember. [ToMiss Q.] Can you understand it?