GURDJIEFF, G.I. â Life is real only then, when I am - Integral Book

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my exposition, I made it a custom in the evenings, both when home andwhen traveling, frequently to listen in the presence of others to thereading aloud of my current work.These others were always either former pupils of the Institute foundedby me who still remained with me, or simply old followers of my ideasfrom different countries whom I had accidentally met in my travels orwho, in accordance with an old habit, continued periodically to visit me.My situation at that time, as previously described, I constated andclearly elucidated for myself already in the month of September, andfrom then on I frequently thought and thought about it, with the resultthat finally on the 6th of November I came to the categorical decisionmentioned below.So now, after everything which has been explained by me, I thinkalready any reader can easily represent to himself what a dilemma thenarose for me, when, after working for almost three years withunimaginable difficulties and being ready to die happily, I certainly andclearly understood, without doubt, that, of these writings of mine,people who did not know me personally could understand absolutelynothing.My categorical decision, to which I came on the 6th of November,1927, consisted in the following:To mobilize all the capacities and possibilities in my common presence,both those personally achieved and those inherited, and until themoment of the arrival of the next new year, which moment is that of myappearance on God's Earth, to discover some possible means ofsatisfactorily emerging from such a situation.
If unable to discover this means, then, on the evening of the last day ofthe old year, to begin to destroy all my writings, calculating the time soas, at midnight with the last page, to destroy myself also.From that day on, while trying outwardly to live and work just as beforeso that my unusual state should not be noticed by the peoplesurrounding me, I directed my thoughts only to this question of how toemerge from my desperate situation.As my intentional mentation about this was very intense, in a day or twoall the thoughts transpiring in me automatically began also to flowexclusively in connection with this question.Time went on. . . . The Christmas holidays were nearing.Engulfed introspectively at all times in such thought, I becameperceptibly thinner and more feeble, and what's more, in addition to this,there for some reason began to reappear in me the consequences of myformer ailments contracted many years before.I remember very well that once during that period, while physicallyfagged to exhaustion because of a just-completed perilous descent in anautomobile over a glacier pass in the Pyrenees, sitting in someprovincial hole of a cafe, I put reproachfully to myself the followingquestion:"What now, exactly, will it be necessary for me to do so that first of all Imyself may be completely satisfied with my writing and, secondly, thatcompletely corresponding conditions may be created for its spreading?"To this concrete question, I, after draining a great number of glasses ofthe local "delight" called Armagnac and after suffi-
Page 4 and 5: PREFATORY NOTE Although this text i
Page 6 and 7: Tales to His Grandson, that the Thi
Page 8 and 9: first thing, is to prepare a nucleu
Page 10 and 11: PROLOGUE I am. . .? But what has be
Page 12 and 13: "black" thoughts, I had decided to
Page 14 and 15: with the impressions with which dif
Page 16 and 17: It would, strictly speaking, even b
Page 18 and 19: Under such conditions of tension ye
Page 20 and 21: Only the next morning, when it bega
Page 22 and 23: On this original instrument I then
Page 24 and 25: And I also knew that the reason for
Page 26 and 27: there, then also in an almost delir
Page 28 and 29: Instead of lying down to sleep awhi
Page 30 and 31: I could not attain the state of "re
Page 32 and 33: The difference between Him and my s
Page 34 and 35: always in my various general states
Page 36 and 37: Even my propensity during this peri
Page 38 and 39: physical body of mine, but sucked f
Page 40 and 41: From such a "promenade," it was dis
Page 44 and 45: ciently long and serious mentation,
Page 46 and 47: First to die, from a long-standing
Page 48 and 49: The fact is that my mother knew not
Page 50 and 51: I began once more to remember these
Page 52 and 53: From the very beginning, from the 1
Page 54 and 55: already here, that, in their compos
Page 56 and 57: All three of the aims, self-imposed
Page 58 and 59: So, thanks to this, the third reaso
Page 60 and 61: Although all the strange will-tasks
Page 62 and 63: wits got together purposely to thin
Page 64 and 65: which follow almost all the misunde
Page 66 and 67: INTRODUCTIONNovember 6th, 1934Child
Page 68 and 69: y me at the end of 1930 and the beg
Page 70 and 71: As the mention of such a free attit
Page 72 and 73: as a supplement to the used-up prod
Page 74 and 75: The result of this was that at subs
Page 76 and 77: opinion, generally for every reader
Page 78 and 79: Expecting with indubitable certaint
Page 80 and 81: "I am not yet certain if it really
Page 82 and 83: FIRST TALKdelivered by me on Novemb
Page 84 and 85: life of people by means of the Inst
Page 86 and 87: of achievement of the required data
Page 88 and 89: advice and direction concerning sev
Page 90 and 91: Coming Good, was first noticed by t
Page 92 and 93:
ing himself with his whole being of
Page 94 and 95:
standings which had an equal relati
Page 96 and 97:
data for their psychic functioning,
Page 98 and 99:
SECOND TALKdelivered by me in the s
Page 100 and 101:
other "a flea on a chain," I consid
Page 102 and 103:
enthusiasm was that during our stay
Page 104 and 105:
as much as my deep occupation with
Page 106 and 107:
during these years, I want, simulta
Page 108 and 109:
actualized and which could contribu
Page 110 and 111:
the former group, a list of whose n
Page 112 and 113:
fulfilling of which advice may alon
Page 114 and 115:
wrote after I had very definitely s
Page 116 and 117:
of all sorts of blind events and as
Page 118 and 119:
strength always and in everything,
Page 120 and 121:
whole lexicon of words in the Engli
Page 122 and 123:
to concentrate each separate part s
Page 124 and 125:
and the third part should follow th
Page 126 and 127:
FOURTH TALKdelivered by me on Decem
Page 128 and 129:
discussions and deliberations of th
Page 130 and 131:
ers of his group, but all at once,
Page 132 and 133:
what Mr. Gurdjieff has said here in
Page 134 and 135:
my head in the cushions which, by t
Page 136 and 137:
those who belonged to the second gr
Page 138 and 139:
inherent only in man, I wish to giv
Page 140 and 141:
FIFTH TALKto the same group on Dece
Page 142 and 143:
in people in general, particularly
Page 144 and 145:
At the beginning it is necessary to
Page 146 and 147:
In my opinion, it is only by fulfil
Page 148 and 149:
phenomenal stupidity of people who
Page 150 and 151:
ciations automatically flowing in m
Page 152 and 153:
THE OUTER AND INNER WORLD OF MAN Al
Page 154 and 155:
presence of a man who has attained
Page 156 and 157:
presence of man, ordinarily perceiv
Page 158 and 159:
part of the brain, the second, in a
Page 160 and 161:
Work went so well that by nine o'cl
Page 162 and 163:
woke up my secretary who was sleepi
Page 164 and 165:
as soon as I should begin the writi
Page 166 and 167:
was not a 'blood brother' of his an
Page 168 and 169:
"All present sat or kneeled quietly
Page 170 and 171:
In short, irrespective of my unquen
Page 172 and 173:
I took The New York Times, a huge,
Page 174 and 175:
THE OUTER AND INNER WORLD OF MANTHE
Page 176 and 177:
logical Clinic for the Aged of the
Page 178 and 179:
in general and of its separate impo
Page 180 and 181:
which have already been mentioned.O
Page 182 and 183:
The first is the outer world—in o
Page 184 and 185:
This principle, which is beyond sci
Page 186:
And as soon as a man begins to thin
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GURDJIEFF, G.I. â Life is real only then, when I am - Integral Book