Reclusland

Just finished reading an amazing article on Virgina Woolf, where it mentioned a book called “The Illusion of Conscious Will” by Daniel M. Wegner.  It intrigued my enough that I ordered a used copy right away, but while doing a little research, I found this short summary (PDF) of the book that includes this:

Wegner sometimes describes this as the thesis that the will is epiphenomenal; but that it misleading since on his account acts of will can have causal consequences. The central point is rather that they never directly cause actions, but can do so only indirectly, via other effects on the agent. He compares them to a compass. The compass doesn’t directly steer the ship. Instead it indicates the direction that the ship is taking, and may thus indirectly affect its direction via its effects on the pilot.

This excites me.  Plus the idea that it’s not so easy to consciously choose to do something fits in with my Gurdjieff studies as well.

Just thought this was awesome.

Drawing of a magnetic field by René Descartes, from his Principia Philosophiae, 1644.
This was one of the first drawings of the concept of a magnetic field.

The inner “I” is in touch with reality but cannot see outside of it.

The outer “I” is aware of possibilities, but loses touch with the real.

Oh, this fourth dimensional existence!

What can we do but partake in the active while keeping within the passive?

From this then, perhaps the fruit will come forth,

and then can the fattened calf be killed for the feast.

“You sit around waiting for pearls when what you should actually be doing is not to be swine.”

(from here)

There is an entire dimension of Gurdjieff’s own life and words that is generally left untouched or unspoken in the presentation of the Teaching. For instance, Gurdjieff said: “You must pray with your whole presence and with all three centers concentrated on the same thing……From realizing the significance of your neighbor when your attention rests on him, that he will die, pity for him and compassion toward him will arise in you, and finally you will love him; also, by doing this constantly, real faith, conscious faith, will arise in some part of you and spread to other parts, and you will have the possibility of knowing real happiness.”

These words take us beyond the diagrams, the cosmology, the ribald behavior, to a man of authentic and deep spirituality. There are anecdotes from persons close to him, such as J.G. Bennett, that further confirm this fact: there was a side of Gurdjieff that was not known or shared with his students. This man took care of Russian refugees, assisted the local addicts and prostitutes in his Paris neighborhood, was related to the Russian Orthodox Church to such an extent that a priest was at his side when he died.

This was a man who valued real faith so greatly that he had no tolerance for superficial piety or social club religion. Therefore, he took an entirely different approach to share the Teaching, one especially suited to early twentieth century agnostics who were in search of something that could not be identified with external religion. In this way, he was able to reach people who would never have made their way into a transforming spirituality. He bypassed old associations made with the ideas of Christ which automatically cut the seeker off from the life-giving teaching behind the words.

Gurdjieff seems to have been a teacher who was (and still is) often thought of as either just crazy or more a scoundrel than a wise-man.  But as Theodore Nottingham points out in the above interview, there was quite a compassionate side to him, hidden under the masks he chose (for whatever reason) to wear.  This is the sense I get of him and his teachings, the more and more of them I read.