Mme. de Salzmann:
…Since we entered the Work, we have known the idea of self-remembering, and we have tried to remember ourselves. We have accepted this idea. It has a certain place in our lives, especially in our thinking. Yet it has remained only an idea. It is not alive, it does not apply to our whole life. We do not live the teaching. The different parts of ourselves are not profoundly touched by this idea. They remain unengaged, unconcerned. —The Reality of Being, 138. Conscience
Mr. Gurdjieff:
As a rule, at every moment of our life only one center works in us—either mind or feeling… By itself a center has no consciousness, no memory; it is a chunk of a particular kind of meat… an organ, a certain combination of substances which merely possesses a special capacity of recording.
Indeed it greatly resembles the coating of a recording tape. If I say something to it, it can later repeat it. It is completely…organically mechanical. All centers differ slightly as to their substance, but their properties are the same.
…(A) center…believes. But it does not understand… It will not change in a…thousand years—it will always remain the same. Our mind has no critical faculty in itself, no consciousness, nothing. And all the other centers are the same.
What then is our consciousness, our memory, our critical faculty? It’s very simple. It is when one center specially watches another, when it sees and feels what is going on there and, seeing it, records it all within itself. —Views From the Real World, New York, February 24, 1924 – Influences
(S)elf-consciousness…is the moment when a man is aware both of himself and of his machine. We have it in flashes, but only in flashes. There are moments when you become aware, not only of what you are doing, but also of yourself doing it. You see both ‘I’ and the ‘here’ of ‘I am here’ both the anger and the ‘I’ that is angry. Call this self-remembering, if you like. —Views From the Real World, London, 1922
For primary exercises in self-remembering the participation of all three centers is necessary… it is necessary to have simultaneously both feeling and sensation.
We can come to this exercise only with the participation of thought. The first thing is thought. We already know this… —Views From the Real World, Prieuré, January 20, 1923
This mind of ours wants to do something, has set itself the task of working differently from the way it worked before, of remembering itself. All the interests we have related to self-change, self-alteration…are only mental.
As regards feeling and body—these parts are not in the least interested in putting self-remembering into practice. And yet the main thing is to change not in the mind, but in the parts that are not interested.
When we say “remember yourself,” we mean yourself. But we ourselves, my “I,” are—my feelings, my body, my sensations. I myself am not my mind, not my thought. Our mind is not us—it is merely a small part of us… If our body and feelings receive for their existence the necessary energy and various elements in the proportion of say, twenty parts, our mind receives only one part… The part which receives more material has more attention.
Since our mind is fed by less material, its attention, that is, its memory, is short… (I)f we wish… to remember ourselves only with our mind, we shall be unable to remember ourselves longer than our material allows, no matter how much …we may wish it… When this material is spent, our attention vanishes.
It is exactly like an accumulator for lighting purposes. It will make a lamp burn as long as it is charged…
But it is possible to increase our self-remembering…by bringing in other parts with their own accumulators and making them participate in the general work. If this is achieved, all our parts will lend a hand and mutually help one another in keeping the desired general light burning…
I must admit that the greater part of our total “I” is not in the least interested in self-remembering… it does not even suspect the existence of this desire in its brother—thought. Consequently we must try to acquaint them with these desires. If they conceive a desire to work in this direction, half the work is done; we can begin teaching and helping them.
It should be pointed out here that self-remembering, however full and whole, can be of two kinds…remembering oneself consciously and remembering oneself by associations. Mechanical…associative self-remembering can bring no essential profit… Views From the Real World —Prieuré, January 19, 1923 “To all my questions…”
…You must get used to consciously remembering. You will only get there by making it your task to remember yourself with your full presence…and say, “I am”… What matters is to do it consciously…
…that is, by your own decision. To remember yourself and at the same time to come together, to enter deeply into yourself, whatever the conditions. If you can’t last long, do it for a short time. —Meetings with G.I. Gurdjieff in Paris, 1944, Thursday August 3, 1944
Mme. de Salzmann:
Our effort must always be clear—to be present, that is, to begin to remember myself. With the attention divided, I am present in two directions, as present as I can be. My attention is engaged in two opposite directions, and I am at the center. This is the act of self-remembering. —The Reality of Being, 5. Where our attention is
It is not necessary to come always to an exalted state… Simply remaining above the level of sleep—a little higher but in a way that has some stability—is itself extraordinary… —The Reality of Being, 45. To “know myself”