The Fourth Way, P.D. Ouspensky
…You must understand that many things you ascribe to things outside you are really in you. Take for instance fear. Fear is independent of things. If you are in a state of fear, you can be afraid of an ashtray… You are afraid, and then you choose what to be afraid of. This fact makes it possible to struggle with these things, because they are in you.
…We often invent objects for an emotion when the emotion is already there. Take envy, fear, suspicion. We think the emotion is produced in us by something outside, when in reality it is in us, we only look for an object afterwards, and in this way we justify it.
…If you observe yourself, you will see. Causes outside remain the same, but sometimes they produce negative emotion in you, sometimes not. Why? Because real causes are in you, there are only apparent causes outside. If you are in a good state, if you are remembering yourself, if you are not identifying, then nothing that happens outside (relatively speaking, for I do not mean catastrophes) can produce a negative emotion in you… It is a question of observation. —Chapter XIV
The Reality of Being
This ordinary “I,” our ego…has a fear of being nothing. Is not identification, at its core, based on fear? —119. The affirmation of my self
…(S)o long as our total consciousness has not been liberated from fear, we will not be able to go very far, to penetrate deeply in ourselves. By its very nature fear is inevitably opposed to our entire search… When we give our total attention to the present, when we are wholly present, fear does not exist… If we wish to penetrate deeply in ourselves and see what is here and even beyond, we must have no fear of any kind, not of failure or of suffering, and above all not fear of death. —74. Free of fear and illusion
Gurdjieff’s Emissary in New York: Talks and Lectures with A.R. Orage 1924-1931
…The ordinary fear of death is a lower emotion because it is concerned with what will happen to the body. But the fear of what will happen to “I” after death is a higher emotion. All higher emotions are related to “I.” —Monday, 26 April 1926
G.I. Gurdjieff Paris Meetings 1943
Gurdjieff: …I can always be afraid, but this fear must not take over completely… It must not have any influence over the rest. My body was afraid, but not me; whereas you, you yourself become fear – your whole presence is nothing but fear.
This happens because your head is not independent, not detached, not free from the rest. Your head is your ‘self’. It is your Reason. That is where your intelligence is. This is your individuality. Everyone has a body, everyone has feeling, but rare are those who have a head that lives an independent life—free, never influenced. Only the head can be just; only the head can be impartial. The head must have the initiative, whereas with you at present, it’s all the rest that has the initiative. And the rest is shit, a piece of meat.
For you, at present, the head must be… a watch man, always turned inward to see with inner sight and to know these two parts: body and feeling… Only then will it be able to play its role, which is to direct, to initiate. —Thursday, June 9
Meetings with G.I. Gurdjieff in Paris 1944
Mr. Gurdjieff: You…have logic. …The logic is weak. It has become a function of your organism. On the contrary… the organism… must submit, and become a function of your logic… Like a child’s consciousness, the organism can be afraid. For example… to eat well…is its first pleasure, its first aim, its first weakness… (I)f you refuse it food once, twice, then it will get scared… Whether it likes it or not, it will submit… But your logic is afraid, and you are the slave of your organism. Today it is your conscious mind that is afraid…
To overcome this requires periods of special work… If it continues like this, you will die as a slave. If you want another future… logic must acquire authority. You must get the body used to fear. It’s difficult… (Y)ou must decide with your head and make it a slave. You have been spoiled your whole life. It’s your fault. Pay. You have always been satisfied. Pay with dissatisfaction. And look at your body as a foreign person. Submit it bit by bit. There are a lot of ways to submit it. The program is easy. What does it like? Eating, dreaming, sex. (T)o discipline it you just have to focus your program on these three things. Not always the same. In the morning one and in the evening another. —Thursday June 1, 1944
Psychological Commentaries on the Teaching of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky, M. Nicoll
A man may act from fear—fear of law, fear of reputation, fear of opinion. Then he acts from outside. Or he may act from ambition—and many other similar forms of self-interest. Or he may act from good—from seeing the good of acting so. This develops the internal man… All the instructions of the Work are about one’s psychic life, which is in chaos. In this way, self-observation becomes deeper, and the valuation of the Work becomes more and more internal. So the Work begins to act on Essence—on what is the real part of a man. —Vol 1, Birdlip, January 9, 1943, Self-Observation
…(F)ear does not develop the understanding… (F)or then Man would be…forced from outside. But that is not understanding, which depends on your seeing the meaning of something for yourself. And to see the meaning of something is internal, and develops the internal side of a man, so that it becomes stronger than the outer, life-driven side. —Vol 1, Birdlip, February 8, 1943, Thinking From Life and Thinking From the Work – Paper II