Being aware that you are aware and seeing yourself in play, is a skill George Gurdjieff (1866-1949) called “self remembering” but that may have suffered in translation. The ability to see yourself being yourself has been called “witnessing” or the “observer” phenomenon.
Simple as it sounds it is one of the most profound spiritual abilities, denied all but a very few, who take the trouble to learn it.
In the talk I mentioned a PDF file. It’s not fancy but it has all the words you need. You can download it here: scripturesinthemaking.com/downloads/self-remembering-notes.pdf
Great chat, thank you! Sorry I can’t join live but I’m in Australia and deeply value my sleep. Just thought I’d share my adventures with multiple ‘I’s. I was in a Rufus May (I think) training day on Hearing Voices as part of Mental Health education. As I have a party going on in my mind, I asked the questions about what do your voices say, what do they want, what happens if you tell them to just shut up and go away? The room sort of silenced itself, all eyes were upon me and I recall the answer was that these voices won’t go away and say horrible things and make individuals do terrible things. I also asked if it was possible to recruit a new set of personas to overlay the nasty ones and the answer was pretty much no at that time. I’m not sure if this is still the case. Personally I believe an individual can, with persistence, change the mind’s play and get new actors.
Also, me myself and my rowdy mind-mates are having a human experience which requires me to lean into ‘being human’. Therefore, feel all the emotions, even the ones that are ‘negative’ because they are messages of how me and my team are navigating this roller-coaster ride of life, such as it is. Cheers!
This Sunday’s talk, for me, touched on a wide range of experiences. However, I am not sure exactly what the working definition of consciousness was being used. When I was a very young child maybe six or younger, I always thought everything ” had a mind and feelings”. I didn’t want to hurt the small leaves of a bush by picking them off, as some of my friends had been doing and apologised for my young friends treating the bush so disrespectfully. Where those thought came from, as a small child, I don’t know. But the earth, the sky, the trees were very much ” alive” to me although not as humans, or animals but had their own consciousnesses, wants and needs. They liked being happy and safe, like any human or animal that I knew of.
I think appreciating the body is important. Thanking the heart for doing a good job and circulating the blood. Thanking the lungs for the work of breathing and bringing in lots of oxygen. Appreciating the cells and how they automatically know how to repair the body is important to the health of the body. The energy of appreciation is important to the body as much as it is to humans and animals.
I am thinking the above is part of what you were talking about?
I don’t have a religion that is connected to any building or association of humans. My religion is connecting to the Universe and trying to understand how it works and what my function is in the universe. I strive to understand or be aware of what my role is and how my roles change according to the needs of the various environments that I am in, at any one time.
In my search for this understanding, I observed myself, my environment and relationships. I read a lot and experimented with what I read and I admit I am somewhat disappointedly the questions that I had at 16, I still had at 60.
I can remember talking to the “spirits” of the house telling them not to hurt me. I grew up in a somewhat ” haunted” house… perhaps that is why I thought the way I did as a child. I have never been on any type of medication, and I am and always have been emotional and mentally stable as well as logical. Yet, I saw unusual things in my childhood house that I never saw anywhere else, such as a blanket levitating off the bed to the ceiling.
So these strange childhood experiences had me intently observing my environment, and when older, starting around ten or so, spending hours in the library searching for answers.
When I was a young child, and I don;t know where I would have gotten this concept, but I thought some people could read my mind. So when I was walking home from school with my thoughts, and a stranger was walking pass me, I would literally ” stop all thoughts” and have a “blank mind” until the stranger was well beyond me and then I would starting thinking again. What made me think that after fifty of sixty feet the stranger could not now read my thoughts…. I don’t know. My point, is that I could manage my thoughts and stop them at will. It kind of felt like trending water.
During your talk today, I kept thinking what you were describing seemed like being in what some call a mediative state.And when I am in a meditative state and not thinking, other parts of my mind becomes alert, or is able to communicate with the ” Universe” and the “Universe” is able to more clearly communicate with me.
How do you define meditation, or as I define it, thought stopping? Or did I totally misunderstand what you were saying?
Do we have multiple “I”? I am not sure what you mean by that exactly. But I do think we have multiple ” spirits/ consciousnesses communicating with us with, words, symbols, ideas and coincidences.
It sounds like you may have had experiences with “mediums,” and psychics , like some of those in the Spiritual Church,who give “demonstrations”. I would think you might say that these “mediums/ “channelers” have a talent, or have learned to allow the various entities or spirits connected to the “cloud” of their mind to surface to their conscious level and be expressed. I guess I am struggling to understand the statement that people are not conscious that they are not conscious. I am guessing that means they are not aware of the different levels of consciousnesses in the mind cloud, as well as being oblivious to what is happening around them?
Hmm schizophrenia just being more connected to what is in the mind cloud? I will have to think more on that one. There are a lot of crazy humans on earth and some who are dangerously crazy. But then again, I wonder where the terms came from such as :
“out of one’s mind” or lost their mind?
many blessings Dr Keith. And please know that you, and what you are doing are appreciated. Thank you for the Sunday talk.
Keith I enjoy all this stuff, I am usually to busy in the summer time, I would love to listen to all the replays could you send me link to them please, And I’ve wanted to tell you for along time what I saw in Vivians face when we did that eye gazing exercise at your house and I was on listing to you when you were talking about it on your Sunday meeting. What I saw in Vivians face was a Very very old women look and only about a two inch circle on her left eye was the real her the rest of her was an old look. you asked if I saw any thing I said no to you, but I did, then the next morning you said Vivian has to leave her mother is dying, So what does this all mean, was I seeing Vivian growing old or was I seeing her mother. Thanks for everything your a great guy keep up the good work. Gale George
Very good session this time! I’ll be sure to try some of the exercises you suggested.
I didn’t pipe up yesterday during the meeting, but I was going to say that sometimes, when I’m able to observe myself as a third person, I can clearly see how dramatic I (and others around me) can be. It honestly feels like we’re part of a reality show some times :-).