Divided Attention and the Search for Self

Stephen Aronson
Introduction: Gurdjieffs ContributionDivided Attention

The four century old conflict between religion and science has fragmented our ability to integrate
the reality of consciousness with the discernible laws governing the measurable Universe. There is
a Ghost in the Machine that, until acknowledged, will continue to be the missing link in our understanding of the true nature of both the Universe and ourselves as a sentient part of the Creation.1
G.I. Gurdjieff advises that one of our tasks is to connect the science of the West with the wisdom
of the East. This means for us practically that we have to connect the ideas and general structure of
the Work by making parallels with similar scientific ideas that exist at present. 2
Gurdjieff told Ouspensky,
.... the study of oneself must go side by side with the study of the fundamental
laws of the universe.

In right knowledge the study of man must proceed on parallel with the study of
the world, and the study of the world must run parallel with the study of man. Laws
are everywhere the same, in the world as well as in man.

The parallel study of the world and of man shows the student the fundamental unity of everything and helps him to find analogies in phenomena of different
orders.3
By bringing the recognition of relativity to the search for Self, both the world of spirit and the world
reachable to science, can be blended through the scientific method of observation, experimentation
and confirmation.
Gurdjieff, like other messengers throughout time, advised that the foundation of this understanding
required one to Know Thyself and that through meditation lay the pathway to the mystery of this
Self, as well as a deeper understanding of the Universe of which it is a part.
Meditation as a means of transformation can be found in all traditions, but in the experience of the
author, the integration and wholeness of Gurdjieffs approach seems uniquely suited for the modern
Western culture with its emphasis on rationality. Acknowledging the difficulty for mans search imposed by the complexity of the modern world, Gurdjieff said his teaching brought the possibility of
more rapid psycho-transformation than traditional Ways and could be practiced in each and every
moment within the flow of daily life, The foundation of this approach lies in Gurdjieffs modern version of divided attention.
This exploration represents the subjective experiences of the author in his search for Self through
the guidance of Gurdjieffs work, particularly the practice of divided attention.

Beyond ConditioningThe Mystery of Interior Sight

There is a deep level of mystery that is discernible even in ordinary life. We can occasionally realize what we are thinking, occasionally recognize we are lying to ourselves, see our daydreams,
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experience an insight that shifts our orientation. Something lies within our psychological experience that appears to operate from beyond the conditioned neurological-biochemical-material three
brains within the body. This something appears unexpectedly for brief moments, offering the
possibility of escape from the trap of a conditioned mind. Part of the illusion created by our programed reactions is the belief that we operate out of this freer something on a regular basis. In fact,
the moments spent in this freer state are rare and brief. Meditation is the pathway to strengthening
and training of this higher something, or our connection with it. Without this as foundation, there
is no possibility of freedom sufficient to begin to know thyself.
Studying these processes, learning what is and what is not possible, requires attention. How to bring
the correct quality of attention, for sufficient duration, to focus in the correct direction with an understanding of what to look for, is a process that can only be discovered by the individual through
solitary effort. Direction for the study of ones interior experiential world requires the training of a
special type of attention.

Qualities of Attention

According to Gurdjieff, attention comes in three basic varieties or qualities. The most prevalent is
a mechanical attention with no real will of its own. It is free floating, undirected and distributed
like heat. It will be automatically pulled towards the nearest, strongest attractor at the moment,
then fall, over and over, again toward the next thing that captures the attention. It is mechanical
because there is no plan or intent behind it. Buddhism calls this monkey mind. Everyone knows,
and has wrestled with this level of distractibility. We say, The lights are on but nobody is home.
Often we cannot recall afterwards what it was we were listening to, looking at, thinking during this
period of random association, nor what happened to trigger it. This is the normal state of attention
the vast majority of time.
Occasionally, an attractor of sufficient interest engages us emotionally and we are caught, riveted, held by our interest for long periods of time, sometimes even against our will. This is a focused
attention out of the ordinary. We can experience this with a book, a movie, a morbid situation, a car
crash, sexual images, something fascinating to such a degree we become oblivious to our surrounds,
even to the point of not hearing our name called. This type of attention can be called emotional. It
has an aim, but the aim comes from the fascination with the attractor. It is not predetermined ahead
of time, or held in place, by ones own will.
The third, and most rare, type of attention is that which is directed by ones own decision prior to
the contact with the object of attention. A continual effort must be made to maintain the focus of
attention against the pull of the mechanical and emotional levels. Attention must be sustained by
the force of ones own choice and effort. It is usually brief in duration, and must be continually renewed. 4 What seems to lie behind the effort to focus directed attention is the mysterious something
that can occasionally see into the mind and feelings from beyond the usual conditioned habits.

Training Attention

In traditional meditation, it is this something that is engaged to initiate and direct its focus on a
mantra, using the mantra as home base, its point of stability. By choosing this focal point, the directed attention is engaged. The frequent mechanical drift away from the mantra is sooner noticed
and a directed return of attention to the focal point easier to reinitiate. The mantra is typically a
sound, image or sensation, such as the breath or prayer of a neutral to positive emotional quality.
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Divided Attention and Search for Self

Making this quality the object of attention decreases, or even eliminates for a while, negative thinking and feelings that trigger physiological stress responses in the first and second brain. With this
hiatus in the usual flow of conditioned experiences, negativity, worry, complaining, planning,
reviewing conversations past or rehearsal, the three brains begin to quiet and the experience of
relaxation begins. This respite in psychosomatic tension is beneficial for health and trains a person
to learn to use directed attention for relief from conditioned thinking and reactions to life, real and
imagined. Practiced for a long time, the resultant tranquility may lead to deeper understanding
of ones hidden nature, and in some traditions, to degrees of liberation from illusions of life and
ordinary self.

Restructuring the Brain

Psycho-neurological research has confirmed that the underlying mechanism for learning rests on
the plasticity of the brain. When presented with new information or experiences, the brain literally
begins to rewire neuronal connections to accommodate the new task. If that rewiring does not take
place, there is no learning. Our brains are continually altering their physical structure in response
to experience. The brains of meditators reflect changes from the activity and are different from the
brains of non-meditators. We not only change our minds, but we literally change our brains to do
so. Because of this fact, the great meditative traditions have found a way to transform their practitioners into types of people different from the ordinary. 5
Through meditation the attention can become steadier, more capable of sustained focus, less susceptible to being continually drawn in to conditioned pathways organized around worry, resentment, living in the past or future. One is better able to focus on what is actually happening in the
moment with less mental/emotional overlay from memories of the past or speculation about the
future, which distort the accuracy of interpreting the actual moment at hand.

Divided Attention

To bring a practice that offered the possibility of more rapid psycho-transformation and could be
practiced in the flow of daily life, Gurdjieff suggested using directed attention, as is done in other
practices, but rather than a single focal point, dividing attention onto two or more points simultaneously as is also done in some Buddhist practices. Using the interior of the body as a starting point,
attention can be grounded in one or more locations by engaging sensation as the link. Holding open
a space between the director/observer of attention and one or more sensitized points inside the body,
allows an experience of the observer as distinct from the body. Attention can then be directed onto
thoughts, feelings, and attitudes, simultaneously while holding open this space. The experiential
distance between observer and observed allows the possibility of noticing qualities of subjectivity
within the thoughts, feelings, attitudes, interpretations that make up the stream of activity typically
understood as oneself. As the limitation and subjectivity of the content of these psychic processes are recognized, deeper levels of sincerity and objectivity can arise. Knowing thyself means first
learning what is not thyself, but rather a mechanical pattern of psychological/emotional/muscular
reactions and responses to the conditioning mechanism of life. A separation of the wheat from the
chaff requires an instrument of separation.
Gurdjieff also suggests using the potential of divided attention to look inside and outside at the
same time, what his pupil Peter Ouspensky called a double-headed arrow.6 How else could one discover a more accurate understanding of why ones life is the way it seems to be than by learning
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to watch oneself in life, in the moment, as if one were watching another person? By developing
directed attention to watch what we believe constitutes oneselfthe interior psychological/emotional responses described abovewhile at the same time watching the world immediately outside
interacting with this oneself, the interaction between life and ones responses become visible. The
pattern of ones life becomes understandable as dependent on the pattern of ones thoughts, assumptions, attitudes, interpretations of meaning. The subjectiveness, arbitrariness, unnecessariness of
many of these reactions becomes apparent. With the seeing of these links from this different perspective, something may begin to change. A different relationship, a different understanding begins
to form.
The experience of working with divided attention focused on our outside movements and vocalizations, simultaneously with our interior psychological states, brings into view the question of what is
directing the directed attention? What is making the decisions regarding the objects of focus? What
is absorbing and learning from the new impressions flowing in from this new observational system?
Can attention be directed deeper to see the source of its direction?

The Mysterious Something and Sense of Self

Life is experienced through sensory organs, hormonal fluctuations labeled as emotion, electromagnetic activity of thoughts, images, memoriesthe building blocks of realityare all internal phenomenon experienced by ........ by what? I use the term myself, but what do I really understand about
this something I call myself? The question is critical. This myself is the instrument that perceives,
interprets and reacts to its beliefs about what is real, including its sense and assessment of itself. If
there are flaws in this instrument, its conclusions about reality, as well as itself, will be incorrect. If
the instrument may not be trustworthy, how can the instrument investigate itself? Is there anything
within, other than the instrument? What is even raising the question? Is the instrument doubting
itself?
Our multi-layered, three centered system of thinking, feelings, sensing is differentially sensitive
to different electromagnetic frequencies outside and inside ourselves, has three interactive, but distinctively different components with different functions in different arenas of data collection. One
of the powers of directed divided attention lies in the potential to see, and therefore meditate
intentionally, in all three brains, or centers, simultaneously. Among the names Gurdjieff gives this
power are Active Mentation and all-brained-balanced-being-perceptiveness. 7 This experience can
confirm experientially that the idea of our being three brained beings is literal, and not only metaphorical.
If the question of Who am I is to be pursued, clues must be sought in all three brains, as together,
they comprise a more whole picture of what is. Literally, to become more of One Mind requires
capacity to see into the interaction of all three areas of functionality, each with the world it looks
into, and simultaneously their interaction with each other.

Divided AttentionA New Instrument

For a useful contemporary analogy we could use the Hubble Telescope. The instrument is comprised
of sub-instruments, each collecting data from different frequencies of the electromagnetic spectrum which can then be overlapped to show a more complex picture of what is out there. There is
always more data to discover if there is an instrument to see into the frequency that carries that
additional level of information.
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Divided Attention and Search for Self

Since a human being has different instruments, each of which bring information from different
levels of vibration out there and in here,to know oneself demands a capacity to discriminate,
reconstruct and combine these different data streams to form a more whole picture. The external
sensory system automatically does this through the body and nervous system. What we experience
as the world outside depends on what levels of the electromagnetic spectrum our sense organs can
capture.
Then, to connect the dots into patterns of meaning, data must pass through the interpretive filters
of feeling and thinking. To understand who I am, requires noticing how my interpretive filter works,
where it is more or less trustworthy depending on its conditioned biases. Turned inwards towards
the question of who I am, produces conflicting opinions and feelings about myself. How can I see
my own biases? What instrument can discern that?
Using again the Hubble telescope as analogy, each of the separate brain-instruments returns its data
to a central location where it can be combined. Our brain as a whole automatically sees an integrated
picture, not its fragmented components. When attention is intentionally divided and directed to
collect data from each of the separate areas of brain functionality, and that data is returned, simultaneously, back to the single point which has directed the multi-dimensional viewing, a combined
picture of the three levels of reality can be consciously perceived in the moment. Discrepancies
and similarities between the overlapping views can be discerned. A higher level of discrimination
and interpretation can then appear with this improved, multi-layered image. One can begin to see
patterns of interaction, consistencies and inconsistencies between the impressions and interpretations of the three brains.

Accepting Ones Fragmentation

To know who I am, requires an ability and willingness to see the discrepancies between these different world views of each of center. We all know the state of being of two minds or recognizing
my heart and head to not agree or the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. If I dont recognize
that my three brains each have their own agenda, rarely communicate with each other, then I cannot
understand my contradictions or incapacities. Worse, if I do not see my own fragmentation, then I
will only self-righteously notice inconsistencies in others.
The major source of input for this multi-brained sensory experience is, of course, the world of people, events and landscapes outside our physical bodies. This outer world that appears so real and
solid to us is actually as multi-layered as our interior experiential domain. Our eyes receive light
from the sun, reflected off the surfaces. These reflected photons are transformed into visual images
in our brain. Sound is the auditory image formed in the brain from the transformation of pressure
waves moving air molecules against our eardrums. Smell and taste are experiences of nearly infinite
mixtures of molecules touching the interior of our nose and mouths. Touch is a tactile image processed through pressure against the skin. All these impressions are then transformed into electrical impulses. The meaning of this image depends on our interpretation. If the three centers do not
coordinate their perspectives, if there is no central location where their individual contributions
can be experienced as an integrated whole, significant errors in interpretation of self and others are
inevitable with little chance of correction.

ALL and Everything 2014

A New Attitude

The search for Self necessitates a way of watching the interplay between apparent events in the
world outside and the interior reactions and interpretations of the assumed meaning of those
events. Ideally, this two field watching should occur simultaneously, although it can also be recombined intentionally again for later viewing. The experience will inevitably produce surprising
results. Many of these results will not conform to the current image of myself. I must be prepared
to discover I am not the person presumed in the image.
The necessity to do so, Gurdjieff calls the individual collision defined as the shock experienced
between what is anticipated and what actually happens and says this should lead to the Divine
property ... impartiality. and a correct evaluation of the essential significant of their own presence,
..... [and] ... corresponding place for themselves in these common-cosmic actualizations. 8
To search for Self requires acceptance that one does not know the Self and that the current image
of self is erroneous. This practice requires effort, persistence, and tolerance for surprising or uncomfortable discoveries. This requires a change in attitude, a quality of impartiality to the subjective reactions encountered in the psychic world. If these building blocks of attributed meaning are
incomplete or distorted, the meanings ascribed to be the basis of ones life will be capricious and
accidental.

A Scientific Approach to Inner Search

One of the problems in the search of knowledge of Self, is the ease of self-deception, satisfaction
with ideas read or talked about but without personal confirmation. The practice of directed, divided
attention can provide conditions for such confirmation. It is a practice modeled on the scientific
method of repeated observation and experimentation before an idea is accepted as a predicable
means of organizing perception. The first way to begin to explore ones understanding of reality
is to temporarily suspend belief in whatever has not been personally confirmed. This is not to say
that we can experience everything that may be true, but rather to challenge oneself to discriminate
between what is personally experienced and information heard or read about. What do I actually
know for myself from my own experience? The rest is hearsay, even if some of it is actually true. This
is prerequisite for what Gurdjieff calls Pondering, an activity which is engaged by men practicing
Being-Partkdolgduty, all messengers from above, higher-being-bodies and endlessness himself.9
Experience is foundation for Understanding. For example, what do I personally understand about
the Sun? I have read a lot. I have seen video and heard scientists talk about the Sun and its processes.
But, what do I personally understand through direct experience? I understand it is a very bright
light, too bright to look at unless directly on the horizon or behind clouds. It looks circular and flat.
It moves across the sky and changes rising and setting positions along the horizon as the seasons
change. It hurts my eyes if I try to look directly at it. I feel heat on some days that seems to be related
to this round bright light. Thats it. That is all I personally understand through direct experience. All
the rest is theory and hearsay. The information obtained by scientific instruments may be correct,
but I have not personally confirmed it.10
If I want to know myself, I must bring this same attitude of separating what I have been told or
thought about myself from what I can actually verify. Impressions must be viewed without bias.
If something is perceived, it is part of the landscape surrounding the perceiver. If I sense the interior of my right foot, there is a clear impression that, although this is my foot, I am not my foot.
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Divided Attention and Search for Self

The foot is part of my body, but is not the me that is sensing it. If there is a noticing of an attitude,
mood of appreciation or disinterest, these are feeling states in the emotional world. I am aware of
them, but if noticed as a phenomena existing in the moment, if understood within the context of its
history and how it has been triggered in the moment, it is clearly not me, the perceiver. If a thought
is noticed, inner talking heard in the head, a daydream forming, and is recognized as a separate and
temporary activity in the mind, then it can be recognized as separate from the observer of it. Buddhism offers the observation that, I have a body, but I am not my body. I have feelings but I am not
my feelings. I have thoughts but I am not my thoughts. When the three data streams from body,
emotions and thoughts converge into a multi-layered image within the receiving Hubble Telescope
of our deeper perspective, the recognition of what I am NOT can begin to penetrate and change
the understanding of this mysterious question. Whatever can be noticed in my world of sensation,
feeling and thought, is NOT the me having the experience of it. By eliminating what is not me, but
rather phenomena now perceived within my expanded sphere of attention, I begin to back into the
deeper mystery.

As Above So Below
The current search in Cosmology for a Unified Theory of Everything, can study the physical body of
the Universe, the functioning and mutual influence of material objects and posit the energy patterns
and underlying laws hidden from view, which organize what can be seen, weighed and measured. If
Man is a something composed of at least three levels, so must the Universe be a something composed of multiple levels.
What has organized and holds the contents of the Universe in their patterns is only partly understood.11 Currently there is a search for presumed dark matter and dark energy that is hypothesized
to make up the bulk of its invisible mass and energy. This may or may not exist, but what is currently
lacking in consideration of a Unified Theory of Everything is the question of subjective experience,
consciousness in its different levels. As our material form occupies a certain level of the electromagnetic spectrum, our emotional and conceptual instruments must be presenting phenomena at higher
vibrational levels above the material. Then there is the central observational location, activated by
divided attention, into which flow data from three different levels of the Universe. From this level,
attention can be directed to illuminate and decode information embedded at lower frequencies.
This appears to be a fourth level that can view and understand the levels below it.
Since we know enough about ourselves to recognize layered conscious dimensions of our experience,
there must also be vast dimensions of invisible conscious layers of encoded information within the
Universe. Either that or our consciousness comes from beyond the known Creation. The question,
Who Am I now seems related to the question, What is the Universe? 12

The Mystery of Attention

A further question now appears. All the above described has been experienced through the medium of Attention. Through willing myself to engage in prolonged practice of intentional-directeddivided-attention, the above discoveries and conclusions have appeared before my inner eye. I have
directed attention first into my bodys interior to sense its feel from the inside. Having discovered
that my observational platform is different from the material body it is exploring, I turn my attention to observe thoughts, voices and images moving inside my mind. I can watch them come and go.
When attention is prevented from becoming attached to them, I realize I am inside my brain watch7

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ing its cognitive activities. Again, I seem to be something watching these phenomena. There is the
sense of a little distance from what is being observed. With another effort, I can move directed attention into my chest and solar plexus. Here I have the potential to become aware of feelings, moods,
shifting of emotions. With sufficient practice, these can be observed from a bit of distance also. The
Buddhists are correct. I have a body, feelings and thoughts, but I am not these phenomena.
What then is this I which continually appears in my self description? What is my true nature? 13
Can I use attention to see where the attention is being directed from? My attention seems connected
with this director.
A different question must be asked first. What is Attention? There is no apparent source of light
inside body and brain, so how is it I can see anything? There are no interior sense organs to hear
thoughts, see dreams, feel feelings or sense the interior of my body. It is dark inside the sphere
of attention when it is focused inside me, yet attention illuminates. There seems to be a different
sort of multi-sensory light, a dark light that illuminates whatever it is within its focus. What kind
of light is this?
We have many phrases that recognize this phenomena. Now I see! The light bulb just went on. I
had an insight. Dont you see what I mean? Whatever I turn my attention towards comes into my
sphere of awareness and then I see it. I become aware of it or I remember it. Whatever my attention
is not focused on is lost sight of. It leaves my awareness. Degree of awareness seems dependent
on the circumference and brightness of the beam of attention. It seems that where my attention is,
there I am. If I learn how to divide attention into different directions simultaneously, I can be in
two or more places at the same time. The energy of attention seems to be a form of light! I must be
directing light inside my brain and body to be able to see the inner world of thought, sensation and
feeling.
This mysterious light of attention brings something into the field of awareness. First it was not
noticed and did not exist at the moment in my experience. Then suddenly it appears, as if out of
nowhere. Since what exists for me experientially in any given moment is limited to the sphere and
brightness of my attention, we can say attention brings it into existence for me. It creates in awareness, an image of this something. Then, with more attention, more about this something comes into
awareness. Attention has divided it into different constituent parts for my experiencing. Then, with
more attention, it may take new form, new perspective, turn into new understanding, new knowledge. Attention creates, divides and reconfigures. It is as if Attention eats, digests, then recombines
to create something new from the parts it dismembered. As my body digests food, the processes of
attention seem like digestion for the observer of these processes.
What then can I understand about Attention? It seems like light. It can be directed, divided, expanded and focused. It can act like a transformer, disclosing increasing details, relationships, changing knowledge and understanding. In the act of directing and dividing attention, I know that I am
deciding the direction of the Attention, performing the movement and receiving the information
about the incoming impression, often watching it change its meaning under my gaze. How am I
doing this? How am I directing the light? The light seems part of me. My wish is its command. It
goes where I want it to, stays there as long as I can maintain focus. It brings back information which
transforms understanding. Are Attention and I the same? Am I just so close to it I cant distinguish it
from me? How am I doing this? How am I directing the light? There must be an aspect of I above the
energy level of light. What is above the quantum realm of light? Light appeared with the Creation. Is
the abode of the being of the Director beyond the Universe?
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What Am I?

What then am I? I seem to be both within and without the sphere of awareness, sometimes directing
attention, most times just looking. If Attention is light, then the light is connected to me. I am connected to the light. All I know at this point is that I am both director and receiver of the dark light of
Attention. I cant see myself. I can see that I am not any of the phenomena perceived in the beam of
attention. I am not the body, or the feelings, or the thoughts, all of which I had believed represented
who I was. I seem to have no materiality, only consciousness. What level of the Universe have I awoken into? There seems to be nothing here, yet everything that exists for me is here. In the light of this
darkness, all I know is that, I AM .
In its essence, intentionally directed divided attention facilitates simultaneous perception into multiple levels, suggesting that the inner psychological world of man may become a bridge between the
outer world of the senses and the underlying dynamics of a living, intelligent Universe. Gurdjieff says
that we have within ourselves the potential to experientially participate in this interchange, if we
can awaken from the sleep of illusion and inattention to which we have been conditioned, because
the difference between each of them and our common great Megalocosmos is only in scale. 14
Gurdjieff says in the last chapter of his published works, And thus, every man, if he is just an ordinary
man, that is, one who has never consciously worked on himself, has two worlds and if he worked
on himself, and has become a so to say candidate for another life, he has even three worlds. 15
The desire to know who I am seems now to be a manifestation of the first two worlds, the interest
of personality in its relation to the world outside its body. In the third world, interest in an individual
i-ness seems to disappear. Whatever this sense of enlarged awareness may represent, it does not
seem to have a name or any interest in assigning one. Divided attention is Gurdjieffs offering to us
of a path to our potential for another life.
Stephen Aronson (saronson@maine.rr.com)

Footnotes

1. Koestler, Arthur; The Ghost in the Machine, The MacMillan Company, New York, 1967
2. M. Nicoll, Psychological Commentaries on the Teaching of Gurdjieff & Ouspensky, v.3 p 665
3. Ouspensky, Peter; In Search of the Miraculous: Fragments of an Unknown Teaching; Harcourt, Brace
& World, 1949, pp 89, 122
4. P.D. Ouspensky, The Psychology of Mans Possible Evolution;Knopf, 1974 pp108-111
5. Scientific American, Neuroscientists and the Dali Lama Swap Insights: An Encounter with His
Holiness the Dali Lama and the Scientific study of Meditation;http://scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?d=neuroscientists-dalai-lama-swap-insights- meditation, July 30, 2013
and Mind & Life Institue: http://www.mindandlife.org/
6. Ouspensky, Peter; In Search of the Miraculous, Harcourt, Brace & World, 1949, p 119
7. Gurdieff, G. I.; Beelzebubs Tales to His Grandson: An Objectively Impartial Criticism of the Life of
Man, Penguin Compass, Arkana, 1999
the active mentation in a being and the useful results of such active mentation are in reality actualized exclusively only within the equal-degree functionings
of all his three localizations of the results spiritualized in his presence, call thinkingcenter, feeling-center and moving-motor-center. p 1042
and
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So, when I finally became a responsible being, I decided that before making my
choice among the mentioned sacred ways, I would bring my planetary body into the
state of the sacred Ksherknara. that is, into the state of all-brained-balanced-beingperceptiveness. and only when already in that state, to choose the way for my further
activities. p 354
8. Gurdieff, G. I.; Beelzebubs Tales, pp 755-56
. Likewise, an all-round awareness of everything concerning these sacred
laws also conduces, in general, to this, that three-brained beings irrespective of the
form of their exterior coating, by becoming capable in the presence of all cosmic
factors not depending on them and arising round about themboth the personally
favorable as well as the unfavorableof pondering on the sense of existence, acquire
data for the elucidation and reconciliation in themselves of that what is called, individual collision which often arises, in general, in three-brained beings from the
contradiction between the concrete results flowing from the processes of all the cosmic laws and the results presupposed and even quite surely expected by their what
is called sane-logic; and thus, correctly evaluating the essential significant of their
own presence, they become capable of becoming aware of the genuine corresponding
place for themselves in these common-cosmic actualizations.
In short, the transmutation in themselves of an all-round understanding
of the functioning of both these fundamental sacred laws conduces to this, that in
the common presences of three-brained beings, data are crystallized for engendering
that Divine property which it is indispensable for every normal three- brained being
to have and which exists under the name of Semooniranoos; of this your favorites
have also an approximate representation, and they call it impartiality.
9. Ibid., see below topics

Pondering pp 364, 674, 738, 755, 1124,

Meditation pp 25, 310, 355, 660, 1043, 1131, 1151, 1156, 1162-63, 1186

Mentation pp 777, 1047, 1162, 1165, 1172, 1186
10. Ibid., pp 687, 1166-69, 1209
11. T he Thunderbolts Project, http://www.thunderbolts.info/wp/
12. Aronson, Stephen; Are We the Universe? The Gurdjieff Club, Moscow, Russia
The technology of our new century excites the possibility of probing ever more
deeply into the mystery of existence. As cosmologists search for a theory to unify the
energies underlying the material universe, neuroscientists peer into the patterns of
energies flowing through the human brain looking for clues to the enigma of consciousness. The two directions of search appear opposite, one outward and the other
interior, but is that so? Is that possible? Can a unified field theory of everything,
exclude anything existing? Can we unify our understanding of the universe without
the inclusion of ourselves? Where within a unifying understanding, will we place life
and consciousness? The isness of both commands inclusion in the search for the
ultimate source of All. Without the fact of both, there would be no one to pose the
question.
Consider. If life is not an inherent property of the universe, where did the life
energy come from?

10

Ibid., pp 687, 1209, 1166-9

Divided Attention and Search for Self

If life is not an inherent property of the universe, universal throughout, then

our life energy comes from a dimension outside the universe. Either, the universe
itself is alive, or the universe is livened by something beyond the universe itself.
If the capacity for the subjective experience of sensation is not inherent in the
fabric of the universe, then where did the reactivity to surroundings, displayed by all
life forms and confirmed by all humans, come from?
If intelligence, consciousness, awareness, wish or capacity for will, is not inherent in the fabric of the universe, then where does our intelligence, consciousness,
awareness, wish and capacity for will come from? Either, our subjective experience
is part of the energies constructing and maintaining the universe, or, whatever we
are, lies outside the universe and manifests through penetration. If so, where then
is that place? Either, the universe is conscious, aware and has capacity for will, or,
consciousness enters the universe from somewhere beyond what we know and call
the universe.
Either we are the universe, or, we are something beyond the universe. Either I
am the universe or I am something beyond the universe, imbedded within it, interpenetrated by it, and imbued with its inherent properties or, perhaps, there is no or.
Perhaps both are true.
We make our world by ascribing to it meaning. It is to us what we decide, or
are conditioned to believe, it means. The origin of meaning lies outside what we call
the world, in the invisible, psychological realm of our hearts and minds. Since man
exists in the universe and consciousness exists in man, we cannot unify the universe
without accounting for consciousness. The search out, and the search in, must be
two sides of the same journey.
Stephen Aronson 2010
13. deSalzmann, Jeanne, The Reality of Being: The Fourth Way of Gurdjieff, pp 170-76
14. G.I.Gurdjieff, Beelzebubs Tales to His Grandson, p 775
15. G.I. Gurdjieff, Life is real only then ,when I Am, pp 169-170

REFERENCES: A few of the many sources that influenced the author

A Course In Miracles, Found ation for Inner Peace, 1975
Bohm, David, Thought as a System, Routledge, London and New York, 1994
____Wholeness and the Implicate Order, Routledge, Classics New York and London, 2002
Bennett, J.G. Deeper Man, Claymont Communications, Charles Town, WV
Buzzell, Keith, Man- A Three-Brained Being, Fifth Press, Salt Lake City, 2007
____Reflections on Gurdjieffs Whim, Fifth Press, Salt Lake City, 2012
____A New Conception of God: Further Reflections on Gurdjieffs Whim, Fifth Press, Salt Lake City, 2013
De Salzmann, Jeanne, The Reality of Being: The Fourth Way of Gurdjieff, Shambhala, Boston & NY 2010
Goswami, Amit, Physics of the Soul, Hampton Roads, VA, 2001
Gurdjieff, G.I., Beelzebubs Tales to His Grandson: All and Everything, First Series, Penguin Compass
Arkana 1999
____Life is real only then, when I am, All and Everything, Third Series, Arkana Penguin Books, 1991
11

ALL and Everything 2014

Koestler, Arthur; The Ghost in the Machine, The MacMillan Company, New York, 1967
Krishnamurti, J., The Awakening of Intelligence, Penguin Books
____Krishnamurtis Journal, Harper & Row,Publishers, San Francisco
Malin, Shimon, Nature Loves to Hide: Quantum Physis and the Nature of Reality, a Western Perspective, Oxford University Press, New York, 2001
____ The Eye That Sees Itself, Morning Light Press, ID, 2004
Mind & Life Institue: http://www.mindandlife.org/
Nisargadatta Maharaj, Sri; I Am That, Acorn Press, Durham, NC 1982 1973
Ouspensky, P. D., In Search of the Miraculous: Fragments of an Unknown Teaching, Harcourt, Brace &
World, Inc. New York, 1949
Scientific American, Neuroscientists and the Dali Lama Swap Insights: An Encounter with His
Holiness the Dali Lama and the Scientific study of Meditation; http://scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?d=neuroscientists-dalai-lama-swap-insights- meditation, July 30, 2013
The Thunderbolts Project, http://www.thunderbolts.info/wp/
Tolle, Eckhart, The New Earth, Dutton, 2005
Wertenbaker, Christian, Man in the Cosmos: G.I. Gurdjieff and Modern Science, Codhill Press, 2012

12

Divided Attention and Search for Self

Beelzebubs Tales and In Search
Megalocosmos
Hydrogen
Table

DO

World
One
Absolute
World
Three
Holy Sun
Absolute

World Six

LA
Okidanokh
All Suns
Djarklom
Sun
World 12
First generation
of Suns early
galactic forms

MI

All Planets
World 24

Earth
World 48

la +

sol

fa +

mi +

re

do +

si

sol

fa +

Moon
World 96

H48

Big Bang,
Great Photon,
Highest of
Gamma waves
Appearance of mass,
confinement of
high energies
Nuclear fusion,
creation of the
Periodic Table
of the Elements,
atoms, ions and
simple molecules

H96

mi +

re

do +

~ Life Appears ~

H192

H384

la +

sol

fa +

mi +

re

do

as a case of
persistent
molecular forms
(water, atmosphere
and rocks) plus
resonant energies

H768

H6

H12

Electromagnetic
Force
Photonic
Action

ElectroH24 magnetic
Fields

H48

Ionic
Waves

Will

Attention

Images

Mechanical 2
Thinking

*DO

Impressions
Octave

*DO

Air
Octave

*DO

Food
Octave

H1536

RE

H12

H24

la +

si

Initial Moment
H6

Higher
Degrees
of Reason

Multiverse?/
Alternative
Universes

S P E C T R U M

C r e a t i o n

Heptaparaparshinokh

FA

Prior Universe

S P I R I T U A L

o f

Sacred

SOL

si

Three Foods
of Man

Search for Self

P S Y C H I C

Entry into

do +

Forms of
Energies

E L E C T R O M A G N E T I C

SI

R a y

C
o
m
m
o
n
c
o
s
m
i
c

Modern
Science

H3072

Crystal
molecular forms,
no intrinsic
energies of
transformation
(aside from
radioactivity)

Thanks to Keith Buzzell, Fifth Press, Reflections on Gurdjieffs Whim, A New Conception of God, Further Reflections on Gurdjieffs Whim

Thanks to Keith Buzzell and the Fifth Press for use of an illustration in Reflections on Gurdjieffs
Whim, A New Conception of God, Further Reflections on Gurdjieffs Whim. The yellow highlighted area
is my addition.

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ALL and Everything 2014

Questions & Answers

Aronson (referring to the accompanying diagram): So, I just want to take you on a brief tour of this
before taking questions and answers. I want to thank Keith Buzzell, Bonnie Phillips and Fifth Press
for allowing me not only to use this illustration, but to add two columns of my own.
What we have here is the Ray of Creation (pointing to left side of the illustration). World One Absolute, World Three The Holy Sun Absolute, the entry into existence at World Six, Okidanokh All
Suns, then our Sun World Twelve, first generation of suns early galactic forms, down to the Earth,
down to the Moon.
Here we have (referring to the column marked Hydrogen Table) Gurdjieffs representation of digestion. Starting with the greatest densities, minerals, organic food, water, air, and up at Hydrogen
96 what Keith Buzzell believes are enzymes, what Gurdjieff called the rarefied gases, active elements.
And then he (Gurdjieff) says, above that, (indicating column titled Forms of Energy) are the psychic
and spiritual energies that science knows nothing about. Butwe can know something about that,
because its inside us. Maybe we are it.
So, at level 48, where impressions come in, there seems to be the level of our ordinary consciousness,
which seems to be facilitated by ionic wave forms traveling around the nervous system. Thats the
explanation. Seems to me it must be a little more complex. And then, up at Hydrogen 24 seems to
be where images form, we are able to create pictures. Think about your childhood house right now.
There is the picture. How did you do that?
Hydrogen 12this could be the level of attention, because we know that attention looks down on all
these other phenomena, thinking and imaging, so it has to be higher. What we seem to be looking at,
in term of what modern science knows, is that here we have the ionic wave flow in our nervous system (pointing to ordinary thought at H48), but this may very well be electromagnetic fields (pointing
to images at H24) generated by all these ionic waves working together. And above that is the level of
photonic action. Ionic waves, electromagnetic field, photonsso we are now at the quantum world.
And then, whatever directs attention .... well .... is that the electromagnetic force itself or something
else? Will, attention, images, mechanical thinking (pointing to column Search for Self)digestion
of air, digestion of impressions (pointing to column Three Foods of Man).
So, if you follow (the illustration) across horizontally, that seems to be what level of the Universe
each of those levels represents ...... and they are all in us. But also, we know that we contain crystals
and molecules (pointing to the bottom of the Ray of Creation column) elements of the Earth in our
body ..... all the way up to what might be the level of stars, maybe up to the Big Bang. So, maybe what
a human being is, through these three levels of digestion, we straddle the entire knowable Universe
level by level. But, we dont notice and take it for granted and, instead, we worry about who we are
in relation to what we think other people may think about us.
So, I would love to have a conversation.
Participant: Thank you. Its such a huge mystery, where do we ... hows it possible that we can see
ourselves at all? From where do we see? Im very much reminded of what Mr. Gurdjieff writes in
Beelzebub. He sites his Teskooano on Mars, didnt he? And also on the other planets to look down on
Earth from there. And he also buried one Teskooano in the earth. I am also reminded of the state14

Divided Attention and Search for Self

ment by Meister Eckhart. He said, The eye with which I see God, is the eye with which God see me.
And, I very much appreciate you bringing something of that mystery.
Aronson: But, we are that mystery! You are that mystery! It has seemed to me, for a while now, that
the deeper inside we look, we see ourselves looking out at ourselves looking in. I think Meister Eckhart seems to be correct.
Participant: Thank you very much. What an extraordinary statement, exposition on all your thinking and working on this. What strikes me is that one of the things Madam de Salzmann says is that
the Attention is a Divine force. I hear that in the way you speak of it. And, what I think you would
agree is, speaking of the power of a divided attention, that it depends on a certain intensity, I cant
just suddenly have a divided attention. Maybe thats what Work is all about developing attention, one
could say. And one of the things you didnt speak of which did interest me, was how Gurdjieff defined
attention in the third series. The degree of blending of that which is in the same in the impulses
of observation and constatation in one totalitys processes with that occurring in other totalities.
Could you help us with that?
Aronson: Well, the only help I know with that is the continual practice of divided attention which
can, I think, lead to the experience of exactly what Mr. Gurdjieff has tried to describe. But, in all of
that I keep coming back to the mystery of what is directing the blending? And what is the receiving
point of all that directed blending? That seems to me to be the heart of the matter. So, thank you for
that quote.
Participant: Thanks. Im reminded of the wave-particle duality a little bit here. I feel there is this
logicaland then again I may be sacrilegious in what Im sayingthere is a logical fallacy in saying,
well, if I see it, then I must not be it. But, then if I see that I must be the thing that is not it, then I
must not be that and so going backwards and backwards to a first cause, feels to me like being stuck
in a particle frame of reference. Because, if we could say that consciousness was a phenomenon of a
system and not an object, then would one not have to have an infinite regress? And, it seemed to me
thats what you were saying when you said that, I am the ..... , what I thought I heard you say that,
I must be the place where the three feeds of that information meet and blend together. And so to
have gotten to that place in your discourse, and then said, But if I can see that, then I must not be
that .... again, this may not be what you actually did say. It may be my interpretation of what you did
was. I felt like at that point, Wait! Whoa! So, tell me, did I miss something? Is that ... Where do you
work ... is there anything in what Ive said that makes any sense?
Aronson: Absolutely! And that would be a very reasonable conclusion from how I phrased this. But,
although it does seem that, if I can see that, it is not me .... if I am the field of awareness, it is in me! I
am it. There is nothing separate. And ... a great trick ... if I can divided myself ... if there is a little narrow attention, and then I wake up and I put some attention here and then put some over there, put
some more here..... in one sense Ive divided. But now, if Ive got looking posts out here everything in
the middle is also visible. So, by dividing attention, particulate, were actually expanding attention,
wave. And, like the difficulty with the third force, we are both particle-wave and ... something else.
The digestive process is a wave, waves up and down the electromagnetic spectrum, but maybe the
place where I momentarily find myself seems particulate, because that is where it is and its bounded.
But then later I find myself in other places. So, it seems as if nothing stays still. Everything is in motion. So, everything is a wave, but in the momentalso feel particulate.
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ALL and Everything 2014

Participant: So as you were talking, what I noticed in me was I ..... two things. One, there is a movement to what I would call reductionist thinking like, is it a particle or a wave? How does it all relate?
So there is a part of me that wants to say this and a part of me doesnt. So, what came up for me when
you were speaking that I wanted to ask you about, was the question chaos which came up for me
because it seemed like chaos was an opposite force from attention. Then what came up is a question
around this was related to the problem that His Endlessness had to solve, which was the place of His
existence, or Her existence, was deterioratingchaos. In other words, leading to a running down. I
wanted to ask you a question about that. ..... how you saw that, this chaos, in relation to attention.
But then, I also went to the place of how attention may be related to somehow reconciling this running down with the order. Because, attention feels like an ordering to me emotionally. That there is
an order happening and what our place in that might be.
Aronson: Do you have a couple of hours? (Laughter) Well, I guess when I cannot see a pattern it
seems chaotic to me. Im not a mathematician. I dont understand fractals, but I can look at them.
And it seems as if, as above, so below. That is as one gets far enough out, or close enough in, pattern
re-emerges. There seems to always be information encoded in vibrations, whether we can read it or
not. Attention is the light that can illuminate those patterns, but there has got to be something there
to recognize them.
Participant: Thanks Steven, that was really good. The thing I kept thinking about at the beginning
of your talk was that you were describing attention in self-observation forming an image of myself
and then you took that self away and threw it away. And, I kept thinking thats very paradoxical
because youre talking about observing yourself but every time you form an image of the self youre
observing, you surrender it. You consider it not yourself anymore. So, youre really not observing
yourself anymore. So, as you progressed in your talk and I was wondering how I can I resolve this
language paradox, it seemed to me that in regards to attention, when I form an image of myself that
is, as you say, more accurate ... which I think is an interesting approach to take, I have inaccurate
images of myself, I have accurate images of myself. But if none of them are myself, are any of them
really accurate since myself is always the observer behind them anyway. But, I see that process in
myself, Ive seen it in my life, and I ask myself about what happens with my attention when it happens that suddenly an image of myself that I had been perhaps suppressing or denying or blind to,
presents itself during a moment of self-observation and something happens. For me what happens
is that I see identification and I see that part of my attention has been involved without me knowing
it in maintaining something, and in that moment of this more accurate image, then there is more
attention available. I was wondering if that was something that occurred to you in your description
as well.
Aronson: I think for me, one of the amazing, enzymatic contributions Gurdjieff made is to apply
relativity to all of this. In one way, I am all of this. There is nothing that is not part of me. There
is nothing in the Universe that is not part of the Universe. You cant separate anything in the Universe out of it. So, all these things I see are part of me. They are aspects of the personality, aspects
of conditioning. But the problem is that when the attention becomes too weak and is magnetically
drawn to these aspects, and my opinions about them, and then gets stuck to what is perceived, then
whatever is present to observe, thinks that what It perceives is all that Itself is, or that what It perceives is It, Itself, in Its essence. I propose that It is not that in Its essence at all. In Its essence It is
both that and this. And what we are coming to is to separate our sense of what we are, from these
16

Divided Attention and Search for Self

tiny, floating fragments, some of which may not be true at all, some of which may be. The problem
is identification. An interesting word, actually. I have no idea if it really works this way, but a while
back I saw that dentification is the largest part of this word. That implies density, hardness. Then
when you put the I in front, I become this dense thing when I become densified or i-dentified. So,
we want to become dis-identified.
Participant: So, we all need dental work for ourselves! Root canals to free ourselves from i-dentalfication. Thats not what I had planned to say! (Laughter) I have had a question for a number of minutes and it keeps changing every few seconds, so I am not sure what is going to come out.
Aronson: Thats the wave. (Laughter)
Participant: Im going to particulate it now. Just to express gratitude for the presentation of ideas
which I experienced as a kind of a process because I took your suggestion at the outset to inhabit
myself and I found my attention being drawn back as you described the process. You described it
with words intellectually, but it was a kind of case in point and very helpful.
One of the questions has to do with the presentation of this process in an intellectual form and an
aspect of the spectrum that I think is maybe missing from this whole diagram which has to do with
the various intelligences that are at work at different levels and the fineness of the material that they
work with and therefore the quality of the intelligence they conduct. But, quality is easy to assess
quantitatively when really there is a qualitative difference in these different intelligences. So, for
instance the intelligence of an awakened heart and a real feeling quality is ineffable to the mind and
the quality of the direct perception of much higher level of consciousness is unknowable even to the
heart. So, the thing that came up for me was this event which was so often taught, which is that if
I am seeing the thing, I know it is not me, which one would think would spur deeper looking in the
search for myself and yet in that Ive found a very subtle form of rejection of experience. And this is a
pitfall that seems to be kind of a theme, connected with Russells talk as well. When I see the thing,
I feel that in order to transcend it, I need to push it away somehow or I need to let it go in favor of
something better. What is the alternative? There is some third possibility between identification and
rejection, which is an integration, if you use that word. But a sense of the way in, is through. And
when in connection with these intelligences at different levels that I encounter an emotion that is
unpleasant, do I simply say, Oh, its not me. Let me identify with the observer, or do I inhabit it and
begin to watch it transform under the gaze of my attention? It brings me back to a sense of what is
real faith and what is real faith in? And, in a sense the faith is in that prime source of attention, that
it has an organizing effect, an integrating and transformative effect, and I can trust and have faith
that when I bring it to bear on all of my experience without exception, Im integrating the totality of
Self that is available. Does that make sense? Thats my question.
Aronson: Yes, every bit of it. My sense of the last part of the question is that all of it might have been
building to, is no, not to merge into what is seen and not to push it away, but to bring what Gurdjieff
call an impartial look. Even to extend a little pseudopod of attention into that something to feel it,
while keeping the rest of my attention outside it out here, so that can promote empathy, recognizing that part is just what it is, doing what it does. Its part of the larger system. I just need not to
think that that is me. Its that little thing floating around whatever this larger thing is, this me. Of
course, here we have to use words. And words and even symbols are insufficient for this. But for me,
my intellect was the last thing to surrender. It didnt want to be duped. It knows it is suggestible. Its
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ALL and Everything 2014

really recalcitrant in terms of faith. But this knows that. (Points to heart) This knows that. (Points to
solar plexus) And this process was perhaps, the way my heart took my head and slowly, gently walked
it through this process so it wouldnt panic, until it got all the way up there (points to Worlds 12 and
6 in the illustration) and said, Whoa! Its a long way down. (Laughter)
Participant: The movement towards my inner self is so much about recognizing who I am not. During the process of an inner separation, for example what is going on in the head, or worries or instinctive whatever ... (pause) ... to say with what is left seems to me to be entering very silent area
in myself. Depending on the intensity of this silence (pause) and it is a silence which is not a silent
point which is not narrow or which is not limited. And, within there, within here, there are so many
things which are possible, which is impossible when this separation has not taken place. Compassion is possible as to something I receive when I am closer to myself within this silence. Acceptance is
so natural in that silence, so it is impossible for me to distinguish between that acceptance of others
and myself and attention and the silence. This wonderful disinterest for anything which is not, in
the actual moment. There is another thing that is the concepts of inside and outside is .. (pause) ..
there is no room for it. It is not there. It is not a part of it. I think if I say anything more, I will speak
less and less about what Im trying to say.
Aronson: Perhaps I should emulate your feeling. I am reminded of Mr. Bennetts interview with the
Shivapuri Baba. He quoted the Shivapuri Baba as saying, Go beyond the mind. Then you will see
God. In this place of silence there is no need for a name. That is totally irrelevant. I think the concern with name has to do with personality. Not only is there no name, there is no interest in a name.
The wish is to just try to be impartial. Over the years I have learned what Faith is. I have absolute
total Faith in the State of Presence. I no longer try to plan or think about what really I am going to
do or what is going to happen. I know that all I need to do is monitor where I am in here (Points to
head and chest), and the closer I can get to the place where Presence might enter, that is my job. I
think of myself now as a doorman. I just stand here and try to hold the door open. When I fall asleep
and then wake up, I just open it again. And, something comes through, and when thats there, I just
watch what happens. Steve does what he does and it carries a better quality because of the Presence
inside of him.
I would say in conclusion that my sense is that the ideas and diagrams in Gurdjieffs work are critically important to give the formatory apparatus something useful to do while we can go and actually learn about the Work. (Laugher and applause) Its in the practice and my experience tells me the
practice is grounded in the body. As long as I can feel myself in the body, I know I am incarnated in
this body. Then other direct experiences can follow. We must work with the body.
Participant: Thats great. Thats great Steve. During all this conversation I was just sitting here wondering how we could find a way to see this conundrum because this is a gigantic conundrum. How
do you talk about this? These states are so difficult to talk about. It struck me that now, it has been
just about one hundred years ago, that Niels Bohr, and I dont know how many of you know much
about Niels Bohr, but Niels Bohr was one of the finest minds of the early twentieth century scientifically and philosophically. His conclusion has so much to do with what we are talking about here. He
came up with what he called the Principle of Complementarity, which in effect said, because human
beings have brains the way they have evolved, we can look at any phenomenon and ask questions
about it relative to, is it particle or is an expression of wave? We can never ask both simultaneously.
18

Divided Attention and Search for Self

We cannot ask both simultaneously. Many of the questions that folks have been focusing on here
are questions we cannot ask simultaneously. But, that doesnt mean they are not real. As Steve, and
I think, emphasized so beautifully at the end when he pointed inside and said, I know I am embodied! The key that comes from Boor is experienceyour own, personal, inner experience. When
we have the experience of consciousness of a different kind, we can throw all kinds of words at it.
Gurdjieff threw very few words at this. What he threw were stories, myths, experiences, one experience after another after another, to give us the taste, in our own world, of what it means to be in
that state. So, my thanks to Niels Bohr. I think he gave us a very clear notion that what much of our
possible confusion is here.
Aronson: And, thanks to Mr. Gurdjieff.

19