A Bigger Perspective

A Greek-Armenian teacher named George Gurdjieff (1866-1949) wrote:

“When a man comes to realize the necessity not only for self-study and self-observation but also for work on himself with the object of changing himself, the character of his self-observation myst changes...he must begin to see himself, that is to say, to see not separate details, not the work of small wheels and levers, but to see everything taken together as a whole - the whole of himself such as others see him.

For this purpose a man must learn to take, so to speak, “mental photographs” of himself at different moments of his life and in different emotional states; and not photographs of details, but photographs of the whole as he saw it. In other words, these photographs must contain simultaneously everything that a man can see in himself at a given moment. Emotions, moods, thoughts, sensations, postures, movements, tones of voice, facial expressions, and so on. If a man succeeds in seizing interesting moments for these photographs he will very soon collect a whole album of pictures of himself which, taken together, will show him quite clearly what he is.”

After years of hiding and shame, it is a new sort of problem to work at seeing ourselves clearly. Not all days will be pleasant; but most days will be better than we might imagine once we get in the habit of living each minute knowing that we will review it again in a few hours. Eventually, because of what God can and will do with a willing person, our reviews might even delight us!