GURDJIEFF’S FOURTH WAY

Spiritual enlightenment is a concept most people would traditionally attribute to someone leading an ascetic lifestyle, practicing extreme levels of abstinence in the name of whichever religion or following they may be an acolyte of. It can be argued there is no clear criterion concerning the characteristics of someone who is considered to be enlightened since there is no standard definition nor benchmark for comparison. Nevertheless, put into the most simplest of terms, it can be interpreted as the act of self-realisation.

One man who argued that the process towards spiritual enlightenment was entirely possible through self-development, without the need to subject oneself to such levels of restraint, was the philosopher and mystic George Ivanovich Gurdjieff. At an early age Gurdjieff became obsessed with the concept of human existence, questioning our purpose in the Universe as a collective. Dissatisfied with the answers that contemporary science and religion offered, over the course of his life he went on to develop a philosophy he referred to as ‘the Fourth Way’. He claimed by correctly exercising ones 3 centres: the emotions, the body and the mind, it was possible to break out of the ‘waking sleep’ he believed most humans were stuck in, increasingly due to changes in society and technology during the tide of the 20th century, which are now more prevalent than ever.

Gurdjieff was born in Armenia (then a part of the Russian empire) sometime between 1866 and 1877, with the exact date remaining a source of debate. Much of the happenings within the early years of his life were transcribed in his autobiographical book ‘Meetings with Remarkable Men’, where he discussed some of the inspirational figures and esoteric spiritual leaders he had come across in his travels throughout Asia and the Middle East. It was during his travels he became aware of the three ways of life, each with the aim of reaching the goal of spiritual enlightenment, namely: the way of the fakir, the monk and the yogi.

A fakir can be described as someone who renounces worldly possessions in the name of God and lives solely on alms. Fakirs are said to develop physical will and power over the body, being able to push their body to its absolute limits through extreme acts such as standing still in one spot for hours, days or even weeks for example. Gurdjieff argued that even if a fakir obtains mastery over their physical body, they would still lack development in their emotional and intellectual functions. Similarly, a monk focuses on subjecting all emotions to just one of religious faith towards God, therefore having will and power over their emotions yet being underdeveloped as far as intellectual and physical control go. Finally, the yogi dedicates their life through knowledge and developing the mind to the point where they may know everything there is to know but cannot put it to effective use as their physical and emotional state would have remained untrained.

All three methods require a standard of life which is both incredibly unappealing and impractical, as they usually require extreme self discipline and a life lived in seclusion. Gurdjieff believed there was an easier way to obtain a higher level of consciousness; that is, to manage to incorporate all three aspects into ones development, whilst simultaneously  living a normal life committed to family and work. He used the knowledge he had received from studying various religious schools such as Sufism, Eastern Christianity, and Tibetan Buddhism to implement his own philosophy or way of life he named the ‘Fourth Way’,  also alternatively known as the Way of the Sly Man.

This philosophy was taught through a series of different activities such as meetings, sacred dances (now known as the Gurdjieff movements), writings, lectures, and both individual and group working activities. The main aim of this method is essentially to allow a constant objective introspection into ones daily actions, behaviour and routines where self-awareness can be acknowledged through the process of self-observation. Self-observation can be defined as objectively being a witness to ones own thoughts, actions and habits without judgement and understanding the effect of our external environment and societal constructs on how we choose to act or think in any given situation. The idea behind this is to see ourselves in one another as a species and to understand that our personalities and conditioning can act as a veil hiding our ‘true selves’. Gurdjieff ties this into his idea of humans having two parts to them: the essence and the personality, with our essence being the ‘natural part we are all born with’ and our personality being whatever we have learned from our surroundings and society.

This is one of the main teachings of the Fourth Way and is perhaps also the easiest teaching to understand. Gurdjieff had the reputation of making himself and his ideas as difficult to decipher as possible, as this would weed out the people who weren’t absolutely determined to receive and understand the knowledge he had to offer. One way in which he would do this was by purposely coming off as unappealing, rude, and inconsiderate towards others. In addition to this, Gurdjieff has been described as a ‘rascal saint’, someone who would indulge in hedonistic pleasures and completely drive his students mad by giving them incredibly tedious and sometimes dangerous tasks with little to no reward for their efforts. This was his method to slowly break down the ego of his students to the point their mind was a clean slate ready to take in new information supposedly to aid them into a state of higher consciousness.

Of course his methods have led to many criticisms, with the obvious one being he was too mentally and physically demanding of his followers. Many of his students, most notably the Russian author P.D. Ouspensky, ended up having to part ways with him due to his increasingly challenging behaviour. Even though followers of the Fourth Way did not have to become a recluse and turn their back to the world in the hopes of reaching enlightenment, this did not mean that their journey to what they sought after was going to be an easy one. Many of the exercises proved very difficult to perform and the methods are not one-size-fits-all, so therefore the results were never guaranteed. (It should be noted this article only focussed on discussing the basic aim of the Fourth Way as the inner workings of the process are entirely too tedious and complex to explain in one sitting, in other words I didn’t have a clue what’s going on). Furthermore, much of what Gurdjieff claims happened during his travels is also shrouded in mystery and frequently debated by sceptics. An example of this is the alleged ‘Sarmoung Brotherhood’ that Gurdjieff claimed to have come across somewhere in Asia that supposedly gave him knowledge he went on to incorporate into his own teachings. He was the earliest source to claim that this ‘ancient Sufi brotherhood’ exists which has led most scholars to assume that he created the story of meeting this esoteric group as a fictional teaching device.

Despite his highly obscure character, Gurdjieff is generally regarded as a Spiritual Guru associated with bringing many Eastern ideologies into Western culture, and his influence can be found in a number of fellow mystics and philosophers all the way through to contemporary artists, actors and musicians. Alan Watts, Osho, Robert Fripp, Sting and Bill Murray are some notable names to have been influenced by Gurdjieff’s teachings in some capacity, with the latter having a YouTube video discussing his relationship to the mystic.

I can’t say I would ever want to subject myself to following the Fourth Way or any other intensely complex school of thought supposedly rooted in providing enlightenment. However, with thinkers like Gurdjieff, I believe it can be helpful to have a look into what points they were trying to convey with their message and seeing what resonates with us and our own curiosity about such aspects of life. Many of these individuals have their own methods in making the overall point of keeping an open mind ; not blindly following a single dogma but giving importance to self-awareness and mindfulness of others and our differences from one another. Just by attempting to see something for what it is without judgement or bias based on our conditioning we can learn to look at things in a more profound and positive light, which can only benefit us in the long run.

Written by Dillion Gohil