George Gurdjieff

>>9648945
>imaginative literature
No. He was a very cynical man and he hated the idea of merely "imaginative literature". You can only read Gurdjieff and take something of value from it if you are serious about it and his ideas have already caught you in some way.

You start with Ouspensky's In Search of the Miraculous.

Then, you can read Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson, then Meetings With Remarkable Men, then, if you so wish by that point, "Life is real only then, when 'I am'" (a long and uncapitalized title, which is why I put it all in quotes)

BTTHG should be read several times as Gurdjieff suggests in the beginning of it, but it's immaterial if you do that before or after reading the other works. It's just that it's impossible to fully understand it without reading it about three times, as Gurdjieff suggests, if not more.

watch the movie and see if u still dig it:

http://www.documentarytube.com/videos/meetings-with-remarkable-men-gurdjieff

it's a fun trip, although i have no idea if it really has much to do with his books. i sampled a little of beelzebub's tales and it just seemed like some wacky occult shit, which is some people like, but to me is like the pro-wrestling of philosophy/religious studies.

He's as esoteric as it gets. All the "fiction" in Beelzebub is just a filter, he straight up says this.

I've read Beelzebub's tales 3 times. I don't know how much 'wisdom' I've gotten out of it, but it's a chill af read IMO.

>>9650465
this movie always make me think it must have been kind of cool to live in a time and place where god, magic, occult, etc. stuff is real, but it's probably better to live in a time when it isn't, although we have all kinds of weird ideology that won't be real years from now either so who knows

>>9650501
>to live in a time and place where god, magic, occult, etc. stuff is real
And you're certain it's not real now?

>>9650472
Maybe true for a lot of strange parts of it, but I also can't help but think he's speaking literally when he's speaking literally. Fritz Peters also noted this, the tendency of people to think he was saying something deep about the soul when he was just saying that, for instance, as he observed it, Americans often suffered from impotence because of their obsession with sex and overuse of it.

In fact, a lot of the trouble in Beelzebub's Tales is understanding what he's LITERALLY trying to say at times, particularly when he's talking about the supposed occult-scientific laws of the workings of the universe and of the working of the human body and personality.

>>9649037
>You start with Ouspensky's In Search of the Miraculous.

yes

Ouspensky was a better writer than G. and probably a more honest person.

>>9650465
>i sampled a little of beelzebub's tales and it just seemed like some wacky occult shit,

Sort of. G. didn't actually have much respect for occultists, e.g. Theosophists, viewing them as bored upper-class hobbyists with no genuine insight. But his teaching has a marked esoteric streak - he claimed that he personally was bringing back long-lost teachings which used to be widely understood in the world's major contemplative traditions, a conspiracy theory view of religious history typical of occultism. It's a bold claim, and one I find hard to digest. You can tell from reading Ouspensky that G. was something of a failure as a teacher: in the early years of his teaching, he went through two or three completely separate groups of students who tried to practice his teachings for a couple years before giving up. Even the inner core of the most committed people all left him, more than once.

He clearly had some realization, but the practices he gave people to facilitate inner development were not effective.

File: 4th way.jpg (54KB, 687x732px) Image search: [Google]

54KB, 687x732px

found this on some blog

He was a trickster.

>>9648945
I had a friend who grew up in the Fellowship of Friends cult in northern california. They follow Gurdjieff and Ouspensky as two of the most recent Enlightened Individuals, of which there are 44 in total, including Shakespeare, Jesus, Buddha, Mozart, Moses, etc. The 44th individual is the cult leader, Robert Burton.

Sounded like a pretty fucked up place. Gay orgies. Typical cult behavior of indentured servitude, forced isolation, group think.

I don't know much about Gurdjieff, but if you're digging into I'd just watch out for Robert Burton and his cult. You don't want anything to do with it.

>>9652645
Whatever your friend got into sure as shit has very little to do with what Gurdjieff actually taught. Its always so common for words to be twisted around to suit some assholes desires. It happened with Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, the list goes on.

Its also why I tend to avoid most esoteric/occult groups, so many sus people its not even funny.

>>9652645
I don't know much about Jesus, but if you're digging into I'd just watch out for Robert Burton and his cult.
I also don't know much about Buddha, but if you're digging into I'd just watch out for Robert Burton and his cult.
Neither do I know much about Shakespeare, but if you're digging into I'd just watch out for Robert Burton and his cult.
Nor much about Moses, but if you're digging into I'd just watch out for Robert Burton and his cult.
Another one I don't know much about is Mozart, but if you're digging into I'd just watch out for Robert Burton and his cult.