Yes, well there is some context around the utterance that might help. In the scenario, Gurdjeiff was a teacher, and this was advice to his pupils. In that sense, he was referring even to information offered by he himself to them, as in; don’t take my word for it. Also, what he was teaching them was a belief system in which there is no distinction between scientific and unscientific. That is, even that which we’d regard as spiritual or emotional matters are the result of measurable processes and conditions that can be studied and subsequently controlled via an understanding of their working.
While I would agree that our perspective of the metaphysical requires a certain flavor of faith, or at least conclusions based on projection of known upon unknown, Gurdjieff would have asserted it’s only that way in our view, whereas objectively—above and outside of our common sphere of conventional consciousness—that which we consider metaphysical is just as plain, measurable, and verifiable as what (we think) we know to be physical.
I found I could say things with color and shapes that I couldn’t say any other way — things I had no words for. – Georgia O’Keefe
There are three responses to a piece of design: yes, no, and wow! Wow is the one to aim for. – Milton Glaser
Design is a funny word. Some people think design means how it looks. But of course, if you dig deeper, it’s really how it works. – Steve Jobs
Creativity is a drug I cannot live without. – Cecil B. DeMille
The life of a designer is a life of fight. Fight against the ugliness. Just like a doctor fights against disease. For us, the visual disease is what we have around, and what we try to do is cure it somehow with design. – Massimo Vignelli
Design is so simple, that’s why it is so complicated. – Paul Rand
Thoreau is wonderful reading that, unfortunately, people don’t seem to have the time for anymore. Your second quote is very famous and it gives me the same feeling I had when I read The Death of Ivan Ilyic by Tolstoy. A sentence can hit like a brick.
And those who do, typically prefer something a little more approachable. Walden is also a book, that if read superficially, seems to be little more than a rather dull account of the author’s day-to-day life while living in the woods for a few months. Lying behind the words, however, is a perspective-changing view of the world and one’s place in it.
You mentioned Tolstoy, so I’ll also toss in Victor Hugo, Fyodor Dostoevsky and Miguel Cervantes. Reading their books can be a struggle, but unlike books read for enjoyment, the writing of these authors disguise a deeper meaning that belies or, maybe, transcends what’s actually written.
Excellent reading list. “Ivan Ilyich” is only about 100 pages long, and I don’t want to give away the ending, but the last sentence… wow. So simple, but so overwhelming.
I agree absolutely about Walden. I keep a copy of it along with Keats poetry because oI can open either and completely change my perspective. Also, with Thoreau, I compare the liking of it to “a” (non-specific) song you heard. Maybe you didn’t really like it at first, but the more you hear it, the better it gets. It’s too complex (layered) for one reading (listening).
P.S. I also use the George Carlin trick when 'm really stuck on fine art or illustration work.
Like for example, just in your First quote: Thoreau uses the word “front”, not “confront”. That is something you won’t really make the distinction of until you think a little. It removes the tension from the act [of facing ones own place in the world].
Same with Keats (I think tuberculosis too, but maybe emphysema?). That’s why you know the emotion in it is true. It’s a person writing for themselves because they feel they have something to say but couldn’t until confronted with the worst personal news possible.
‘‘The willow which bends to the tempest, often escapes better than the oak which resists it; and so in great calamities, it sometimes happens that light and frivolous spirits recover their elasticity and presence of mind sooner than those of a loftier character.’’
Ford Prefect explaining the effects of going into hyperspace to Arthur Dent - “It’s unpleasant, it’s like being drunk” “What’s so unpleasant about that?” “You ask a glass of water”.
