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For full citations of references, please see Introduction and Bibliography.
I often come back, for myself, to what Maurice Nicoll emphasises, that understanding is the greatest force we can create. And it is echoed implicitly everywhere one looks in the teaching of Gurdjieff.
For example, Nicoll says:
New understanding is the most powerful force we can create in the Work. It comes from new ideas.1
And:
. . . there is no greater force we can create in ourselves than understanding. . . . anyone in contact with the Work must continually seek to increase his understanding of it. It is the parable of the talents over again. For otherwise the Work gets cold and begins to die.2
I ask myself, What is understanding? And what is it that I try when I try to understand? And do these two questions, or, rather, what they encompass, have any connection with each other? That is, is my "understanding" anything to do with understanding? And if not, can I persistently work on bringing these two things into unity in myself?
C.S. Nott said, in response to a grilling by Madame Ouspensky in the early Spring of 1935, the results of which grilling she did not seem very satisfied with:
"I know that I don't understand many things. In fact, I'm beginning to realize that I understand very little, in spite of, or perhaps because of my work with Orage and Gurdjieff . . ."3
There is something very precious in the moment of the present experienced knowledge that one does not understand. When I stand before the unknown in myself, the trappings of pseudo-knowledge having fallen away for a while, which include not only a freeing from associations of what has been read and heard over the years, but also associations regarding myself, which are inevitably false, it seems there is is now a possibility of touching something more real in myself. Perhaps here is where understanding resides.
Nicoll - Commentaries, Vol.3, p.948.
Nicoll - Commentaries, Vol.5, p.1630.
Nott, C.S. - Further Teachings of Gurdjieff: Journey Through this World, p.95.
I respectfully disagree with Nicoll on this, understanding comes from new ideas. I believe understanding comes from experience, probably experience (impressions) digested by all centers. Related to this, in Paris Meetings 1943, someone asks a questions and Gurdjieff says he cannot explain it to the person because 'you do not have enough experiences.' (grossly paraphrased). Ideas help to contextualize and express understanding. They may also be needed to complete, digest, experience in the intellect.
Another suggestion related to understanding which has stayed with me, there is this from Ouspensky, "Try to begin from what you can understand, and later your understanding will increase. No one can understand everything at once to understand means to connect."