RM often found himself wanting to assert his own opinion about something, hoping people would follow his opinion because he thought it was a good one.
He had questioned himself on whether or not he was leading people astray. He got the impression that every time he tried to persuade anybody of anything, it was probably leading them astray, because he did not know if he was following in the right direction or not.
It was all very vague for him. So he was conscious of the CHALLENGE but was unable to answer that question, except to keep quiet, because maybe every time he tried to assert himself he might be leading people astray, at least trying to.
T had remembered it during the month, but the thought of leading people astray was so counter to what her life was about, that she had found it a struggle to do the whole challenge, which was including the bodily part. There was one realisation to do with the Insight Timer app. She used it every day, but she used it to remind herself to meditate, and then she carried on doing what she had to do. So she turned it on, heard the lovely bells through the minutes of meditation, and if she noticed one of her "friends" had been meditating at the same time, she sent a message saying "Thanks for meditating with me." She was projecting into them her own misleading of herself, her leading herself astray that she was meditating. One of her rationalisations was that so long as she was present when doing things it was a meditation, but that was rubbish.
L said it had been a difficult challenge because he did not like to think of himself as leading people astray, but then he realised that if he was playing chess with somebody, and set a trap, then he was leading them astray, and hoping they would take the bait. If he was doing it there, it was not a bad thing, clearly. On one recent occasion, he had been in a coffee shop, and had paid by cash, and was short-changed and it was the second time it had happened to him at that particular coffee shop. It was like Oscar Wilde's, once is "misfortune", twice is "carelessness". L had said "was it not meant to be £1:50?", and she had given him 20p back. They had both pretended that it hadn't been deliberate. So his pretending was, in a way, leading her astray, because he knew it was deliberate, and so did she, and then he realised that in all trading, there was this kind of leading people astray, because if you were doing a trade with somebody, or if you were buying shares on the stock market, or options, you thought you had got it right. There was always somebody on the other side of the trade who took the opposite view, and then there was the broker, who took their cut. So everybody involved was trying to lead the other parties astray, and hoped to make a profit from the encounter, just as happened in the coffee shop. He realised that he tried to deceive himself all the time, and also that direct communication between people was impossible anyway. So, leading people astray was inevitable, and happened all the time.
Responding to L, LR thought that in the example of trading we knew that was going to happen, and in the coffee shop, the cashier knew and L knew, but it was unspoken, because we do not speak the truth: I'm going to con you out of 20p and I'm going to tell you that you have. LR had the sense that the deception was to do with not being honest to self, and was about deceiving self.
As RM had described a fear or a caution to speak, LR wanted to ask him if he really wanted to persuade people, or was it just that he was so direct and honest he wondered if people would take it the wrong way. If it was a dialogue, the other person had to take responsibility for how they thought and felt. LR could not take responsibility for somebody else, and if there was an issue they could hopefully discuss it.
Responding to T, RM said that his view was that meditation was an exercise in being present. So every time you were present you were meditating, It was no more or less complicated. The minute he said Am I present?, he was. So meditation was being present, so he would say, yes, she was meditating.
Responding to L, RM said Gurdjieff's view was that it was conscious suffering that was important. The problem arises when it is unconscious suffering. On that principle, if you were playing a game and deliberately misled an opponent, it was not a problem because you knew exactly what you were doing, you were totally in tune with that for a good reason. It was when it was unconscious, when it was a reaction where you did not even know what was going on, that was a problem because you were asleep, and it was coming from sleep to awake. L said he thought it was worse to lead someone astray consciously, it was worse than doing it unconsciously. That was the difference in law between murder and manslaughter. If someone deliberately committed a crime it was worse, if they did it unconsciously it was still a crime, but not as severe. RM said he was not talking about deliberate, he was talking about consciously doing it. Just knowing what you were doing consciously, changes what you do. That was how you changed your behaviour, by being conscious.
The reading then continued from Chapter 28 of Beelzebub's Tales.
In the common presence of every kind of three-brained being, there can arise during the process of his planetary existence, four kinds of independent Hasnamuss-individuals.
The first kind of Hasnamuss-individual is a three-brained being who, while acquiring in his common presence that something, still consists only of his planetary body and who, during the process of his sacred Rascooarno, is subject to the corresponding consequences of the presence in him of the properties of this something and is thus destroyed forever such as he is.
The second kind of Hasnamuss-individual is that Kesdjan body of a three-brained being which is coated in his common presence with the participation of that same something and which, acquiring—as is proper to such a cosmic arising—the property of ‘Toorinoorino,’ that is, nondecomposition in any sphere of that planet on which he arose, has to exist, by being formed again and again in a certain way, such as he is, until this certain something will have been eliminated from him.
T said it was interesting that he had all these complex, multi-syllabled words and symbols, and then he kept on saying something, something, something, because something was just ordinary, but what did he mean by something? L asked if it was something that we needed to get rid of, or was it something positive. O thought it was something positive, the life force, that all your life you had tried to conceal and substitute through activities. RM said it was about getting rid of the attachment to things.
For the second kind of Hasnamuss-individual, ... he must inevitably be again coated in a planetary body and in most cases with the exterior form of a being of one- or two-brained system; and in view of the brevity in general of the duration of beings of these planetary forms and also not having time to adapt himself to a single exterior form, he must constantly begin all over again in the form of another being of the planet with the full uncertainty as to the result of this coating.
LR thought he was talking about the possibility of reincarnation. If somebody had not let go of the something, then they would have to come back again. LR believed that humans were here on this planet as a chance to refine, and develop and do good for the higher creation, and if we could not let go of the somethings, then we would have too come back again, or not at all.
| Observe if there are occasions where you have a feeling of self-satisfaction from leading others astray. Consider the degree of satisfaction, and what part of you is being satisfied. Press your tongue against your teeth. |
T had remembered it during the month, but the thought of leading people astray was so counter to what her life was about, that she had found it a struggle to do the whole challenge, which was including the bodily part. There was one realisation to do with the Insight Timer app. She used it every day, but she used it to remind herself to meditate, and then she carried on doing what she had to do. So she turned it on, heard the lovely bells through the minutes of meditation, and if she noticed one of her "friends" had been meditating at the same time, she sent a message saying "Thanks for meditating with me." She was projecting into them her own misleading of herself, her leading herself astray that she was meditating. One of her rationalisations was that so long as she was present when doing things it was a meditation, but that was rubbish.
L said it had been a difficult challenge because he did not like to think of himself as leading people astray, but then he realised that if he was playing chess with somebody, and set a trap, then he was leading them astray, and hoping they would take the bait. If he was doing it there, it was not a bad thing, clearly. On one recent occasion, he had been in a coffee shop, and had paid by cash, and was short-changed and it was the second time it had happened to him at that particular coffee shop. It was like Oscar Wilde's, once is "misfortune", twice is "carelessness". L had said "was it not meant to be £1:50?", and she had given him 20p back. They had both pretended that it hadn't been deliberate. So his pretending was, in a way, leading her astray, because he knew it was deliberate, and so did she, and then he realised that in all trading, there was this kind of leading people astray, because if you were doing a trade with somebody, or if you were buying shares on the stock market, or options, you thought you had got it right. There was always somebody on the other side of the trade who took the opposite view, and then there was the broker, who took their cut. So everybody involved was trying to lead the other parties astray, and hoped to make a profit from the encounter, just as happened in the coffee shop. He realised that he tried to deceive himself all the time, and also that direct communication between people was impossible anyway. So, leading people astray was inevitable, and happened all the time.
Responding to L, LR thought that in the example of trading we knew that was going to happen, and in the coffee shop, the cashier knew and L knew, but it was unspoken, because we do not speak the truth: I'm going to con you out of 20p and I'm going to tell you that you have. LR had the sense that the deception was to do with not being honest to self, and was about deceiving self.
As RM had described a fear or a caution to speak, LR wanted to ask him if he really wanted to persuade people, or was it just that he was so direct and honest he wondered if people would take it the wrong way. If it was a dialogue, the other person had to take responsibility for how they thought and felt. LR could not take responsibility for somebody else, and if there was an issue they could hopefully discuss it.
Responding to T, RM said that his view was that meditation was an exercise in being present. So every time you were present you were meditating, It was no more or less complicated. The minute he said Am I present?, he was. So meditation was being present, so he would say, yes, she was meditating.
Responding to L, RM said Gurdjieff's view was that it was conscious suffering that was important. The problem arises when it is unconscious suffering. On that principle, if you were playing a game and deliberately misled an opponent, it was not a problem because you knew exactly what you were doing, you were totally in tune with that for a good reason. It was when it was unconscious, when it was a reaction where you did not even know what was going on, that was a problem because you were asleep, and it was coming from sleep to awake. L said he thought it was worse to lead someone astray consciously, it was worse than doing it unconsciously. That was the difference in law between murder and manslaughter. If someone deliberately committed a crime it was worse, if they did it unconsciously it was still a crime, but not as severe. RM said he was not talking about deliberate, he was talking about consciously doing it. Just knowing what you were doing consciously, changes what you do. That was how you changed your behaviour, by being conscious.
The reading then continued from Chapter 28 of Beelzebub's Tales.
The first kind of Hasnamuss-individual is a three-brained being who, while acquiring in his common presence that something, still consists only of his planetary body and who, during the process of his sacred Rascooarno, is subject to the corresponding consequences of the presence in him of the properties of this something and is thus destroyed forever such as he is.
The second kind of Hasnamuss-individual is that Kesdjan body of a three-brained being which is coated in his common presence with the participation of that same something and which, acquiring—as is proper to such a cosmic arising—the property of ‘Toorinoorino,’ that is, nondecomposition in any sphere of that planet on which he arose, has to exist, by being formed again and again in a certain way, such as he is, until this certain something will have been eliminated from him.
T said it was interesting that he had all these complex, multi-syllabled words and symbols, and then he kept on saying something, something, something, because something was just ordinary, but what did he mean by something? L asked if it was something that we needed to get rid of, or was it something positive. O thought it was something positive, the life force, that all your life you had tried to conceal and substitute through activities. RM said it was about getting rid of the attachment to things.
For the second kind of Hasnamuss-individual, ... he must inevitably be again coated in a planetary body and in most cases with the exterior form of a being of one- or two-brained system; and in view of the brevity in general of the duration of beings of these planetary forms and also not having time to adapt himself to a single exterior form, he must constantly begin all over again in the form of another being of the planet with the full uncertainty as to the result of this coating.
LR thought he was talking about the possibility of reincarnation. If somebody had not let go of the something, then they would have to come back again. LR believed that humans were here on this planet as a chance to refine, and develop and do good for the higher creation, and if we could not let go of the somethings, then we would have too come back again, or not at all.
