Listening (transcribed theme)

Description

excerpt:

“The theme is Listening. And it may be that even if we did have it, or something very like it before, you will be able to appreciate better. Since this came to me to have this theme of Listening. It’s been constantly in my mind the whole time, and I’ve been seeing for myself how extraordinary it is that we shut out what can enter us because we can’t listen. We can’t listen because what originates in our own self is all the time standing at the door and not letting things come in. You know, I’ve read three or four times through the lecture on freedom and pride, where Gurdjieff says if we want influences to enter we must remove these sentinels at the door; vanity and self-love. But as long as they’re at the door, influences from outside cannot enter. And of course not only from outside, but influences from within us, they are most important. There we stand, blocked. Unable either to receive from the outside or to receive from the deeper parts of our own self. People come and talk with me, and presumably they want me to say something to them, and I want to say something, and I start saying it and I realize that they cannot listen to what I am saying, because as soon as I say something they react they begin with their own gramophone record begins to turn”

J.G. Bennett – Sherborne House