George Ivanovich Gurdjieff was a Greek Armenian philosopher, mystic, spiritual teacher, music composer, and movements teacher (free movements of body dance). He had a powerful presence in England and when he spoke, people wanted to listen. If Gurdjieff was going to speak on a particular evening at six o’ clock, five hundred people would come to one great hall somewhere in London. If somebody was late by even a minute, the doors would be closed. He was called ‘Rascal Saint’. One person who made Gurdjieff famous was a person called P. D. Ouspensky who was a very famous man by himself. He was a great philosopher, mathematician, and a great intellect. He had written a book on truth, which was hundreds of pages long.
Gurdjieff’s ‘Law of Three’ is referred by himself as “the second fundamental cosmic law”. According to this law, every incident consists of three separate forces, which are Active, Passive and Neutral. This law applies to everything in the universe including organic life on earth. The active force is dominant, passive force is submissive, and the neutral force is holy spirit (spirituality).
I have read Gurdjieff’s work which is bit difficult to understand, its bewildering. I am giving hereby my thoughts on law of three. Gurdjieff says we human beings live unconsciously which means our thoughts constantly flood in and out, and we often fall prey to them. The thoughts could be good, ugly, mysterious, magical, fearing or bad. We are always on autopilot mode; we let those thoughts drive our thinking and take action without realizing its reality and effects. Instead, if we direct our mind to live consciously it could be a game changer. It is taking control of our life, about thinking what decision we are taking, rather than allowing them to sway us.
If we live consciously, we could rather settle for a life which suits us, which fits us. Here I mean, understanding our strengths and weaknesses and shaping them for a fitter life. If we’re drifting through life, if we feel out of control, or don’t know how we got here, trust me we are on an autopilot mode of thoughts. Scientists have found that an average person has about 12,000 to 60,000 thoughts per day. Of those thousands of thoughts, 80% are negative, and 95% are exactly the same repetitive thoughts as the day before.
If you allow yourself to notice all thoughts that come into your head as you are consciously aware of your breathing most thoughts are imaginary. The process of breath itself may not be in most people’s recognition. They may only be conscious of the sensations caused by the movement of air in their nostrils or lungs. If we notice, pay attention to our breathing, we will learn to appreciate the Universal Energy, the Shakti. And if we recognize our breathing process sincerely, we may accept these thoughts, without judgment. Thoughts are not bad or good, positive or negative, they just are what they are. You are separate from your thoughts.
So, a thought might occur: “you are not wise”, “you look good today”, “she is jealous of me”, “I will get this job“ etc, etc, etc. You may become aware that you are having difficulty thinking about your thoughts – so think about that. You may be thinking: “I can’t do this very well,” “I am being ignored”. Well, those are thought too. Allow yourself to think about that. Some people allow the thoughts to just float like leaves on a stream, or clouds in a sky, noticing each passing thought and each coming after the other, first, second, third, fourth and so on.
A Buddhist idea is to think of thoughts as pages written on water. There is similarity between the Buddhist idea and one stanza in the song whahan kaun hai tera from Movie “Guide” 1965 there is a stanza of the song ‘kehete hai gyani, duniya hai paani, paani par likhi likhai’ earth is a watery planet because 70% of the earth’s surface is covered by water. Whatever is written on water does not hold significance because the writing will never last as water keeps flowing. Nothing is permanent in life; name, fame, and fortune do not stay permanently. We come into the world empty-handed and leave empty-handed. It’s 2025, and I still can’t get over S.D. Burman’s voice and Shailendra’s lyrics, it is one of the finest songs.
You may notice that just now you become aware of a thought, it passes and is replaced by another thought. That’s what happens – thoughts come, and they go. Finally, bring yourself back to awareness of the breath. Behind Gurdjieff’s teaching lies the idea that human beings live and die in a state of sleep, but do not realize this. In this sense, all human beings are divided into two categories – those who realize they are asleep (ignorant) and other ones who are attempting to awaken. Gurdjieff says that human beings live mostly in a kind of sleep.
My understanding from Gurdjieff’s teaching is if we awaken from “waking sleep,” we understand who we are. That most humans exist in a state of “waking sleep,” where they remain unaware of their infinite potential and ultimate value as human beings. If we awaken from the waking sleep, we can enjoy full freedom of the cosmic benefits. Cosmic benefits are energies of sun, moon, stars, earth, air, night sky, ocean, sea, trees, greenery, rain, winter, summer, flowers etc, and we are interwoven with the cosmic energy.