Problems with the Work Process

One of the safety and security needs we all have is a need for stability things seem safer if only the anticipated happens. There are no surprises, no changes. Indeed, we will often put up with unpleasant things for long periods of time (sometimes a lifetime) rather than take a chance on the unknown. This conservative safety need is often coupled with specific fears of what might happen, or with semiconscious or unconscious traumas associated with change. 

This conflict between safety and growth needs is why Gurdjieff insisted that the Fourth Way starts from a reasonable level of success (by commonsense standards) in the ordinary world. The householder, the successful malcontent, has lots of imperfections and craziness in an absolute sense, but by common standards has mastered the tasks of staying alive and reasonably comfortable. He or she has a solid base to start from, and that successful base, satisfaction of lower needs, allows the essential curiosity and desire for self-actualization to emerge. 

Ideally all of these ordinary social needs would be met outside the work 

When these ordinary social needs are too strong, and/or we are not able to observe or control them adequately, the real function of the work group may be lost. We may imitate the work practices externally, but internally we keep distorting them. If we notice that people working on selfobservation or self-remembering have certain movement styles, for example, we may imitate those styles so that otherpeople will think we re like them, so that we can be accepted, rather than focus on the inner practices that might lead to those outer manifestations. 

A Gurdjieffian work group is particularly apt to do this because of the explicit teaching that consensus reality and our normal state of consciousness are a kind of sleep or trance. You should not, of course, accept this statement on faith, but only as a focus for self- and world-observation you should test this idea rather than Just accept it. Nevertheless, the statement easily constitutes an implicit permission from authority to reject many or all of the cultural norms you normally live by and develop new ones that suit you better. 

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