Centers, Description of

From Cassiopedia

Gurdjieff speaks of four lower Centers: moving, instinctive, feeling, and thinking. He also spoke of a fifth center which he called the sex center. Concerning the sex center, Gurdjieff said that it practically never worked independently because its energy was often robbed by the moving/instinctive/feeling/and thinking centers. This produced quite wrong work of the lower centers producing useless excitement and in return gave to the sex center useless energy which it was unable to work with. Gurdjieff also postulated that there were aspects of higher consciousness manifesting in two additional Centers: the Higher Emotional and the HigherThinking.

According to Gurdjieff these two Higher Centers are intact, fully operational, and are ready for the psyche to use. However to access the Higher Centers, our lower centers need to be fully balanced.

When the lower Centers are balanced, then we think properly with the Thinking Center, feel properly with the Feeling Center, and the body is properly regulated by the Instinctive Center. It is noted that the Instinctive Center, while not connected with a 'Higher Instinctive Center,' operates freely in accordance with other parts of nature.

Due to the abnormal conditions in which we live, the working of the Higher Centers fail to reach our ordinary consciousness and are seldom experienced, due to a phenomenon called 'scrambling' of the lower centers. This 'scrambling' of the lower centers (or what Mouravieff called Confluence) become so distorted and off balance that the signal from the Higher Centers cannot get through. Scrambling or Confluence causes the misuse of the Centers. For example, we can think with our feelings or feel with our instincts. This misuse of energy creates an imbalance, a 'gnashing of teeth' in the lower centers inhibiting a clear or PURE connection to the higher centers.

Only in a state of 'clear consciousness' can the lower centers be properly unscrambled so that they can synchronously work together and not distort the communications coming from a higher source.

Below is a simplified description of these centers from Ouspensky's book The Psychology Of Man's Possible Evolution, pages 27 through 29:

In the following lectures I shall speak about these obstacles, the greatest of which is our ignorance of ourselves, and our wrong conviction that we know ourselves at least to a certain extent and can be sure of ourselves, when in reality we do not know ourselves at all and cannot be sure of ourselves even in the smallest things.

We must understand now that psychology really means self-study. This is the second definition of psychology.

One cannot study psychology as one can study astronomy; that is, apart from oneself. And at the same time one must study oneself as one studies any new and complicated machine. One must know the parts of this machine, its chief functions, the conditions of right work, the causes of wrong work, and many other things which are difficult to describe without special language, which is also necessary to know in order to be able to study the machine.

The Human machine has seven different functions:

1) THINKING (or intellect) All Mental processes are included here: realization of an impression, formation of representations and concepts, reasoning, comparison, affirmation, formation of words, speech, imagination, and so on.

2) FEELING (or emotions) The second function is feeling of emotions; joy, sorrow, fear, astonishment, and so on. Even if you are sure that it is clear to you how, and in what way emotions differ from thoughts it is advisable to verify all your views in regard to this. We mix thoughts and feelings, in our ordinary thinking and speaking; but for the beginning of self study it is necessary to know clearly which is which.

3) INSTINCTIVE FUNCTION (all inner work of the organism) The words 'instinct' and 'instinctive,' are generally used in the wrong sense and very often in no sense at all. In particular, to instincts are generally ascribed external functions which are in reality moving functions, and sometimes emotional. The instinctive function in man includes in itself four different classes of functions: FIRST: All the inner work of the organism, all physiology, so to speak; digestion and assimilation of food, breathing, circulation of the blood, all the work of inner organs, the building of new cells, the elimination of worked-out materials, the work of glands of inner secretion, and so on. SECOND: The so called senses: sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch; and all other senses of weight, of temperature, of dryness and moisture, and so on; that is, all indifferent sensations - sensations which by themselves are neither pleasant nor unpleasant. THIRD: All physical emotions, that is, all physical sensations which are either pleasant or unpleasant. All kinds of pain or unpleasant feeling such as unpleasant taste or unpleasant smell, and all kinds of physical pleasure, such as pleasant taste, pleasant smell, and so on. FOURTH: All reflexes, even the most complicated, such as laughter and yawning; all kinds of physical memory such as memory of taste, memory of smell, memory of pain, which are in reality inner reflexes.

4) MOVING FUNCTION (all outer work of the organism, movement in space, etc.). The moving function includes in itself all external movements, such as walking, writing, speaking, eating, and memories of them. To the moving function also belong those movements which in ordinary language are called 'instinctive,' such as catching a falling object without thinking.

The difference between the instinctive and the moving function is clear and can be easily understood if one simply remembers that all instinctive functions without exception are inherent and that there is no necessity to learn them in order to use them; whereas on the other hand, none of the moving functions are inherent and one has to learn them as a child learns to walk, or as one learns to write or draw.

Besides these normal moving functions, there are also strange moving functions which represent useless work of the human machine not intended by nature, but which occupy a very large place in man's life and use a great quantity of energy. These are: formation of dreams, imagination, daydreaming, talking with oneself, all talking for talking's sake, and generally, all uncontrolled and uncontrollable manifestations.

5) SEX FUNCTION (the function of two principles, male and female, in all their manifestations).

6) HIGHER EMOTIONAL FUNCTION (which appears in a state of self consciousness).

7) HIGHER MENTAL FUNCTION (which appears in a state of objective or 'clear' consciousness).

Concerning the Higher Emotional and Higher Mental functions, we are not in these states of consciousness so we cannot study these functions or experiment with them, and we learn about them only indirectly from those who have attained or experienced them. See Centers, Higher.

...It is very important to remember that in observing different functions it is useful to observe at the same time their relation to different states of consciousness.

...it is necessary to understand that man's consciousness and man's four lower functions (intellectual, emotional, instinctive, and moving) are quite different phenomena, of quite different natures and depending on different causes, and that one can exist without the other.

FUNCTIONS CAN EXIST WITHOUT CONSCIOUSNESS, AND CONSCIOUSNESS CAN EXIST WITHOUT FUNCTIONS.

See Consciousness, Centers, Centers, Playing Card Analogy.