After a long hiatus, I am finally back on my task of exploring the surprisingly fruitful interconnections between the work of Jean Gebser and G.I. Gurdjieff. While neither man officially acknowledged the other’s teaching (nor in the case of Gurdjieff, had likely even heard of it!), their respective takes on the conscious evolution of humanity are more in sync than you might initially suspect

The term “ecstasy” comes from the Greek ec-stasis, “standing outside of oneself.” Its opposite is “ENSTASY,” a term I first encountered in Valentin Tomberg’s profound discussion of the subject in Meditations on the Tarot (pp. 309-311). It means centering in oneself: becoming fiercely, alertly coiled within one’s own “I Am” presence, such that one becomes a center of gravitation in one’s own right.

When I say that the ability to access and sustain the Integral structure of consciousness is developmental, I mean just that: it is fundamentally a question of physiology, rather than of moral virtue or mystical yearning. We cannot think, pray, meditate, or conceptualize our way to it. It is fundamentally a matter of preparing the entire body to receive it.

There are two other things you should know about Gebser’s “aperspectival” time: it is non-exclusionary, and it is purposive. Linear or perspectival time, the time we’re used to, is exclusionary. Its linear, unidirectional flow provides sequencing and causality.

In my last post I invited us all to begin thinking more specifically in terms of the gifts and strengths contributed to the whole by the magic and mythic structures of consciousness.

The Baton Has Been Passed. Can We Now Run With It? No, dear friends, I didn’t send you off on a wild goose chase to immerse yourself in 450 pages of some of the most dense and intellectually challenging prose ever crafted on this planet.