In Conclusion
The observed objects of self-observation
Out of necessity, this effort must be concluded.
A summary:
1. The underlying assumption here has been that humanity is at an unprecedented, epochal threshold, where the long-term survival of civilisation is in question. This threshold is ultimately the direct result of the failure of spiritual paths – especially in the Western world - to generate transformation of human consciousness on a sufficient scale.
2. The central question here has been why these spiritual paths have so failed. Explanations have been drawn from the experience of the Gurdjieff Work which are tentative and partial, with broad application to other spiritual paths. These explanations rely on examination of relevant cultural, economic and social factors, and are typically overlooked in any consideration of the purposes, functions and effects of these paths, to the detriment of the potential efficacy of their praxis.
3. The primary weakness of Western spiritual paths arises from their social location, being situated within the most technologically and economically developed societies on the planet, which boast the most advanced material cultures and the most sophisticated (but critically limited!) epistemological and hermeneutic worldviews. Kapleau’s (Pillars) observed in Asian Buddhist countries the inverse relationship between the rigour, precision and vitality of their material cultures and their spiritual counterparts – an observation likely extendable to other countries given pronounced individual and collective limit to intelligent and effective work (whatever its direction). Western spiritual paths are generally devoid of the empirical pragmaticism which is so animating of Western material culture, seen, for example, in wholesale refusal of adequate hypothesis testing, in widespread adoption of magical thinking, and most egregiously in the prolific use of imprecise and vague language (‘energies’, ‘being’ etc). This problematic is compounded by the fact most Western spiritual praxis is located within ageing, weakening populations where drift toward socially generated and enforced consensus only accelerates in time, unstopped by any formal commitment to authentic truth and realisation.
4. Western spiritual paths are generally intellectually oriented, which unfortunately encourages captivation by obtuse intellectual systems and by exotic intellectual gestures. The remarkably prolix cultural production of these paths is a result. Books, podcasts, blogs etc proliferate, while realisation, seemingly, does not. Unfortunately, much ‘intellectual archaeology’ there proceeds without account of critical psychological and cultural contexts, despite the arguably unbridgeable (psychological and cultural) distances involved, which in turn magnifies the related problematic of imposing meaning upon texts (itself a subset of the larger problematic of the imposition mental and emotional imagery upon experience itself, per the narcissistic gesture par excellence). Such imposition seldom takes useful note of the significance of the hyper efficiency of some spiritual teachings (such as the Buddha’s flower sermon or Jesus last commandment), which are facts that insist on the intense (and subjective) instrumentality of all codified teachings.
5. Western spiritual paths lack capacity to identify individual spiritual potential; there is no equivalent, say, of Tibetan past life analysis. Goal orientation suffers accordingly. Goals become implicit, undeclared and typically relate to the more final outcomes articulated by each tradition (‘stream entry’, ‘enlightenment’ etc) - despite the demonstrated distances between individual potential and individual performance among followers of Western spiritual paths. Failure there often meets consolations which confuse spiritual goals with the fruits of ordinary psychological maturation, while representation of progressive disidentification with the narrowly physical (and physically adjacent) is corrupted by excessive (and excessively intellectual) anticipation of the directionality of the spiritual process itself.
6. Western spiritual paths and comparable social gestures (such as the psychoanalytic tradition) are subject to marked inter-generational decline. Remarkably, such entropy is sometimes anticipated by founders of some paths, such as Gurdjieff, who noted his work would not survive three generations past his. The decline is caused by (and symbolised by) declining incidence of individual realisation, leading to the normalisation of further vitality sapping gestures such as institutionalised reverence for dead legendary teachers, which serves to substitute for any realisation in the lives of living followers. Progressive (and regressive!) renegotiation of criteria for spiritual development (and authority) then follows over time, where intellectual discontinuities in received dogma become ever more pronounced, with sterile, largely intellectual excursions into other traditions and paths proliferating in inchoate hope of recovery of spiritual hope itself.
7. Approaches to Western spiritual paths are grievously undermined by an internalised (and invisible) cultural paradigm which is dominated by a post-modern secularist aperspectivalism characterised by deeply embedded (and widely promulgated) deconstructionist gestures, and by a general prejudice against non-familiar (or outright foreign) social discourses and imaginations. As a result, possible spiritual goals are not fully understood, and the necessary demands for the realisation of these goals are not properly. Historically unprecedented levels of psychological self-absorption both reflect and reinforce the dismal outcomes attendant to this internalisation.
8. The essence of the ‘Return to Gurdjieff’ is recognition of the probability the earliest record of Gurdjieff’s teaching (Fragments) more closely reflects what he was taught (and how he was taught) than any later iteration of his teaching. The spiritual process is wholly represented in Fragments, and hence there were no subsequent distinct – or distinctly useful – innovations in the teaching. Objections to this claim only arise where there is no notable realisation. Notably, Gurdjieff never claimed there were. Instead, his approach to students reflected their varied needs and abilities, producing a variated teaching over time. Without his assessment of students, no reconstruction of the supposed ‘stages’, ‘development’ or ‘growth’ of his teaching is possible. In more ways than one, we are left with Fragments.
9. Mention has been made here of the limited government (and whistleblower) disclosure of the presence of Non-human intelligence (NHI) in our world. A popular inability to comprehend the facts and implications of the limited and incomplete disclosure to date seems to explain an otherwise curious lack of popular reaction to the notion of NHI present here. The non-reaction of natives to the ships of Spanish explorers is an instructive parallel, drawn by many.
10. This disclosure is seemingly managed and careful, suggesting a guiding awareness that future disclosed ‘facts and implications’ may be disturbing if not outright dangerous to society at large. This prospect further reinforces spiritual transformation as a pressing imperative, given the equanimous perspectives spiritual transformation can provide, and the appropriate reaction it can promote. Dzogchen – the highest teaching of Tibetan Buddhism – describes itself as the spiritual path in thirteen separate star systems. If this claim (or an analogous claim) is substantively true, then intelligent life elsewhere faces comparable challenges to spiritually evolve. And presumably some intelligent life elsewhere has succeeded in meeting these challenges. To meet them – and our future – we need to become what we can be.