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Shirra Meiklejohn-Wilson was called by the Work Itself in a vision in 1976.  Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson is a modern exponent of the Fourth Way which was introduced into the West in the early 1900's by George Gurdjieff.  The Fourth Way, or the Work, is a nearly 4000 year-old tradition and discipline which has enabled individuals, world-wide, to spiritually develop while remaining within their everyday life.  This invaluable characteristic of  "being in life but not of it",  is one of the chief components of Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson's teachings.

Within three months of the Work's call, Ms. Meiklejohn- Wilson had joined a Work group in her home town of Greenwich, Connecticut.  Within a year, Ms. Meiklejohn- Wilson began teaching her own Fourth Way group, also in Greenwich, Connecticut.  Ever mindful of the Work's admonishment to balance her centers, Ms. Meiklejohn- Wilson set out to hone her professional skills. 

Towards that end, Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson returned to college.  Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson earned a Bachelor of Arts in Religion from Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut, as well as a Masters of Arts in Religion from the Yale Divinity School in 1988. 

Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson also became an in-patient volunteer at the Brandford Hospice.  Soon after, Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson took a clinical pastoral education course at the University of Connecticut's Acute Care Hospital in Farmington, Connecticut.

Having moved from Greenwich, Connecticut to Guilford, Connecticut in an attempt to shorten her commute to college, Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson began teaching the Work in an expanded form in Guilford, Connecticut as well.

Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson is a firm believer in the wisdom of Sun-Tsu as express in The Art of War:

      If you know yourself but do not know your enemy,

      you will sometimes meet with victory, sometimes with defeat.

      If you know your enemy but do not know yourself,

      you will sometimes meet with victory, sometimes with defeat.

      But if you know yourself and you know your enemy,

      you will be victorious on a hundred occasions.

              Sun-Tsu

In 1988 it became clear that another move was inevitable.  Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson decided to settle in Tryon, North Carolina.  Once in Tryon, Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson continued to build her private as well as her clinical practices.  Ms. Meiklejohn- Wilson was the first court appointed Polk County Offender Counselor in North Carolina.  Within the first year, Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson began to start her Southern Work groups.

It has been Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson's observation that people do not know themselves nor do they know their enemy.  Even if people knew themselves as well as their enemy; they would still lack the requisite knowledge with which to alter or develop the content of their own psycho-spiritual abilities. 

Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson maintains that spiritual development is a form of spiritual boot camp and therefore not for the fainthearted.

However, the wisdom of the Work with its practical aims, personal efforts, coupled with a student's sincere desire to know the Truth, creates the requisite soil in which the seed of spiritual development can be planted. 

In 1992, Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson received her second call from the Work Itself.  This second call contained three aims which the Work told Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson to achieve. 

The first aim was to change Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson's lifestyle from spontaneous phone calls into letter writing and journalizing.  The Work wanted Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson to record the actual elements and sequences of a mystical Work-level initiation as it was occurring.  The Work Itself wanted a verbatim record kept of all of the elements that made up the transition from subjective reality into the aim and contents of the Real Objective World.

Towards that end, Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson kept  a verbatim journal of the initiation called " The Out of Egypt Chronicles."  Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson also collected a ten volume record of all of her correspondences with students, clients and professionals, called, "Just For The Record."

The second Work aim was to write down "the teachings as Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson knew them.  This aim resulted in a set of seven volumes entitled, The Sojourner Pass Commentaries.

During this creative writing period, Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson also created a four volume, Independent Home Study Course as well as writing two Fourth Way Text Books, "Conscience and Incarnation" as well as "Daddy Near/Father Away." 

Along with the aim to write down the mystical interpretations of Work knowledge, Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson also founded the Sojourner Pass Community in 1994.  The Sojourner Pass Community is a Fourth Way School.  This Fourth Way school is a quasi-monastic ascetic Work Community that strictly adheres to the teachings of George Gurdjieff.  The SPC holds various classes and workshops, as well as individual instruction, addressing the Fourth Way knowledge concerning Cosmology, Esoteric  Psychology and Esoteric Christianity.

Adhering to the Fourth Way admonition to harmoniously balance and develop all of an individual's latent psycho-spiritual possibilities, the SPC holds group classes as well as private instruction which enables its students to develop their own intellectual, emotional and physical attributes.

In 1998, Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson began teaching Fourth Way, three-month, Work seminars. 

In addition, Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson has resurrected the salon.  Because Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson wished to interact with people at the highest level of competence possible, Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson returned to the salon as a perfect forum for the creation of meaningful, purposeful social interchange.

The last aim given to Ms. Meiklejohn-Wilson in 1992 was to wake up the Work teachers, world wide, and persuade the Work teachers to band together in consciousness, while still retaining their own individual autonomy.

Ms. Meiklejohn's open letter on the web is her first attempt to complete this last aim.

All inquiries, comments or questions should be emailed to the attention of Mr. David Fraser at david fraser@mindspring.com.

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Sojourner Institute
P. O. Box 155
Tryon, NC 28782

Phone:  828-859-9927
Fax:  828-859-9960
Email:  smwilson@sojourner-institute.com