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phone: 828-859-9927
fax: 828-859-9960

P. O. Box 155
Tryon, NC 28782
Principles and tenents towards teaching the work go back

1. You cannot keep what you do not give away.

2. Halfway measures avail nothing.
Go the extra mile.
Super effort.

3. Sly man's pill:
Right effort
Right time
Right reason

4. Be thankful for the opportunity to teach. The Work only protects the students (teachers are students) who do the Work or Work on all three lines of The Work:
Working for the Work Itself.
Working with others in The Work
Working upon oneself

5. Most (students) give way when success is assured.
The vast majority of Work students do not proceed past the
mi/fa interval. Fewer still proceed through the si/do interval. The Work Itself must reach down from the high 'do' to assist the students up through the si/do interval.

6. Do not work for results. The mi/fa interval cannot be passed through unless, and until, The Work student renounces the necessity to be paid for their efforts.

7. Without aim, man perishes.

8. Sacrifice and sacrifice until you get what you want.

9. Pay in advance, take what you want.

10. The son of man has nowhere to lay h/his head.
This Work is a long journey. The slower your pace for working upon yourself, the less distance you will travel.

11. "W/man cannot do. Before a w/man can do, they must first be born. Before a w/man can be born, they must know what to die to." Gurdjieff
Many are called but few are chosen.

12. Create a system of forms, checks as well as balances in order to assure that your students are working on all four centers at once. One aim per center per day.

13. Alternate head, heart and body meetings. Head meetings are intellectual. Heart meetings address the necessity for sincere self-observation as well as providing a critical assessment of the student's current level of being. Body meetings are movement meetings and/or meetings which address the capacity to awaken as well as how to learn from the wisdom of the moving centers.

14. Everything turns into its opposite in time. Sincere efforts give way to halfway measures all the time.

15. A teacher's job is to apply shocks when necessary.
A teacher's job is to reflect a perfect mirror of Real Buried Conscience.
A teacher's job is to create the conditions under which sincere development, observation as well as conscious efforts may be applied.

16. Desire plays no part in The Work.

17. Do not do as you have always done.

18. Seek out third force always and in every situation.

19. Do what you least want to do.

20. Go against attitudes, habits as well as fears and associative thinking.

21. Never try to solve a problem on the level of the problem. Instead, jump up for The Work rope and, thereby, becoming able to see the situation in a new Work way.

22. Students like to let things slide. Create the mandatory aim that all tasks as well as all aims must be accomplished before retiring to bed.

23. God helps those who help themselves. "Stretch forth your withered arm." "Arise and walk." "Seek ye the kingdom of heaven and all things will be added unto you."

24. Never tempt the Lord thy God.

25. The Work aims not in the acquisition of powers, but rather, The Work aims at the non-identification with life itself.

26. The group is as great as its weakest link.

27. Consider the week as a seven-note octave. Each day a certain amount of effort coupled with aims must be met. Once the student looks for shortcuts and/or does not complete their aims, they begin to slow down, resulting in their falling behind the group. Students who fall too far behind the group eventually will be forced to leave the group for the benefit of the group. See #26.

28. The Work aims at enabling Its students to walk upon the waters of life itself. To be above life, means to be ahead of life. Never ever fall behind. If a student fails to keep up with The Work, The Work will not rescue them.

29. Use life as a means of working upon yourself:
a. Where is that in me?
b. What Work principles apply to this situation?
c. What would Jesus do in this situation?

30. Use yourself. Create personal stories as well as anecdotes to illustrate a principle.

31. Draw diagrams whenever possible.

32. Alternate the form of Work knowledge between esoteric psychology meetings, esoteric Christianity meetings and cosmology meetings.

33. Work teachers have three forms:
a. The teacher, as an example of The Work Within their life.
b. The teacher as a teacher of The Work.
c. The teacher as a student of The Work.

34. When putting a meeting together:
a. Database- gathering of material
b. Sort into categories
c. Place along vertical scale of being
d. Ascertain purpose of principle
e. Create aims to actualize principle

34b. Create at least one aim based upon the principle of the meeting. This specific aim is on top and/or in addition to the one aim for each center.

35. After a cosmology meeting, create aims to find the principle inside of the self.

36. The right and left foot, of The Work, is aim coupled with sacrifice.

37. The Work has a price.
Time, effort, sacrifice, obedience as well as choice.

38. Student Shadow Attacks: Students project their own shadow onto their teacher, then attack the teacher. Nine out of ten times, the student remains totally unaware of the situation. As a result, no amount of effort displayed by the teacher creates any positive effects. Notice that Jesus Christ tried three times to wake up Jesus' disciples in Gethsemane, also, with no apparent success.

39. There is no resurrection or second birth without a conscious death, which precedes it. A Work teacher must incorporate their level of being, exemplified in the Son of Man, in order to die consciously.

40. W/mankind, in general, as well as students, in particular, remain asleep within a sea of delusion as well as denial.

41. Root out all forms of gossip as well as complaining. Mechanical talking in the bane of existence. Create a bridle with a bit for the horse's mouth.

42. Always reality test principles. Always be ready to be wrong. Always remain able to be taught. Honesty along side humility are hallmarks of a Work teacher.

43. Students stop all along the path. The teacher's job is to make the student's decision as conscious as possible, but not to change it. "Anyone who interferes with another person's karma should be shot." Gurdjieff

44. When the student is ready, the teacher appears.

45. Learn how to project to students harmlessly and painlessly. Use yourself even if you have to be cleverly insincere. Always make "I" statements versus "you" statements. "You" statements engender second force by law.

46. It is not enough to know the word; you must embody it.

47. You cannot teach what you have not lived. The dice of God are loaded. Authority is based upon the actualization of The Work, not the mere knowledge or love of it.

48. There are three stages of Christian initiation and/or conversion.
Each stage is precipitated by and accompanied by a crisis:
Crisis of Meaning
Crisis of Betrayal
Crisis of Absence and/or Emptiness
Be Prepared!

50. "Always point north." Gurdjieff


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(c)Sojourner Pass Press 1995