Consciousness: Where the Light Comes In

Consciousness: Where the Light Comes In

Last weekend our Center of students who live in the Washington, DC area hosted a weekend of events for the North American/Canada East Coast Region. About thirty-three students attended and, as with all activities in our school, the intended purpose of the gathering was to promote and sustain an internal presence through various external planned events.

Every event in the school is a celebration of consciousness. —The Teacher

To that end, we rented a house on the Potomac River where twelve visiting students lodged together and worked to support the activities at the so called, “Teaching House.” The schedule included a reception, visits to museums and historical sites, a formal dinner, a morning meeting on the theme of verification followed by a luncheon. On the last evening, we attended a piano concert and had a bon voyage breakfast the following morning. It was action packed, and the pressure of planning, preparing, and scheduling was bound to reveal both mechanical behaviors and ample opportunities to create higher states.

Transformation is still the primary way to produce consciousness. —The Teacher

P.D. Ouspensky explains that what makes the Fourth Way unique is that the practice of self-remembering occurs most favorably in the midst of normal, everyday life. This is where sleep and obstacles to awakening can be exposed by mechanical habits that cover up and keep me from seeing and knowing myself. The ordinary stimulus and response functioning of the four lower centers is daily on full display. I do not need to be cloistered in a monastery, take vows to be admitted into an ashram, or retreat to a secluded place of religious or spiritual instruction.

The unifying element of the Fourth Way is pursuing consciousness wherever I happen to find myself; to work with the weakness of the moment which is always some form of sleep. So, what is my practice? I give up expressing negative emotions when a fellow student at our event irritates me, or even when the grocery clerk is unpleasant; I notice uncontrolled mind activity – imagination – when the morning meeting on verification confuses me, or even when my mind goes wandering while talking to my neighbor; I try to release identification when I judge another student for putting the fine formal dinner plates in the dishwasher, or even when I disagree with a political view of a family member; I stop the unnecessary suffering – self-pity – when another student takes over the flower arranging which I may have wanted to do myself, or even when a colleague gets the promotion I was hoping for.

All of these examples are “where the light comes in,” if I am sufficiently aware enough to notice. For the most part, the lower functions can hum along without attention, just as I can ride a bike and be in a higher state looking at the world go by. When balanced, the lower centers can be moved out of the way and assist us in pursuit of consciousness with the right attention and transformation. I want to know myself because then I can take the raw material of the vessel I live in and transform its habits and mechanicality into alarm clocks to remind me to wake up.

We come together to increase consciousness. I increase my chances of waking up at such an event because someone else might be nearby to help awaken me. I take these moments and do my best to continue the effort of self-observation and self-remembering. The Work does not deny my functions but uses their predictability for raising consciousness.

This is a strange repose, to be asleep

With eyes wide open, standing, speaking, moving,

And yet so fast asleep. — Shakespeare

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Formal Dinner Table at Regional Gathering 2025