Third Eye Awakened: Higher Centers

Third Eye Awakened: Higher Centers

“How do you know if you are experiencing Higher Centers?” The Fourth Way system emphasizes Higher Centers as the seat of higher states of consciousness. If fully functioning Higher Centers, also known as Third eye, are the goal, then how are they to be recognized?

Emblazoned on the forehead of an artwork of an enlightened being, Third Eye symbolizes the human potential to connect with a higher reality through an awakened or higher state of awareness. These higher states are known by many names, including Higher Centers, Self-remembering, Presence, and the Higher Self.

If you want to understand the nature of reality, or you desire self-knowledge, or you wish to feel closer to God, or to serve others, the Fourth Way system brought to the West by George Gurdjieff and Peter Ouspensky can help. Anyone with such aims may benefit from experiencing higher states because more can be seen and understood in a higher state. It is as if the light bulb has gone on and a new comprehension of reality lives inside you, continuing to inform your actions long after the state has passed.

Virtually everyone has the potential for experiencing a higher state because its seeds exist in the human body from birth. Although Higher Centers are dormant in most adults, there are ways to encourage them to wake up and grow. Discovering them begins by learning to recognize your own inner child, which the system calls essence. It is the part of you that can be open to the moment, just like a child or a beginner; it is also the part that can learn to recognize when you are experiencing a higher state. The issue then becomes, how to help essence transcend into the Higher Self. This requires cleansing yourself of useless self-absorbed thoughts and pretentious acts while training the attention, or mindfulness, that you bring to each moment. Whether the moment involves an object, a task, or another person, essence can learn to divide its attention between itself and that which it perceives. When you reside in a state of divided attention you are “Self-remembering.” One definition of Self-remembering is “essence aware of itself.”

Your Higher Self is a higher state. The theory is that humans experience different degrees of awareness from deep sleep to full wakefulness and beyond. On this sliding scale one may be closer to, or farther from, any particular point on the range of possibilities. The first state is the lowest, with the least awareness, and it is what is commonly called sleep. The second state is where people live most of their lives, where we eat, talk, read, drive cars, and so on. These two lower states are the medium for the lower centers and the lower self. The second state is often characterized as “sleep” because, as seen from higher states, it is just as full of illusions and distortions as the first state.

The third and fourth states are associated with Higher Centers. In the third state, Higher Emotional Center functions and there is a greater awareness of reality as it pertains to oneself. In the fourth state, Higher Mental Center functions and one’s awareness is again greater, including the perception of universal laws underlying reality. Becoming one’s Higher Self through experiencing the third and fourth states brings with it discriminating awareness, enhanced understanding, and the warmth of compassion, which enable one to be one’s Higher Self and to work within ultimate reality.

It is helpful to understand some of the reasons for difficulty in recognizing higher states. Foremost is imagination about them – if a state fails to match one’s imaginary picture of what it should be, it will not be valued. For example, if “radiant bliss” or “great wisdom” is expected, a higher state that occurs in a simple moment or at a time of suffering will be discounted. Other reasons for difficulty in recognizing higher states include being so absorbed in what Higher Centers “are not” that one loses track of what they “are.” This can result in a reluctance to drop the steward in order that the Master, one’s Real ‘I’ may appear.

Another common misunderstanding is that Higher Centers will always be the same and that they are either “on or off,” like a light switch. To the contrary, they vary greatly in feeling and contents; moreover, they are constantly changing. In fact, they grow. Higher Centers, even when mature, are always learning. They must educate themselves and each time they manifest they increase their being.

From the Introduction to the book Awakening, quotes from the Teacher collected and edited by Dianne Crosby

Eventually the Third Eye will win out over the lower self.─ The Teacher

Join the discussion

Various Ancient Cultures’ representations of Third Eye