Part of self-observation is coming to recognize sleep, first of all in ourselves. Sleep means living in our imagination and our day dreams – a subjective world. However, when we remember ourselves for a moment, we temporarily step out of sleep.

“Man is a machine, everything with him happens: he cannot stop the flow of his thoughts, he cannot control his imagination, his emotions, his attention. He lives in a subjective world of ‘I love,’ ‘I do not love,’ ‘I like,’ ‘I do not like,’ ‘I want,’ ‘I do not want,’ that is, of what he thinks he likes, of what he thinks he does not like, of what he thinks he wants, of what he thinks he does not want. He does not see the real world. The real world is hidden from him by the wall of imagination. He lives in sleep. He is asleep.”

George Gurdjieff quoted by P. D. Ouspensky, In Search of the Miraculous

The Wall of Imagination

This “wall of imagination” marks the boundaries of our prison cell. Actually, Gurdjieff goes on to say that this sleep is not the normal kind of sleep, but a hypnotic sleep.

“First of all it must be realized that the sleep in which man exists is not normal but hypnotic sleep. Man is hypnotized and this hypnotic state is continually maintained and strengthened in him. One would think that there are forces for whom it is useful and profitable to keep man in a hypnotic state and prevent him from seeing the truth and understanding his position.”

In Search of the Miraculous

Seeing Sleeping People

Actually, sleep is not a metaphor but a fact. Ouspensky describes his experience seeing sleeping people:

“I was walking along the Troitsky street and suddenly I saw that the man who was walking towards me was asleep. There could be no doubt whatever about this. Although his eyes were open, he was walking along obviously immersed in dreams which ran like clouds across his face. It entered my mind that if I could look at him long enough I should see his dreams, that is, I should understand what he was seeing in his dreams. But he passed on. After him came another also sleeping. A sleeping izvostchik went by with two sleeping passengers. Suddenly I found myself in the position of the prince in the “Sleeping Princess.” Everyone around me was asleep. It was an indubitable and distinct sensation.”

P. D. Ouspensky, In Search of the Miraculous

Waking from Sleep

While sleep in others is directly visible to higher centers, it is not visible from the second state. Yet other people are not the question, but we ourselves. By trying to observe ourselves, divide our attention and remember ourselves, we begin to realize that most of each day is passed in a state of waking sleep. Perhaps we awake for a moment, but then we fall back into imagination, and wake up again some time later.

“Only when a man realises that he is asleep, is it possible to say that he is on the way to awakening. He never can awaken without first realising his sleep.”

P. D. Ouspensky, In Search of the Miraculous

David Tuttle, with over forty years in the work, has contributed various article for the Fourth Way Today include The Uncarved Block, An Apollo Walk and The Cascade Fire.