Impressions as food, in the way that Gurdjieff talks about it, has become a focus for me. I was especially struck by a story in the last chapter of Meetings With Remarkable Men. In this chapter, Gurdjieff recounts his on-going struggles with financing his enterprise. The strain he puts himself under to do this results in a consequential incident:
“One evening I finished my work in Paris earlier than usual. … As I had to be at the Preiré without fail the next morning,…I decided to go there at once, go to bed early and have a good sleep. …
On approaching the Fontainebleau Forest, … I would soon be coming to a place where in damp weather there was often fog late at night. … it was quarter past eleven. …
From that moment on, I remember nothing, neither how I drove, nor what happened.
When I came to myself I saw…I was sitting in the car, which stood right there on the roadway. Around me was the forest; the sun was shining brightly; …
It seems that…I must have gone on about a kilometer and then fallen asleep against my will. [This] had never happened to me in my life before. I had slept on until ten o’clock in the morning. …
The chill I caught that night was so severe, that even now I can feel its effects.
From then on it became very difficult for me…to demand from my body too strenuous an effort. Willy-nilly, I had to stop all my business. The situation of the Institute therefore became critical in the extreme.”
Faced with insurmountable financial issues, including the care of numerous war refugees, Gurdjieff decides that he needs a “complete rest.”
This is the part that astounds me and has to do with impressions as food—not only food, but medicine:
“…why should I not immediately carry out the plan I have made to go to America, without waiting to complete the preparations for the trip?…
A tour through the different states of North America, with constant traveling and change of environment, far from the usual surroundings and consequently always with new impressions, will create the necessary conditions—in accordance with my established subjectivity—for a complete rest.”
So in order to heal himself, Gurdjieff takes on what looks like an even greater challenge. Pay for almost fifty people to go to America to put on movements demonstrations. Prepare with a lavish performance in Paris before hand. AND the only available funds to do this with is the money saved to purchase the Preiré, which is coming due. All because of the importance of receiving new impressions to regain his health, upon which everything depends.
In past readings of Remarkable Men, I never picked up on this part of Gurdjieff’s story, how he modeled the importance of impressions as food. My own relationship with taking in impressions has begun to grow. A new food I need to cultivate and learn to “eat.”
I so appreciated this comment. Just this morning I was planning to do something I’ve never done solely for the impressions, but thought I wish I knew more about impressions. Then I saw you had posted this blog. I, too, had been struck by Gurdjieff’s comments on travel and impressions in that last chapter of Meetings with Remarkable Men. I’m still wanting to learn more about impressions but your post made me sense I was on the right track today with what I planned to do. Thanks!
Thank you for sharing this, Eileen. I, too, feel that I’m entering a new exploration. All the work with taking-in the finer elements of the air seems like prep for this new work, done in a three-centered way.