“Mind the gap,” is an automated announcement made in British subways when a train’s doors open. The first time I heard it (and thereafter) it tickled my funny bone. Hearing this proper British voice reminding us (clueless?) passengers to be mindful as we stepped from the platform onto the train, just seemed funny. I had no intention of stepping into the narrow gap between the subway car and the platform.
But what about the gap between remembering myself and forgetting myself? That chasm.
Inner Space
Once upon a time, there was a young woman—well, maybe a middle-aged woman. She had been hard at work on herself for about twenty years. In her earnest quest to follow all the commands of the Fourth Way, she had pushed herself to her limit. What should she do? Where could she go from here?
She sought the advice of a wise old man. He gave her a simple task, “Remember yourself.”
So, she walked down the road remembering herself. She was so good at it, that each second she forgot herself, she found herself again in the next moment. Again, half a second later—she saw she’d forgotten and she remembered. The moment of forgetfulness kept subdividing into smaller and smaller duration. Yet, in each micro-moment of seeing that she had not remembered herself, she then remembered.
The Pitfall
Suddenly this earnest woman saw that those micro moments of forgetting would never stop—they would just keep subdividing into infinity. She could keep remembering but she would keep forgetting. This task of “remember yourself” suddenly seemed like a cruel joke.
In that moment, falling backwards into the chasm of the nano-gap, she died.
Why? Why had she spent her adult life working to remember herself when Gurdjieff had clearly said, “Man cannot Do.” It could not be done! So why, why, Why? What was the point?
She went home and stopped trying, holding onto the memory of that fatal nano-second gap. All she knew, was that she could not bear to “do” the work as she had done before.
A New Work Opens
Fast forward thirty years. She had ended up trying not to try so hard. Exploring the Work from different vantage points, she was introduced to something new. It gave her a fresh perspective on the “gap.”
Now, instead of running away from it, the gap has become a place to seek out. What lives in that space? Is this where the answer lies? Where what wants to remember and what Can, find each other? Where the me that works and the I that has always been, hold hands across the divide?
Mind the gap, indeed!
Lovely Roberta! Holding hands–such a simple, happy beloved gesture.
Richard Rudd, a wise teacher, says that “seriousness is a virus” that humans
suffer from. I am sure I have it often. Together may we all hold hands and lighten up.