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Some of my earliest contacts with anything remotely related to the Sufi Path was through Gurdjieff and Ouspensky.

' I actually spent some time with a Gurdjieff group that was tied to Madam Walsh - wife of the attending physician at the time of Gurdjieff's passing away in France.

'One of the other primary lines of Gurdjieff-linked teachings was through Madam de Hartmann, wife of Thomas de Hartmann who often played, and helped arrange, the music that was played in conjunction with the form of sacred dancing which Gurdjieff introduced to the West.

'Interestingly, at the time I was involved with all of this, the latter group didn't seem to have much to do with the former group, and vice versa.

While there were many very talented and intelligent people associated with the Gurdjieff-like group with which I spent a little over a year, I didn't feel any of the leaders of the group had substantial spiritual insight into the nature of Being.

More importantly, not only did I find some of their answers to my questions problematic - especially as things related to the possible links between Gurdjieff and the Sufi tradition, alluded to in, for example, the second of three works by Gurdjieff - namely, Meetings with Remarkable Men -
"but, as well, I found disconcerting and troublesome the way several of them came in search of me at my place of employment when I indicated to them that I was going to pursue the Sufi Path rather than continue with the Gurdjieff group.

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All too many people confuse manifestations of worldly kashf with spirituality. Although some authentic shaykhs have access to such powers, the general principle among legitimate guides is to keep one's distance, as much as possible, from matters of worldly kashf.

I have read much that Gurdjieff has written (including: Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson) along with many of the writings of his followers such as Ouspensky, Nicoll (e.g., the multi-volume Commentaries), as well as spent some time with at least one person who actually knew Gurdjieff. Nonetheless, although I saw lots of evidence for worldly kashf in Gurdjieff (and some of those who followed him), there seemed to be very little evidence for spiritual kashf in conjunction with him - indeed, there seemed to be more confusion about spirituality swirling around, and through, his teachings than clarity.

Gurdjieff was interested - or, so, he claimed - in waking people from their sleep. But, there is such a thing as dreaming that one has awoken, only to remain fast asleep, and one of the questions which is still relevant with respect to Gurdjieff and his teachings is to what extent Gurdjieff was actually spiritually awake, or to what extent his teachings were capable of helping one find the truth of things.

God knows best what the truth is concerning him. However, he gives expression to a continuing problem for seekers after the Truth, and, in fact, this is the primary reason why I have spent a bit of time talking about Gurdjieff.

I have heard many people allude to powerful zikrs that they have experienced. I, too, have participated in zikrs which have quite powerful.

Nonetheless, one still can raise questions about what is actually transpiring during such sessions or from where the power is coming which may be associated with a given zikr. The unrealized individual is vulnerable to attacks from Iblis and nafs while saying zikr - or, while engaged in prayer, contemplation and seclusion, and the presence of an altered state of consciousness in conjunction with certain practices does not necessarily mean that the state is an expression of Divine favor.

Trans-personal experience does not, in and of itself, necessarily say anything about the significance of such experience. Iblis is capable of inducing non-ordinary states of consciousness, as is nafs, and so are practitioners of occult systems. Many drugs - designer and natural - also are capable of generating very powerful, transforming experiences, and, under certain circumstances, group dynamics can bring about overwhelming emotional, physical, and psychological changes.

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The Gurdjieff Work, also known as “Fourth Way Schools,” upholds teachers with direct lines leading back to Gurdjieff and Ouspensky, among others. Teachers who are “officially” acknowledged to have studied the “real Work” with the “right people”. In published statements the "Fourth Way" disavows Alex Horn as a legitimately connected teacher.

Yo, my Gurdjieff teacher wasn’t a real Gurdjieff teacher.

I loved knowing the Work was also known as, “The Sly Man’s Way”. That as a member, I had a near obligation to bend societal rules, indeed, avoid them completely because they were mechanical and represented death. In the beginning was the word, and the word was: SLY.

Today I see it as brilliantly seductive and quite psychopathic.

What I want to know is: was Gurdjieff a real Gurdjieff teacher. Okay.

Because I did study the Work books and materials for many years, eventually rejecting them for my own reasons. For one, Gurdjieff himself did not seem all that “conscious”. The man drove his Citroen around Europe like Mr. Toad in Wind in the Willows, until he crashed and very nearly killed himself. Students have wondered if Gurdjieff’s accident was perhaps, a "conscious smashup” if you will. Please, the guy drove like a nimrod, plus he drank an unholy amount of the strongest coffee and liquor everyday.

Mother’s Against Drunk Drivers would not have approved.
I met and married Michaelle around a year after I left The Group. She knew nothing of Gurdjieff. In the next five years we had two children and I am most sad to say my family suffered as a result of my having been so twisted in “G”. For ten years after I left I still felt the IDEAS were valid and pushed them on others, which of course, everyone highly resented. For the first few years I was intolerable. You know, telling people they were asleep. I drank as much before Horn as I did after, but before I was annoyingly exuberant, not often violent. After The Group I was violent and abusive period. One of the reasons I loved meetings was we drank. And cigarettes. My god, the cigarettes. At a meeting of two hundred people there might be twenty or so, gallon jugs of wine going around.

Alex Horn’s take on the Gurdjieff ideas encouraged their practice through confrontation of weakness, humiliation, amoral goal setting, screaming, physical fighting and more. This was all supposed to be for a good end.

From the bottom of my heart then, for all time, I apologize to my family. I know I can never make it up to you Michaelle, River and Forest. Still, I am sorry. It took many years to outgrow Post Alex Stress Disorder and you did not deserve it.