Ideas
Gurdjieff claimed that people cannot perceive reality in their current states because they do not possess consciousness but rather live in a state of a hypnotic "waking sleep."
"Man lives his life in sleep, and in sleep he dies." As a result of this condition, each person perceives things from a completely subjective perspective. He asserted that people in their typical state function as unconscious automatons, but that one can "wake up" and become a different sort of human being altogether.
Read more about this topic: George Gurdjieff
Famous quotes containing the word ideas:
“Men can intoxicate themselves with ideas as effectually as with alcohol or with bang and produce, be dint of serious thinking, mental conditions hardly distinguishable from monomania.”
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95)
“When the precipitancy of a man’s wishes hurries on his ideas ninety times faster than the vehicle he rides in—woe be to truth!”
—Laurence Sterne (1713–1768)
“The uppermost idea with Hellenism is to see things as they really are; the uppermost ideas with Hebraism is conduct and obedience. Nothing can do away with this ineffaceable difference. The Greek quarrel with the body and its desires is, that they hinder right thinking; the Hebrew quarrel with them is, that they hinder right acting.”
—Matthew Arnold (1822–1888)