Explorations in Active Mentation


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Man, a Three-brained Being


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Reflections on Gurdjieff's Whim


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The Third Striving


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The Third Striving consists of an examination of World Laws and World Maintenance as put forth by G. I Gurdjieff. In his epic work All and Everything, Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson, the third "striving," which is formulated thus: "the conscious striving to know ever more and more concerning the laws of World-creation and World-maintenance, is the third of five " ' being-obligolnian-strivings' " to be practiced ..." in order to have in their consciousness this Divine function of genuine conscience...," (Beelzebub's Tales, pp 385-86). To inquire into and come to an understanding of Law is a responsibility for all individuals who practice and pursue the Gurdjieff Work. It is required (but not enough) to carry out a variety of practices and to struggle, in one's inner world, toward a realization of Conscience. Beyond this, Gurdjieff calls on us to consciously come to Objective Reason, and this requires us to contemplate and actively mentate as best we can on the laws which define the working of our inner and outer World. Only when we understand the laws can we hope to properly utilize the energies of Okidanokh, in the coating process of Kesdjan and Higher Being-body. This volume seeks to offer discoveries and further inquiry into this pivotal "striving," employing the most recent discoveries in modern physics, cosmology, biology and chemistry along with experiential data.




A New Conception of God


Book Description

A New Conception of God: Further Reflections on Gurdjieff?s Whim continues the thread that was introduced in the previous volume[, Reflections on Gurdjieff's Whim]. In this 314 page volume, bountiful with full color, exquisite illustrations, Buzzell shares his unending pursuit of ?fathoming the gist? G.I. Gurdjieff?s three series of writings under the title of All and Everything, with an emphasis on the first series, Beelzebub?s Tales to His Grandson. Included with the book, is an eightpage fold-out of key illustrations which can be a substantial aide for the reader to navigate through the concepts. In every long thought, Buzzell pursues the implications of current scientific discoveries in the fields of physics, chemistry, biology, evolutional biology and cosmology, revealing the vastness of Gurdjieff?s vision of the potential evolution of three-brained beings: we humans on the planet Earth. Buzzell examines Gurdjieff?s concept of Conscience, exploring the implications of its involvement in all parts of one?s being, with emphasis on the relationship betweenConscience with Reason. He takes up the perennial question of war, focusing on its origins within the subconscious. He goes deep into the interstices of the power of the survival impulse in all our three ?brains? or centers: body, feeling, thinking and identifies their essential qualities whichshed light on the mechanics of egoism. Buzzell responds to Gurdjieff?s injunction to comprehend the essential difference between sensing and feeling, giving a convincing and clarifying account of the biology of these two distinct experiences, as well as their ancient sources. Throughout, a symbol is employed, A Symbol of the Cosmos and its Laws, which visually organizes the complex notions of levels in Gurdjieff?s concept, the ?Ray of Creation,? as well as many other concepts such as the significance of the digestion of food, air and impressions. With this symbol, Buzzell helps us to see the intrinsic lawfulness of all events and processes. The book culminates with a chapter, the title of which gives a taste of its magnitude: ?Attention (H12), the Greatest Gift to Life; The Power to Pursue Meaning and Purpose.?




Democracy and Education


Book Description

. Renewal of Life by Transmission. The most notable distinction between living and inanimate things is that the former maintain themselves by renewal. A stone when struck resists. If its resistance is greater than the force of the blow struck, it remains outwardly unchanged. Otherwise, it is shattered into smaller bits. Never does the stone attempt to react in such a way that it may maintain itself against the blow, much less so as to render the blow a contributing factor to its own continued action. While the living thing may easily be crushed by superior force, it none the less tries to turn the energies which act upon it into means of its own further existence. If it cannot do so, it does not just split into smaller pieces (at least in the higher forms of life), but loses its identity as a living thing. As long as it endures, it struggles to use surrounding energies in its own behalf. It uses light, air, moisture, and the material of soil. To say that it uses them is to say that it turns them into means of its own conservation. As long as it is growing, the energy it expends in thus turning the environment to account is more than compensated for by the return it gets: it grows. Understanding the word "control" in this sense, it may be said that a living being is one that subjugates and controls for its own continued activity the energies that would otherwise use it up. Life is a self-renewing process through action upon the environment.




Explorations in Mental Health Training


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Some 176 projects that "represent the status of activity (of mental health training grants) as of the spring of 1974". Broad arrangement by kinds of personnel. Entries include name of grantee, institution, address, grant number, grant duration, and summary of project. Subject index, Index of grantee institutions.




School, Family, and Community Partnerships


Book Description

Strengthen programs of family and community engagement to promote equity and increase student success! When schools, families, and communities collaborate and share responsibility for students′ education, more students succeed in school. Based on 30 years of research and fieldwork, the fourth edition of the bestseller School, Family, and Community Partnerships: Your Handbook for Action, presents tools and guidelines to help develop more effective and more equitable programs of family and community engagement. Written by a team of well-known experts, it provides a theory and framework of six types of involvement for action; up-to-date research on school, family, and community collaboration; and new materials for professional development and on-going technical assistance. Readers also will find: Examples of best practices on the six types of involvement from preschools, and elementary, middle, and high schools Checklists, templates, and evaluations to plan goal-linked partnership programs and assess progress CD-ROM with slides and notes for two presentations: A new awareness session to orient colleagues on the major components of a research-based partnership program, and a full One-Day Team Training Workshop to prepare school teams to develop their partnership programs. As a foundational text, this handbook demonstrates a proven approach to implement and sustain inclusive, goal-linked programs of partnership. It shows how a good partnership program is an essential component of good school organization and school improvement for student success. This book will help every district and all schools strengthen and continually improve their programs of family and community engagement.




How We Think


Book Description

Our schools are troubled with a multiplication of studies, each in turn having its own multiplication of materials and principles. Our teachers find their tasks made heavier in that they have come to deal with pupils individually and not merely in mass. Unless these steps in advance are to end in distraction, some clew of unity, some principle that makes for simplification, must be found. This book represents the conviction that the needed steadying and centralizing factor is found in adopting as the end of endeavor that attitude of mind, that habit of thought, which we call scientific. This scientific attitude of mind might, conceivably, be quite irrelevant to teaching children and youth. But this book also represents the conviction that such is not the case; that the native and unspoiled attitude of childhood, marked by ardent curiosity, fertile imagination, and love of experimental inquiry, is near, very near, to the attitude of the scientific mind. If these pages assist any to appreciate this kinship and to consider seriously how its recognition in educational practice would make for individual happiness and the reduction of social waste, the book will amply have served its purpose. It is hardly necessary to enumerate the authors to whom I am indebted. My fundamental indebtedness is to my wife, by whom the ideas of this book were inspired, and through whose work in connection with the Laboratory School, existing in Chicago between 1896 and 1903, the ideas attained such concreteness as comes from embodiment and testing in practice. It is a pleasure, also, to acknowledge indebtedness to the intelligence and sympathy of those who coöperated as teachers and supervisors in the conduct of that school, and especially to Mrs. Ella Flagg Young, then a colleague in the University, and now Superintendent of the Schools of Chicago.