Let us suppose, then, that you have to live with a person who is you. Perhaps this is what the other person has to do. Of course, if you have no self-observation you may actually imagine this would be charming and that if everyone were just like you, the world would indeed be a happy place. There are no limits to vanity and self-conceit. Now in putting yourself into another person’s position you are also putting yourself into his point of view, into how he sees you, and hears you, and experiences you in your daily behavior. You are seeing yourself through his eyes.
If you have no self-observation you cannot do this, because you will simply take yourself for granted as being “quite all right” in everything. But if you have become sufficiently trained in self-observation to have begun to lose your former ideas of yourself and if you already have a collection not only of snapshots but of cabinet-size photographs of yourself in your most typical roles, the case will be quite different. You will be able to see yourself to some extent as the other person sees you and so you will begin to realize practically what the other person’s situation is and what some of his or her difficulties are and what it might mean if you had to live with yourself. Of course, the other person must do the same. Some of you may think, on hearing this, that it is quite right to say that the other person should try to see how difficult he or she is. But notice that we are beginning the other way round. It is you who have to see how difficult you are for the other person. Let me tell you that all this is not at all easy to grasp. You may think you know it all already. You may have heard it already, but a lifetime at least is needed to see all that it implies.
Maurice Nicoll, “Internal Considering and External Considering” in Psychological Commentaries on the Teaching of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky (Vol. 1, p. 266).
Working Note: For Today’s Inner Effort
Orientation: See yourself for a moment from the other person’s position.
What to Notice:
Taking yourself as entirely right.
Speaking in a way that leaves no place for the other person.
Expecting understanding without giving it.
Forgetting that others experience your manifestations.
Work Effort for Today:
In one interaction, reverse the viewpoint.
Ask how your behavior may appear from the other side.
Observe without defending yourself.
Remain with what is seen.
Remember: See yourself through their eyes before you react.
