G.I.Gurdjieff

Gradually our interest is attached to the new thing, eventually to such an extent that we sink into it from head to foot. Suddenly we are possessed, captivated by it. We have disappeared. And this propensity to be captivated, this infatuation, is a property of each one of us under many different guises. It binds us, taking away our strength and time, and leaving us no possibility to be objective and free—two essential qualities for anyone who would follow the way of self-knowledge.

Man is he who can “do,” but among ordinary people, as well as those who are considered extraordinary, there is no one who can “do.”

A person who sleeps cannot “do.” With him everything is done in sleep. Sleep is understood here not in the literal sense of organic sleep, but in the sense of a state of associative existence. First of all, we must awake. Having awakened, we will see that as we are, we cannot “do.” Then we will have to die voluntarily and be reborn. Once reborn, we must grow and learn. When we have grown and know, then we will be able to “do.”