Welcome to Bennett Books Blog!

Bennett Books Blog is dedicated to nurturing, nourishing, and further developing a living legacy of work-on-oneself introduced into Western culture by GI Gurdjieff at the opening of the twentieth century. It is a legacy of harmonious development, continuous education, ongoing practice, and lived experience in the many-faceted mystery of being human. Throughout the first half of the last century Gurdjieff intently lived this mystery with all who were drawn to him, able to bear his presence, receive his guidance, and willing to commit themselves to work in his laboratories.

John Godolphin Bennett and Elizabeth Mayall (Bennett) were two of many who answered the call. And, they were my teachers. And this blog, in their name and dedicated to their memory, invites all who knew them to bring to it what they experienced through and with them.

But this blog is not limited to JG and Elizabeth Bennett's students: it welcomes contributions from all who live, and continue to live, that lived experience of sincere work-on-oneself.

What is written here has neither intent to an authority nor a pretense of an authority on Gurdjieff the man or his teaching. How can it? I never met Mr. Gurdjieff: I was just five years old when he died, five-thousand miles away, and infinitely more distant in culture and class. As for his teaching and the practice of it, I too am a novice, although one with more than forty-years time coming to the conclusion that the work is formless, the work is infinite, I must undertake to live it.

In 1974 I studied with John and Elizabeth Bennett at their Sherborne Academy in England. With one-hundred others I sat in the great hall, practiced the morning exercises and experienced in those exercises and from Mr. B. a direct transmission of confidence that another world* is within our reach.

A transmission of a living legacy is not limited to those who received it in person. Actively or passively, directly or indirectly, a real transmission seeps into the mind, heart, and body of all who through the sincerity of their own work can open to it. That day has come and is already here: the work transmitted by Gurdjieff is strongly alive in so many that many others are now opening to it. Today, more and more visible are new seekers who are seeking to understand not just "who am I?" but "what am I?" and "how can I become what I am meant to be?"

Bennett Books Blog is a place for open discussion about the possibilities inherent in the human situation and the tools for actualizing those possibilities. It is intended to be an ongoing experiment in an interactive web page for sharing ideas and comments about the role of attention, breath, and body in a self-participating work of optimal human development and how these essential gifts of life relate to continuous education, active learning, care-free health, smart culture, inclusive community, and reciprocal relationship.

Fundamentally, it is intended to be an interactive conference point on the living legacy of ideas and practices for continuous harmonious human development brought to the West by Gurdjieff at the turn of the nineteenth century.

Whether you agree or disagree with what is now or will be written here, your personal experience in the form of a comment to this blog is welcome here.

Be well,
James Tomarelli for Bennett Books Blog

* "I want to say something about the foundation of it all, on which everything rests. I have spoken about another world and about different perceptions. All of you are interested in this and it was part of what attracted you here. It is possible for you to achieve something in the way of new perceptions and an understanding of the higher worlds and also to change in yourselves. The foundation of this whole work that we do together is the confidence that this is really possible. The main contribution that I can make is to convey to you my own confidence that this can be done." _JG Bennett, "Basic Course IV Inaugural Address," October 1974, Sherborne Academy, Sherborne, England.

***

Freshly Laundered & Hanging Out to Dry
A memoir from the boomer generation
by Barbara June Appelgren

"I've written a book about my experience during the second course at Sherborne (1972-73). I'll be posting it in segments on this blog and invite you to read it. With about 500 graduates, why hasn't more been published? The only writings I know of are Allen Roth's Sherborne and a delightfully humorous article by Lynn Quirolo called Meeting J.G. Bennett. Please let us know if you're aware of others."

"A memoir is supposed to be true. However, I'm sure the one hundred people who shared the experience of being young adult students at Sherborne on the second course would tell the story differently. And I hope they will."_BJ Appelgren, from the Forward.

read all the posted Chapters...