“In addition to these, other people become fakirs simply from being struck by some fakir they have seen. Near every fakir in the temples people can be seen who imitate him, who sit or stand in the same POSTURE. Not for long of course, but still occasionally for several hours. And sometimes it happens that a man who went into the temple accidentally on a feast day, and began to imitate some fakir who particularly struck him, does not return home any more but joins the crowd of that fakir’s disciples and later, in the course of time, becomes a fakir himself. You must understand that I take the word ‘fakir’ in quotation marks. In Persia fakir simply means a beggar; and in India a great many jugglers call themselves fakirs. And Europeans, particularly learned Europeans, very often give the name of fakir to yogis, as well as to monks of various wandering orders. Fragments: Two

“If a man were able to work on himself everything would be very simple and schools would be unnecessary. But he cannot, and the reasons for this lie very deep in his nature. I will leave for the moment his insincerity with himself, the perpetual lies he tells himself, and so on, and take only the division of the centers. This alone makes independent work on himself impossible for a man. You must understand that the three principal centers, the thinking, the emotional, and the moving, are connected together and, In a normal man, they are always working in unison. This unison is what presents the chief difficulty in work on oneself. What is meant by this unison? It means that a definite work of the thinking center is connected with a definite work of the emotional and moving centers — that is to say, that a certain kind of thought is inevitably connected with a certain kind of emotion (or mental state) and with a cer­tain kind of movement (or POSTURE); and one evokes the other, that is, a certain kind of emotion (or mental state) evokes certain movements or POSTUREs and certain thoughts, and a certain kind of movement or POSTURE evokes certain emotions or mental states, and so forth. Everything is connected and one thing cannot exist without another thing. Fragments: Seventeen

In this connection G. showed us a number of different exercises for obtaining control over muscular tension and he showed us certain POSTUREs adopted in schools when praying or contemplating which a man can only adopt if he learns to relax unnecessary tension of the muscles. Among them was the so-called POSTURE of Buddha with feet resting on the knees, and another still more difficult POSTURE, which he could adopt to perfection, and which we were able to imitate only very approximately. Fragments: Seventeen

To adopt this POSTURE G. kneeled down and then sat on his heels (without boots) with feet closely pressed together. It was very difficult even to sit on one’s heels in this way for more than a minute or two. He then raised his arms and, holding them on a level with his shoulders, he slowly bent himself backwards and lay on the ground while his legs, bent at the knees, remained pressed beneath him. Having lain in this position for a certain time he just as slowly raised himself up with arms outstretched, then he again lay down, and so on. Fragments: Seventeen

“The character of the movements and POSTUREs in every epoch, in every race, and in every class is indissolubly connected with definite forms of thinking and feeling. A man is unable to change the form of his thinking or his feeling until he has changed his repertory of POSTUREs and movements. The forms of thinking and feeling can be called the POSTUREs and movements of thinking and feeling. Every man has a definite number of thinking and feeling POSTUREs and movements. Moreover moving, thinking, and feeling POSTUREs are connected with one another in man and he can never move out of his repertory of thinking and feeling POSTUREs unless he changes his moving POSTUREs. An analysis of man’s thoughts and feelings and a study of his moving functions, arranged in a certain way, show that every one of our movements, voluntary or involuntary, is an unconscious transition from one POSTURE to another, both equally mechanical. Fragments: Seventeen

“In ordinary conditions we have no conception how much our thinking, feeling, and moving functions depend upon one another, although we know, at the same time, how much our moods and our emotional states can depend upon our movements and POSTUREs. If a man takes a POSTURE which with him corresponds to a feeling of sadness or despondency, then within a short time he is sure to feel sad or despondent. Fear, disgust, nervous agitation, or, on the other hand, calm, can be created by an intentional change of POSTURE. But as each of man’s functions, thinking, emotional, and moving, has its own definite repertory all of which are in constant interaction, a man can never get out of the charmed circle of his POSTUREs. Fragments: Seventeen

“In order to oppose this automatism and gradually to acquire control over POSTUREs and movements in different centers there is one special exercise. It consists in this — that at a word or sign, previously agreed upon, from the teacher, all the pupils who hear or see him have to arrest their movements at once, no matter what they are doing, and remain stock-still in the POSTURE in which the signal has caught them. Moreover not only must they cease to move, but they must keep their eyes on the same spot at which they were looking at the moment of the signal, retain the smile on their faces, if there was one, keep the mouth open if a man was speaking, maintain the facial expression and the tension of all the muscles of the body exactly in the same position in which they were caught by the signal. In this ‘stopped’ state a man must also stop the flow of his thoughts and concentrate the whole of his attention on preserving the tension of the muscles in the various parts of the body exactly as it was, watching this tension all the time and leading so to speak his attention from one part of the body to another. And he must remain in this state and in this position until another agreed-upon signal allows him to adopt a customary POSTURE or until he drops from fatigue through being unable to preserve the original POSTURE any longer. But he has no right to change anything in it, neither his glance, points of support, nothing. If he cannot stand he must fall — but, again, he should fall like a sack without attempting to protect himself from a blow. In exactly the same way, if he was holding something in his hands he must hold it as long as he can and if his hands refuse to obey him and the object falls it is not his fault. Fragments: Seventeen

“Let us try to follow what occurs. A man is walking, or sitting, or working. At that moment he hears a signal. A movement that has begun is interrupted by this sudden signal or command to stop. His body becomes immovable and arrested in the midst of a transition from one POSTURE to another, in a position in which he never stays in ordinary life. Feeling himself in this state, that is, in an unaccustomed POSTURE, a man involuntarily looks at himself from new points of view, sees and observes himself in a new way. In this unaccustomed POSTURE he is able to think in a new way, feel in a new way, know himself in a new way. In this way the circle of old automatism is broken. The body tries in vain to adopt an ordinary comfortable POSTURE. But the man’s will, brought into action by the will of the teacher, prevents it The struggle goes on not for life but till the death. But in this case will can conquer. This exercise taken together with all that has been said is an exercise for self-remembering. A man must remember himself so as not to miss the signal; he must remember himself so as not to take the most comfortable POSTURE at the first moment; he must remember himself in order to watch the tension of the muscles in different parts of the body, the direction in which he is looking, the facial expression, and so on; he must remember himself in order to overcome very considerable pain sometimes from unaccustomed positions of the legs, arms, and back, so as not to be afraid of falling or dropping something heavy on his foot. It is enough to forget oneself for a single moment and the body will adopt, by itself and almost un-noticeably, a more comfortable position, it will transfer the weight from one foot to another, will slacken certain muscles, and so on. This exer­cise is a simultaneous exercise for the will, the attention, the thoughts, the feelings, and for moving center. Fragments: Seventeen

“But very difficult cases occur. I will tell you of one case in my own life. It was many years ago in Central Asia. We had put up a tent by the side of an arik, that is, an irrigation canal. And three of us were carrying things from one side of the arik to the other where our tent was. The water in the arik came up to our waists. I and another man had just come out on the bank with some things and were preparing to dress; the third man was still in the water. He dropped something in the water, we afterwards found out that it was an ax, and he was feeling about on the bottom with a stick. At this moment we heard from the tent a voice which called ‘Stop!’ We both stood stock­still on the bank as we were. Our comrade in the water was just within our field of vision. He was standing bending down towards the water and when he heard ‘stop’ he remained in that POSTURE. One or two minutes passed by and suddenly we saw that the water in the arik was rising. Someone perhaps a mile away had opened a sluice to let water into the small arik. The water rose very rapidly and soon reached the chin of the man in the water. We did not know if the man in the tent knew that the water was rising. We could not call out to him, we could not even turn our heads to see where he was, we could not look at each other. I could only hear my friend breathing. The water began to rise very rapidly and soon the head of the man in the water was completely covered. Only one hand was raised supported by a long staff. Only this hand was to be seen. It seemed to me that a very long time passed by. At length we heard: ‘Enough!’ We both sprang into the water and dragged our friend out of it. He had been almost suffocated.” Fragments: Seventeen