Seeing Into the Heart of Things: Never be bullied into silence. Never allow yourself to be made a victim. Accept no one's definition of your life; define yourself. -Harvey Fierstein

This is a very secretive, elusive and elitist group. Originally founded by Alex Horn and Sharon Gans in California in the 1970's, the group now operates in both New York and Boston (Billerica) and has no link to any "legitimate" school. Sharon Gans leads the New York group and has ultimate control over all the groups and activities. There is a leader and several other "teachers" in Boston.

They claim to be a secret esoteric school with connections to other schools throughout history. Sharon Gans claims to possess knowledge for personal development and spiritual transformation derived from the Fourth Way ideas of George Gurdjieff and Peter Ouspensky. In recent years, in order to hide more deeply from public view, they do not present themselves as a Fourth Way school to newer students so it is very difficult for the new students to understand that what they have stumbled into (or been lead into by a friend) is actually a cult. They used to call themselves "The Work" but now they call themselves "The Study" or maybe something else. The sands are constantly shifting to avoid detection.

Things You Might Have Heard About in "School" or Related to "The Study"

The Study; Aim; the Ray of Creation; Self Remembering; Sleeping Humanity; Five Week Commitment; the Three Story House; Internal Considering and External Considering; Multiplicity; Somerville; Belmont Lions Club; Interval; Identification; The Person I Work With; Self Observation; the Many "I's"; Accumulators; Five Week Aim; Octaves; Billerica; A, B and C Influences; Self Observation Notebook at 10, 2 and 6; Intellectual Center, Emotional Center and Moving/Instinctive Center; Lines of Work; Sustainer; the Law of Three (Three Forces) and the Law of Seven; Third Force; Shocks; Paying for One's Arising; Magnetic Center; the Food Diagram; Negative and Positive Emotions; Mechanicality; the Four Ways; Buffers; Clever Sincerity and Clever Insincerity; the Conscious Circle of Humanity; Number 1,2 and 3 Man, Number 4 Man; Being Bodies; Real "I"; the Work Octave; Recurrence; Horse Carriage and Driver; Pictures; Essence and Personality; Metanoia; False Personality; Transformation; Gurdjieff; Ouspensky; Maurice Nicoll; Rodney Collins; Boston Philosophy Cult; Philosophy Meetup; Secret Society; Observations; 5 Week Commitment; Intellectual, Emotional, Instinctive and Moving Centers; Unnecessary Suffering; 4 Story House; Many "I's"; No Fraternization; Higher States of Consciousness; Objective Consciousness; Law of 3; Law of 7; Octaves; Tai Chi; Body Work...

Monday, December 1, 2014

Never be bullied into silence. Never allow yourself to be made a victim. Accept no one's definition of your life; define yourself. -Harvey Fierstein