Many years ago — while working on the Gurdjieff idea that muscles, which are not being used, should be relaxed — I noticed that I had great tension in my neck and shoulders. My shoulders would be raised up about two inches, as a result of the tension.

I made an effort to relax them…and with attention, dropped them to a relaxed position. In a matter of seconds, while I was commenting to myself about how much they were raised, I looked, again, at them and, to my surprise, I noticed that in those few seconds they had already raised up a half inch.

I made another effort of attention…and dropped them again.

Moments later, I looked…and they, again, had started to rise.

I made another effort of attention…and dropped them again, etc.

Finally, after witnessing this recur several times, I decided to make the dropping of my shoulders “my God” and proceeded to create in me a repeated attention towards looking at my shoulders and dropping them.

Every few minutes, for several days, I kept to the task, i.e., I would bring attention to my shoulders and as a result drop them to a relaxed position.

Then, all of a sudden, one time I looked at my shoulders and they were already in a relaxed position. They did not need to be dropped. A few minutes later, I looked again and they were still dropped…and, again, later…still dropped, etc.

From that moment on, every time I brought attention to my shoulders, I saw that they were already in a relaxed state and I have never had to drop them since! What had happened? Where did the tension go? Was this some kind of miracle?

Yesterday, while having a conversation with Dr. Arnold, I figured it out.

The emotional and intellectual parts of a center work with attention. Without attention, we are functioning in the mechanical part of the center.

Man lives mostly in his mechanical parts. And, unfortunately, even if he brings attention to a center and raises himself to a higher part, the functioning of that part will, eventually, be pushed back into the mechanical part of the center…and the function, which was once done with attention by a higher part, will continue on, mechanically, without attention.

For example, if you learn the Gurdjieff movements well enough, you will, at some point, be able to perform them “automatically” without attention…and the movements will no longer be of any use to you, for they will no longer exercise the higher parts of the center, i.e., the parts that work with attention.

Making functions mechanical (automatic), might be good for Mother Nature, i.e., the faster that a new born horse can get up on its four legs and run, the better chance it will have for survival. But for man, he must go against nature. He must shove his functions up to a higher part, while, all the while, nature will be trying to shove them back to a lower part.

So, how does a man escape this dilemma? How does he keep his practiced functions from becoming mechanical?

The answer lies in the model of the dropped shoulders.

If a man brings repeated attention towards having a function, function with attention, then the multiple attempts, which he makes, to make that function ‘function with attention’, will, itself, be shoved into the mechanical part of the center…after which, the mechanical part of the center will, automatically, cause that function to function with attention!

In short, the mechanical part will automatically elicit the function of the emotional part.

Where after, when a man, himself, instructs the attention of his emotional part to look at his shoulders — with the aim of relaxing them, he will find that they have already been relaxed because his mechanical part has beaten him to it and has already activated the emotional part, which in turn has already dropped the shoulders.

The exercise of Presence Momentum is perfect for this. Push yourself up, then stop pushing, wait a few minutes…then, when the momentum of your presence wears off, push yourself up again. Remember, it is not the presence we seek to make mechanical; it is the push.

So push often.

THE DOG