Четвертый путь. Успенский

This book sets out the Fourth Way, a system of ideas taught by P. D. Ouspensky. He first explains what the system is. Then he states its main ideas in brief. After that, he makes them concrete through questions and answers. His students in many countries asked these questions.

Ouspensky holds that we use only a tiny part of our powers. He says we are born to live in four states of consciousness. Yet most of the time we know only two. We are either asleep or what we call awake. Even when awake, he argues, a person acts like a machine. Such a person just reacts to what happens outside. Still, we can choose how to use what we have. He compares us to an airplane. Hitch horses to it, and it becomes a cart. Or it can fly.

The book explains how to reach higher states of consciousness. Ouspensky names these as self-consciousness and objective consciousness. His aim is a fully human life. In such a life, we are not victims of a reality that breaks our dreams. We become a true part of it.

The text gives Ouspensky's talks word for word. They come from meetings held between 1921 and 1946. It suits readers drawn to self-study and the inner work of the Fourth Way.