Jacob Needleman Quotes

Why has time disappeared in our culture? How is it that after decades of inventions and new technologies devoted to saving time and labor, the result is that there is no time left? We are a time-poor society; we are temporally impoverished. And there is no issue, no aspect of human life, that exceeds this in importance. The destruction of time is literally the destruction of life.

Our world, so we see and hear on all sides, is drowning in materialism, commercialism, consumerism. But the problem is not really there. What we ordinarily speak of as materialism is a result, not a cause. The root of materialism is a poverty of ideas about the inner and the outer world. Less and less does our contemporary culture have, or even seek, commerce with great ideas, and it is that lack that is weakening the human spirit. This is the essence of materialism. Materialism is a disease of the mind starved for ideas.

Our modern world-view tragically misperceives and wrongly defines what it is to be human. We are conditioned by our society to believe happiness comes from pleasure, or from getting things or power over people or money or fame or even health and survival. None of these sometimes very good things can bring ultimate meaning to our lives. We are born to be deeply conscious, inwardly free and deeply capable of love. The longing for these things is the definition of what it means to be human.

We are born for meaning, not pleasure, unless it is pleasure that is steeped in meaning.

We lose our time because we lose our attention

Faith cannot be shaken, it is the result of being shaken.

We are human beings, beings whose fundamental food is the experience of truth.

The only really interesting questions are the unanswerable ones.

What is [the role of money] in the search for meaning? Is our relationship to it one of the chief factors that keeps us in our prison, or could it also be a tool for breaking out, for awakening to a life filled with intensity of purpose?

The process of inner self-examination brings about a knowledge that is as rigorous and supported by evidence as anything science has to offer. At the same time, this point of view redefines faith as a knowledge that is attained not only by intellectual means, but also through the rigorous development of the emotional side of the human psyche. Such emotional knowledge is unknown to the isolated intellect and has therefore been mistakenly labeled as "irrational."

Life is not so much defined by the external situation as it is by the internal one.

If one steps out on a starry night and observes one's inner state, one asks if one could hate or be overwhelmed by envy or resentment. ... Is it not true that no man or woman has ever committed a crime while in a state of wonder?

When thought races ahead of Being, a civilization is racing towards destruction.

Real inquiry is a tremendous moral transforming force. It's not just questioning and looking for a quick answer or explanation, but the process of inquiry-of questioning, of opening-opens something in the human being which has not been touched in our culture. Everybody who is human has in themselves the potential of passionate inquiry after truth, and that's the transforming force.

To search means, first, I need Being, Truth; second, I do not know where to find it; and third, an action takes place that is not based on fantasies of certainty— while at the same time a waiting takes place that is rooted not in wishful thinking but in a deep sense of urgency.

For the growing number of people seeking to approach the ideas of Gurdjieff, Toward Awakening by Jean Vaysse offers reliable guidance, as well as evidence of the continuing vitality of this remarkable teaching. It may be counted as among the small handful of books that communicate something of what Gurdjieff brought.

What is most necessary for people and what is given us in great abundance, are experiences, especially experiences of the forces within us. This is our most essential food, our most essential wealth. If we consciously receive all this abundance, the universe will pour into us what is called life in Judaism, spirit in Christianity, light in Islam, power in Taoism.

To be totally engaged with all my functions and all my faculties and all my capacities in life to me that would be success.

God acts in history: that is, God provides ideas, methods, and experiences intended to bring comprehension to man, an understanding heart, a conscious life.

Frederick Franck is one of a rare and precious breed—an authentic troubadour whose lyricism is pure in word and image. He quietly roams our materialistic world and shows us that even here, even now, there is hope for our soul.

Man must have results, real results, in his inner and outer life. I do not mean the results which modern people strive after in their attempts at self-development. These are not results, but only rearrangements of psychic material, a process the Buddhists call 'samsara' and which our Holy Bible calls 'dust'.

The problem of money dogs our steps throughout the whole of our lives, exerting a pressure that, in its way, is as powerful and insistent as any other problem of human existence. And it haunts the spiritual search as well.

If the group is an art form of the future, then convening groups is an artistry we must cultivate to fully harvest the promise of the future.

To love my neighbor is to assist the arising and unfolding in him of that which can harmonize the real elements of his nature.

Death is the great equalizer. I've seen that phenomenon many times. I've had people in my classes come to me, men and women over 50 years old, and they say, "I made it, I'm rich. But what the hell is my life for?"