The Abkhazian Letters by George Rose

‘The book contains correspondence between myself and the Elder Murat Yagan. The Elder Murat Yagan was one of the last remaining custodians of the traditional culture and practices of the Abkhazian people. These previously restricted practices are better known in the West as "The Yoga of the Caucuses". The book also describes the experiences of a small London based community that were committed to the work of G I Gurdjieff and J G Bennett. There is additional material on the art of dreaming, healing practices and the activation of the Nests (energy centres) that improve health and develop reserve human abilities. The cover photo was taken in the earlier part of the last century. The image presented was the theme and topic of one of my final letters to the Elder Murat Yagan. That letter is included in this book.’

As you my readers may have noticed, I don’t generally write bad reviews. This is because I don’t review things if I don’t think they’ve any value, though I occasionally review things which I feel could have been good but in reality miss by a mile. 

So this is another of my positive reviews. I’ve met Mr Rose, who is a very interesting magician, and also read another of his slim volumes, on Svengali. That book was worth reading, but this one is of another calibre altogether.

Rose starts us off in London, where a stranger, a young woman, opens a discussion about working with dreams. His reply to her query as to how he worked with dreams - ‘I use them to explore the invisible city. It is a place that is parallel to  this city and at some points they connect with each other’ - got my attention immediately, because I have a recurring dream theme about a mysterious city that exists in parallel to cities I know on the outer. I call that mysterious city Carcosa. 

Rose quotes the Elder Murat Yagan’s book The Science of Universal Awe: ‘If you know how to control your dreams, you can find access to things that you can have in no other way… you can learn a language in your dreams for which you have no instructor…’ Via introducing a London Gurdjieff group, Rose then discusses the ‘Work’, and how we can use the pressures of everyday life, the ‘thankless tasks’, as thrust blocks to transform ourselves, to wake up. An example of this is ‘external considering’, where, rather than being concerned with what other people think about us we act from our own centre but take other people’s feelings into account, not expressing our negative emotions. 

This might sound like spiritual bypassing, but it’s clear from this account and other material in this book that it is not. In a later section on meditation Elder Yagan tells us to carefully and exhaustively consider whether we resent anyone or anything. Because ‘if even for one moment the ego kindles any resentment of any kind then you cannot meditate.’ This has increasingly become a major theme of my inner work over some years, so I recognized the truth of that statement straightaway. Resentment at how your life is or at all the things you need to do poisons your thinking and creates a basis for depression, and these issues are very closely related. 

Other teachers are quoted. Victor is an esoteric martial artist, another thread of the tradition that is alluded to in this book, and he discusses the importance of silence, and a related form of contemplative prayer: ‘You just listen without labelling… if your mind starts to comment… you just let the thoughts leave you and listen silently.’ This sounds very like the meditation practice I have grown. I’ve followed many sets of instructions for meditation over the years, and adopted practices, in some cases for years at a time, but in the end my core practice is something as simple as what Victor describes.   

Rose revisits the Gurdjieff theme of our having three centres, and there are exercises which utilize breath and energy techniques. One extraordinary one is for becoming aware of your ‘life force’ by focusing on a current physical pain. This is very much like what we do with Connected Breathwork in a mode of physical healing. There is also exercise for rejuvenation which is a bit like qigong.  

The approach to contact with the ‘Higher Self’* is similarly direct. You simply announce, silently, that you are open to contact with the HS. 

The letters then appear, questions and answers about the practice between Elder Yagan and his students. One of the topics discussed is ‘Essentialist Christianity’. Some of the teachings are also referred to as ‘Yoga of the Caucasus’, especially in reference to author Stephan Walewski. The latter teachings Rose considers to have the same source as the Gurdjieff material. They are called Ahmsta Kebzeh, were used ‘to educate the elite leaders in the Abkhazian community’ and are said to be deeper and richer than the Gurdjieff teachings. 

The idea of the five Nests is then explored. These are embodied energy centres which relate to magic and spirituality and help develop the human nervous system. Rose picks up the other themes that have already been mentioned and develops them with more detailed instructions. This leads into Part 3 of the book, which is a facsimile of a text handwritten and diagramed by Walewski. It gives further details for practice.

This little book (155 pages) contains so much that is useful. The author is inspired by Castaneda, leading us into the teachings via stories of his life. His exposition of what appears to be a living tradition includes detailed guides to practices. I unreservedly recommend it to anyone who’s studied the Gurdjieff work or wondered where it came from. And to anyone like myself who is drawn to a system that is refreshingly light on metaphysics and rich in embodied practice.

*my quote marks don’t indicate scepticism about higher consciousness; it’s just that I don’t tend to use the term Higher Self because it doesn’t feel like a self to me.