How to Work on Impressions Before They Work on You

You all can understand that life is continually causing us to react to it. All these reactions form our life—our own personal life. To change one's life is not to change outer circumstances: it is to change one's reactions. But unless we can see that outer life comes in as impressions which cause us to react in stereotyped ways, we cannot see where the point of possible change comes in, where it is possible to work. If the reactions that form your own personal life are mainly negative, then that is your life. Your life is chiefly a mass of negative reactions to the impressions that have come in every day.

The transformation of impressions so that they do not always provoke negative reactions is then one's task, if one wishes to work on oneself. But for this, self-observation at the point where impressions enter us is necessary. If one fails to transform impressions at the moment of their entry, one can always work on the results of these impressions and prevent them from having their full mechanical effect.

Maurice Nicoll, “The Idea of Transformation in the Work: Part I and Part II” in Psychological Commentaries on the Teaching of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky (Vol. 1, p. 52-53)