What Are You Up Against?

We so often feel we are up against things. People often live in this state all their lives. It is then necessary, as by inner dialogue with oneself, such as: "What is it I am up against?" etc. to find out what it is you are up against, because what you feel you are up against is due to what you want.

Then perhaps you are full of impossible and vague wishes that create useless Second Force and so produce in you the equally vague feelings of resistance, of being up against things. Then you have to begin to become more conscious in First Force, in what you want.

Maurice Nicoll, “A Further Note on Personal Work: On Seeing Second Force in Oneself" in Psychological Commentaries on the Teaching of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky (Vol. 2, p. 518)