I'm always trying to find new ways to draw what people have always recognized within themselves out of them, and it's amazing when what I write draws out something that people always had within themselves. What's bothersome is that many of those same people seem to be waiting for a tide to come in before they set sail with their own deeply held sentiments. The issue is a lot more complex than simply telling yourself to "have faith," so I'd like to tell you a story about my own experiences with this issue.
For a long time after I renounced religion, I toyed around with the idea of rebirth, but I didn't really take it seriously. One morning, however, I caught myself and realized I truly did believe in it, that I was kidding myself when I said I didn't really believe it. I knew I had no real ground to stand on for it at first though, so I searched Google for all ideas about rebirth. A few Google searches later, and I had a list of books to check into at a local university library, covering a wide array of things I'd already come up with to look into, but especially books on the topic of rebirth. Unfortunately as I dug through my reading list, I found even the most promising books to be fruitless, if not downright ridiculous. I wasn't entirely swayed from the idea, but I decided it'd be a better use of my time to go on to other books on my reading list.
I'd been interested in the Enneagram of Personality for some time, and I had been exploring how the Enneagram fit into the broader picture of our culture. As part of my exploration of its history, a book on esoteric Christianity made it onto my list. Being a long-standing agnostic, I didn't really consider the ideas as more than a dubious history lesson at first, but as I read about the strait gate and the narrow way to salvation (Luke 13:23-24; Matthew 7:13-14), and how Annie Besant reinterpreted this as a salvation from rebirth, I found it made a great deal more sense than Jesus coming to tell everyone that very few would ever attain salvation, and that their only hope is just to "make every effort to enter."
In that moment, however, I didn't find "proof" that my belief in rebirth is true. I just found where my beliefs fit in to the broader picture, so I can talk about how they contrast with other beliefs more intelligently. The catch is that there are a lot of issues that I don't have an opinion on yet, simply because there's nothing in my experiences or understanding of the world to give me that opinion. In light of that, I can easily be swayed to consider larger beliefs, because the other stuff is just stuff I don't know about yet.
"The Fourth Way" and Gurdjieff's style of teaching I think is often misunderstood, for reasons I alluded to above. One thing Gurdjieff did in teaching his pupils was to demand total obedience to his conditions, and that only through following a teacher who already knows (a guru) can a person find their own way. Many people seem to take this as blind obedience to his teachings, the irony being that not only did Gurdjieff insist that his pupils only do what they understand, but also that after a few years of study even his best pupils (including the writer of In Search of the Miraculous) broke away and struck it out on their own.
The key is that Gurdjieff unlocks a path who cannot find their way. It's a transitory path for lost souls, individually tailored because it begins with becoming aware of yourself. It's a way for finding your own way. All Gurdjieff does is serve as a role model. Just as you'd follow the direction of a great artist who offers to teach you how to paint, or a personal development guru who offers to give you the results they already have, so too can adhering to the Fourth Way lead you to your own spiritual path.
More generally, following your own deeply held sentiments is the first step to the blossoming of your own spirituality. If you have something you already see in your own experience that you haven't followed, I'd encourage you to follow it. And if you're totally lost, I'd encourage you to read about the Fourth Way in In Search of the Miraculous, which by the way you can download for free.
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