"This is something to be always remembered as one of the first principles for any seeker of truth.

"The tendency of the human mind is to deny those things which are ugly, to hide those things which he does not want others to know – to hide in such a way, in such depths of the unconscious that even he himself becomes unaware of them. This way he maintains his superficial personality.

"Gurdjieff had a story about it…

"There was a magician who used to live in faraway deep forests, and he had many sheep because that was his only food. In those deep forests he was keeping all those sheep just to kill them every day, one by one. Naturally, the sheep were very afraid of the man, and they used to run into the forest being afraid that any day can be their day. Their friends are gone, there is no reliability…tomorrow they may be gone. Out of fear they used to go far away, deep into the forest. And to find them was a tedious job every day.

"Finally, the magician did a trick. He hypnotized all the sheep, and told every sheep, 'You are an exception; everybody may be killed but you can never be killed. You are no ordinary sheep; you have a divine privilege.' To some he said, 'You are not sheep at all; you are lions, you are tigers, you are wolves. Only sheep are killed. You need not hide yourself in the forest; that is very embarrassing, because a lion hiding himself in the forest in the fear that he will be killed…only sheep are killed.' And in this way, he managed to hypnotize all the sheep in different ways.

"He even said to a few sheep, 'You are men, human beings, and human beings don't kill each other. You are just like me. Never be afraid and never escape out of fear.' Since that day, no sheep escaped and hid in the forest, although they all saw every day that one sheep was being killed, slaughtered. But naturally everybody thought, That must be a sheep; I am a tiger, a lion, a human being. I am special and exceptional, I have a divine privilege…."