Science and the Mystics

The Feedback Loop of the Mystic by John Brighton
A Book review for SpeakEasy

“The Feedback Loop of the Mystic” is John Brighton’s valiant attempt to bring a contemporary neuroscience interpretation to George Gurjdieff’s esoteric philosophy. Brighton’s effort stems from his desire to give scientific language for his own paranormal experiences. He is obviously brilliant and erudite. This book is extra-ordinarily well researched, which it would need be for Brighton to achieve his courageous goal of a near impossible project.

Brighton is candid about his personal paranormal experiences as he explains in the memoir-like opening chapters. He is also upfront about his years of being a student in the Fourth Way—a system of self-development envisioned by Gurjdieff and his earliest students. Brighton’s goals for writing this book seem three-fold: 1) to bring neuroscience to Gurdjieff’s holographic worldview of the enneagram (to read this book you need to dismiss all you know about the enneagram as a personality typing tool); 2) provide a path to higher consciousness; and 3) create a modality for healing through the mind’s energy waves. My attempt at streamlining Brighton’s work is itself, meager.

“The Feedback Loop” could serve as an Encyclopedia on neuroscience and esoteric psychology. Brighton often reads like the labyrinth-like tales of Gurdjieff himself. Something which almost every student of Gurdjieff seems to fall prey, including his primary disciple Peter Ouspensky, as well the more contemporary Cynthia Bourgeault in “The Holy Trinity and the Law of Three.”

The three points I have taken away from reading Brighton’s book, are:

1) G.I. Gurdjieff “lost science” was pure anamnesis—remembering what he could not have known. Such gives brilliance to Gurdjieff’s work.
2) The convergence of mystical traditions can bring true healing energy to this broken world.
3) Our brain intertwined with the Cosmic Presence is powerful beyond imagination.

Fair warning, Brighton assumes you have some knowledge of Gurdjieff. If you’re interested, I would recommend A.G.E Blake’s “The Intelligent Enneagram.” Brighton also assumes you can remember an exceptionally large number of acronyms, without a complete index. His self-published book also evidenced a lack of professional editing. And a personal pet peeve of mine is his not using source quotes, especially Carl Jung, and an overuse of Wikipedia. Those two concerns raise a personal suspicion about some of the other sources he references.

Brighton deserves tremendous credit for writing this book and I’m glad I read it, though I would be cautious about to whom I might recommend it.