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# 2019-12-22 - A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle | |
# Chapter 1, The flowering of human consciousness | |
[Flowers] provided inspiration to countless artists, poets, and | |
mystics. Jesus tell us to contemplate the flowers and learn from | |
them how to live. The Buddha is said to have given a "silent sermon" | |
once during which he held up a flower and gazed at it. | |
Seeing beauty in a flower could awaken humans, however briefly, to | |
the beauty that is an essential part of their own innermost being, | |
their true nature. The first recognition of beauty was one of the | |
most significant events in the evolution of human consciousness. The | |
feelings of joy and love are intrinsically connected to that | |
recognition. Without our fully realizing it, flowers would become | |
for us an expression in form of that which is most high, most sacred, | |
and ultimately formless within ourselves. | |
Since time immemorial, flowers, crystals, precious stones, and birds | |
have held special significance for the human spirit. | |
Once there is a certain degree of Presence, of will and alert | |
attention in human beings' perceptions, they can sense the divine | |
life essence, the one indwelling consciousness or spirit in every | |
creature, every life-form, recognize it as one within their own | |
essence and so love it as themselves. | |
So when you are alert and contemplate a flower, crystal, or bird | |
without naming it mentally, it becomes a window for you into the | |
formless. There is an inner opening, however slight, into the realm | |
of spirit. This is why these three ... have played such an important | |
part in the evolution of human consciousness since ancient times; | |
why, for example, the jewel in the lotus flower is a central symbol | |
of Buddhism and a white bird, the dove, signifies the Holy Spirit in | |
Christianity. They have been preparing the ground for a more | |
profound shift in planetary consciousness that is destined to take | |
place in the human species. This is the spiritual awakening that we | |
are beginning to witness now. | |
This book's main purpose is not to add new information or beliefs to | |
your mind or to try to convince you of anything, but to bring about a | |
shift in consciousness, that is to say, to awaken. In that sense, | |
this book is not "interesting." ... This book is about you. It will | |
[either] change your state of consciousness, or it will be | |
meaningless. It can only awaken those who are ready. If the | |
awakening process has [already] begun in you, the reading of this | |
book will accelerate and intensify it. | |
If we look more deeply into humanity's ancient religious and | |
spiritual traditions, we will find that underneath the many surface | |
differences there are two core insights that most of them agree on. | |
The words they use to describe those insights differ, yet they all | |
point to a twofold fundamental truth. The first part of this truth | |
is the realization that the "normal" state of mind of most human | |
beings contains a strong element of what we might call dysfunction or | |
even madness. Certain teachings at the heart of Hinduism ... call it | |
maya, the veil of delusion. Buddhism uses different terms. | |
According to the Buddha, the human mind in its normal state generates | |
dukkha, which can be translated as suffering, unsatisfactoriness, or | |
just plain misery. [Or discontent, pain, and stress.] According to | |
Christian teachings, the normal collective state of humanity is one | |
of "original sin." Sin is a word that has been gradually | |
misunderstood and misinterpreted. Literally translated from the | |
ancient Greek in which the New Testament was written, to sin means to | |
miss the mark, as an archer who misses the target, so to sin means to | |
miss the point of human existence. It means to live unskillfully, | |
blindly, and thus to suffer and cause suffering. | |
The achievements of humanity are impressive and undeniable. No | |
doubt: The human mind is highly intelligent. Yet its very | |
intelligence is tainted by madness. Science and technology have | |
magnified the destructive impact that the dysfunction of the human | |
mind has upon the planet, other life-forms, and upon humans | |
themselves. ... A further factor is that this dysfunction is actually | |
intensifying and accelerating. | |
It is important to realize, however, that fear, greed, and the desire | |
for power are not the dysfunction that we are speaking of, but are | |
themselves created by the dysfunction, which is a deep-seated | |
collective delusion that lies within the mind of each human being. | |
You do not become good by trying to be good, but by finding the | |
goodness that is already within you, and allowing that goodness to | |
emerge. But it can only emerge if something fundamental changes in | |
your state of consciousness. | |
Most ancient religions and spiritual traditions share the common | |
insight--that our "normal" state of mind is marred by a fundamental | |
defect. However, out of this insight into the nature of the human | |
condition arises a second insight: the good news of the possibility | |
of a radical transformation of human consciousness. In Hindu | |
teachings this transformation is called enlightenment. In the | |
teachings of Jesus, it is salvation, and in Buddhism, it is the end | |
of suffering. Liberation and awakening are other terms used to | |
describe this transformation. | |
The greatest achievement of humanity is not its works of art, | |
science, or technology, but the recognition of its own dysfunction, | |
its own madness. To recognize ones own insanity is, of course, the | |
arising of sanity, the beginning of healing and transcendence. A new | |
dimension of consciousness had begun to emerge on the planet, a first | |
tentative flowering. [Religious] Teachings that pointed the way | |
beyond the dysfunction of the human mind, the way out of the | |
collective insanity, were distorted and became themselves part of the | |
insanity. | |
Those unable to look beyond form become even more deeply entrenched | |
in their beliefs, that is to say, in their mind. | |
The dysfunction of the egoic human mind, recognized already more than | |
2,500 years ago by the ancient wisdom teachers and now magnified | |
through science and technology, is for the first time threatening the | |
survival of the planet [or at least the survival of the human race]. | |
A widespread flowering of human consciousness did not happen because | |
it was not yet imperative. | |
A significant portion of the earth's population will soon recognize | |
that humanity is now faced with a stark choice: Evolve or die. | |
What is arising now is not a new belief system, a new religion, | |
spiritual ideology, or mythology. We are coming to the end not only | |
of mythologies but also of ideologies and belief systems. The change | |
goes deeper than the content of your mind, deeper than your thoughts. | |
In fact, at the heart of the new consciousness lies the | |
transcendence of thought, the newfound ability of rising above | |
thought, of realizing a dimension within yourself that is infinitely | |
more vast than thought. | |
Ego is no more than this: identification with form, which primarily | |
means thought forms. | |
The inspiration for the title of this book came from a Bible prophecy | |
that seems more applicable now than at any other time in human | |
history. It occurs in both the Old and New Testament and speaks of | |
the collapse of the existing world order and the arising of "a new | |
heaven and a new earth." We need to understand here that heaven is | |
not a location but refers to the inner realm of consciousness. This | |
is the esoteric meaning of the word, and this is also its meaning in | |
the teachings of Jesus. Earth, on the other hand, is the outer | |
manifestation in form, which is always a reflection of the inner. | |
Collective human consciousness and life on our planet are | |
intrinsically connected. A new heaven is the emergence of a | |
transformed state of human consciousness, and a new earth is its | |
reflection in the physical realm. | |
# Chapter 2, Ego: the current state of humanity | |
Words, no matter whether they are vocalized and made into sounds or | |
remain unspoken as thoughts, can cast an almost hypnotic spell upon | |
you. You easily lose yourself in them, become hypnotized into | |
implicitly believing that when you have attached a word to something, | |
you know what it is. The fact is: You don't know what it is. You | |
have only covered up the mystery with a label. Everything, a bird, a | |
tree, even a simple stone, and certainly a human being, is ultimately | |
unknowable. This is because it has unfathomable depth. All we can | |
perceive, experience, think about, is the surface layer of reality, | |
less than the tip of an iceberg. | |
Underneath the surface appearance, everything is not only connected | |
with everything else, but also with the Source of all life out of | |
which it came. When you look at it or hold it, a sense of awe, of | |
wonder, arises within you. Its essence silently communicates itself | |
to you and reflects your own essence back to you. When you don't | |
cover up the world with words and labels, a sense of the miraculous | |
returns to your life that was lost a long time ago when humanity, | |
instead of using thought, became possessed by thought. A depth | |
returns to your life. Things regain their newness, their freshness. | |
And the greatest miracle is the experiencing of your essential self | |
as prior to any words, thoughts, mental labels, and images. | |
The quicker you are in attaching verbal or mental labels to things, | |
people, or situations, the more shallow and lifeless your reality | |
becomes, and the more deadened you become to reality, the miracle of | |
life that continuously unfolds within and around you. In this way, | |
cleverness may be gained, but wisdom is lost, and so are joy, love, | |
creativity, and aliveness. They are concealed in the still gap | |
between the perception and the interpretation. Of course we have to | |
use words and thoughts. They have their own beauty--but do we need | |
to become imprisoned in them? | |
Words reduce reality to something the human mind can grasp, which | |
isn't very much. | |
The word "I" embodies the greatest error and the deepest truth, | |
depending on how it is used. | |
Most people are still completely identified with the incessant stream | |
of mind, of compulsive thinking, most of it repetitive and pointless. | |
There is no "I" apart from their thought process and the emotions | |
that go with them. This is the meaning of being spiritually | |
unconscious. | |
The egoic mind is completely conditioned by the past. Its | |
conditioning is twofold: It consists of content and structure. In | |
the case of a child who cries in deep suffering because his toy has | |
been taken away, the toy represents content. The content you | |
identify with is conditioned by your environment, your upbringing, | |
and surrounding culture. The reason why such acute suffering occurs | |
is concealed in the word "my," and it is structural. The unconscious | |
compulsion to enhance one's identity through association with an | |
object is built into the very structure of the egoic mind. | |
One of the most basic mind structures through which the ego comes | |
into existence is identification. I try to find myself in things but | |
never quite make it and end up losing myself in them. That is the | |
fate of the ego. | |
What you identify with is all to do with content; whereas, the | |
unconscious compulsion to identify is structural. It is one of the | |
most basic ways in which the egoic mind operates. | |
Paradoxically, what keeps the so-called consumer society going is the | |
fact that trying to find yourself through things doesn't work: The | |
ego satisfaction is short-lived and so you keep looking for more, | |
keep buying, keep consuming. | |
We need to honor the world of things, not despise it. Each thing has | |
Beingness, is a temporary form that has its origin within the | |
formless one Life, the source of all things, all bodies, all forms. | |
When you live in a world deadened by mental abstraction, you don't | |
sense the aliveness of the universe anymore. | |
But we cannot really honor things if we use them as a means to | |
self-enhancement, that is to say, if we try to find ourselves through | |
them. This is exactly what the ego does. | |
Some economists are so attached to the notion of growth that they | |
can't let go of that word, so they refer to recession as a time of | |
"negative growth." | |
When i was seeing people as a counselor and spiritual teacher, I | |
would visit a woman twice a week whose body was riddled with cancer. | |
She was a schoolteacher in the midforties and had been given more | |
more than a few months to live by her doctors. Sometimes a few words | |
were spoken during those visits, but mostly we would sit together in | |
silence, and as we did, she had her first glimpses of the stillness | |
within herself that she never knew existed during her busy life as a | |
schoolteacher. | |
One day, however, I arrived to find her in a state of great distress | |
and anger. "What happened?" I asked. Her diamond ring, of great | |
monetary as well as sentimental value, had disappeared, and she said | |
she was sure it had been stolen by the woman who came to look after | |
her for a few hours every day. She said she didn't understand how | |
anybody could be so callous and heartless as to do this to her. She | |
asked me whether she should confront the woman or whether it would be | |
better to call the police immediately. I said I couldn't tell her | |
what to do, but asked her to find out how important a ring or | |
anything else was at this point in her life. "You don't understand," | |
she said. "This was my grandmother's ring. I used to wear it every | |
day until I got ill and my hands became to swollen. It's more than | |
just a ring to me. How can I not be upset?" | |
The quickness of her response and the anger and defensiveness in her | |
voice were indications that she had not yet become present enough to | |
look within and to disentangle her reaction from the event and | |
observe them both. Her anger and defensiveness were signs that the | |
ego was still speaking through her. I said, "I am going to ask you a | |
few questions, but instead of answering them now, see if you can find | |
the answers within you. I will pause briefly after each question. | |
When an answer comes, it may not necessarily come in the form of | |
words." She said she was ready to listen. I asked: "Do you realize | |
that you will have to let go of the ring at some point, perhaps quite | |
soon? How much more time do you need before you will be ready to let | |
go of it? Will you become less when you let go of it? Has who you | |
are become diminished by the loss?" There were a few minutes of | |
silence after the last question. | |
When she started speaking again, there was a smile on her face, and | |
she seemed at peace. "The last question made me realize something | |
important. First I went to my mind for an answer and my mind said, | |
`Yes, of course you have been diminished.' Then I asked myself the | |
question again, 'Has who I am become diminished?' This time I tried | |
to feel rather than think the answer. And suddenly I could feel my I | |
Am-ness. I have never felt that before. If I can feel the I Am so | |
strongly, then who I am hasn't been diminished at all. I can still | |
feel it now, something peaceful but very alive." | |
"That is the joy of Being," I said. "You can only feel it when you | |
get out of your head. Being must be felt. It can't be thought. The | |
ego doesn't know about it because thought is what it [the ego] | |
consists of. The ring was really in your head as a thought that you | |
confused with the sense of I Am. You thought the I Am or a part of | |
it was in the ring." | |
"Whatever the ego seeks and gets attached to are substitutes for the | |
Being that it cannot feel. You can value and care for things, but | |
whether you get attached to them, you will know it's the ego. And | |
you are never really as attached to a thing but to a thought that has | |
'I,' 'me,' or 'mine' in it. Whenever you completely accept a loss, | |
you go beyond ego, and who you are, the I Am which is consciousness | |
itself, emerges." | |
She said, "Now I understand something Jesus said that never made much | |
sense to me before: 'If someone takes your shirt, let him have your | |
coat as well.'" | |
"That's right," I said. "It doesn't mean you should never lock your | |
door. All it means is that sometimes letting things go is an act of | |
far greater power than defending or hanging on." | |
[Her mother] also mentioned that after her death they found her ring | |
in the medicine cabinet in the bathroom. | |
One thing we do know: Life will give you whatever experience is most | |
helpful for the evolution of your consciousness. How do you know | |
this is the experience you need? Because this is the experience you | |
are living at this moment. | |
The ego isn't wrong; it's just unconscious. When you observe the ego | |
in yourself, you are beginning to go beyond it. Don't take the ego | |
too seriously. When you detect egoic behavior in yourself, smile. | |
At times you may laugh. How could humanity have been taken in by | |
this for so long? Above all, know that the ego isn't personal. It | |
isn't who you are. | |
"Blessed are the poor in spirit," Jesus said, "for theirs will be the | |
kingdom of heaven." What does "poor in spirit" mean? No inner | |
baggage, no identifications. Not with things, nor with any mental | |
concepts that have a sense of self in them. And what is the "kingdom | |
of heaven"? The simple but profound joy of Being that is there when | |
you let go of identification and so become "poor in spirit." | |
Anticonsumerism or antiprivate ownership would be another thought | |
form, another mental position, that can replace identification with | |
possessions. [In other words, replacing tangible possessions with | |
mental possessions, something easily understood in this present time | |
of digital assets.] | |
How do you let go of attachment to things? Don't even try. It's | |
impossible. Attachment to things drops away by itself when you no | |
longer seek to find yourself in them. In the meantime, just be aware | |
of your attachment to things. Sometimes you may not know that you | |
are attached to something, which is to say, identified, until you | |
lose it or there is the threat of loss. If you then become upset, | |
anxious, and so on, it means you are attached. If you are aware that | |
you are identified with a thing, the identification is no longer | |
total. "I am the awareness that is aware that there is attachment." | |
That's the beginning of the transformation of consciousness. | |
The ego identifies with having, but its satisfaction in having is a | |
relatively shallow and short-lived one. Concealed within it remains | |
a deep-seated sense of dissatisfaction, of incompleteness, of "not | |
enough." "I don't have enough yet," by which the ego really means, | |
"I am not enough yet." | |
As we have seen, having--the concept of ownership--is a fiction | |
created by the ego to give itself solidity and permanency and make | |
itself stand out, make itself special. Since you cannot find | |
yourself through having, however, there is another more powerful | |
drive underneath it that pertains to the structure of the ego: the | |
need for more, which we could also call "wanting." No ego can last | |
for long without the need for more. Therefore, wanting keeps the ego | |
alive much more than having. This is the psychological need for | |
more... It is an addictive need, not an authentic one. | |
Apart from objects, another basic form of identification is with "my" | |
body. | |
In some cases, the mental image or concept of "my body" is a complete | |
distortion of reality. [I would argue this is true in all cases.] A | |
young woman may think of herself as overweight and therefore starve | |
herself when in fact she is quite thin. She cannot see her body | |
anymore. All she "sees" is the mental concept of her body, which | |
says "I am fat" or "I will become fat." At the root of this | |
condition lies identification with the mind. As people have become | |
more and more mind-identified, which is the intensification of egoic | |
dysfunction, there has also been a dramatic increase in the incidence | |
of anorexia in recent decades. If the sufferer could look at her | |
body without the interfering judgments of her mind or even recognize | |
those judgments for what they are instead of believing in them--or | |
better still, if she could feel her body from within--this would | |
initiate her healing. | |
Although body-identification is one of the most basic forms of ego, | |
the good news is that it is also the one that you can most easily go | |
beyond. This is done not by trying to convince yourself that you are | |
not your body, but by shifting your attention from the external form | |
of your body and from thoughts about your body to the feeling of | |
aliveness inside it. No matter what your body's appearance is on the | |
outer level, beyond the outer form it is an intensely alive energy | |
field. | |
What I call the "inner body" isn't really the body anymore but life | |
energy, the bridge between form and formlessness. | |
Jean-Paul Sartre looked at Descarte's statement "I think, therefore I | |
am" very deeply and suddenly realized, in his own words, "The | |
consciousness that says 'I am' is not the consciousness that thinks." | |
What did he mean by that? When you are aware that you are thinking, | |
that awareness is not part of thinking. | |
# Chapter 3, The core of ego | |
Most people are so completely identified with the voice in the | |
head--the incessant stream of involuntary and compulsive thinking and | |
the emotions that accompany it--that we may describe them as being | |
possessed by their mind. As long as you are completely unaware of | |
this, you take the thinker to be who you are. This is the egoic | |
mind. We call it egoic because there is a sense of self, of I (ego), | |
in every thought--every memory, every interpretation, opinion, | |
viewpoint, reaction, emotion. This is unconsciousness, spiritually | |
speaking. Your thinking, the content of your mind, is of course | |
conditioned by the past: your upbringing, culture, family background, | |
and so on. The central core of all your mind activity consists of | |
certain repetitive and persistent thoughts, emotions, and reactive | |
patterns that you have identified with most strongly. This entity is | |
the ego itself. | |
The content of the ego varies from person to person, but in every ego | |
the same structure operates. In other words: Egos only differ on the | |
surface. Deep down they are all the same. In what way are they the | |
same? They live on identification and separation. When you live | |
through the mind-made self comprised of thought and emotion that is | |
the ego, the basis for your identity is precarious because thought | |
and emotion are by their very nature ephemeral, fleeting. So every | |
ego is continuously struggling for survival, trying to protect and | |
enlarge itself. To uphold the I-thought, it needs the opposite | |
thought of "the other." The conceptual "I" cannot survive without | |
the conceptual "other." The others are most other when I see them as | |
my enemies. At one end of the scale of this unconscious egoic | |
pattern lies the egoic compulsive habit of faultfinding and | |
complaining about others. Jesus referred to it when he said, "Why do | |
you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice | |
the log that is in your own eye?" At the other end of the scale, | |
there is physical violence between individuals and warfare between | |
nations. In the Bible, Jesus' question remains unanswered, but the | |
answer is, of course: Because when I criticize or condemn another, it | |
makes me feel bigger, superior. | |
Complaining is one of the ego's favorite strategies for strengthening | |
itself. Every complaint is a little story the mind makes up that you | |
completely believe in. Whether you complain aloud or only in thought | |
makes no difference. Some egos that perhaps don't have much else to | |
identify with easily survive on complaining alone. When you are in | |
the grip of such an ego, complaining, especially about other people, | |
is habitual and, of course, unconscious, which means you don't know | |
what you are doing. Applying negative mental labels to people, | |
either to their face or more commonly when you speak about them to | |
others or even just think about them, is often part of this pattern. | |
Resentment is the emotion that goes with complaining and the mental | |
labeling of people and adds even more energy to the ego. The ego | |
loves it. Instead of overlooking unconsciousness in others, you make | |
it into their identity. Who is doing that? The unconsciousness in | |
you, the ego. [Sometimes the fault that you perceive in another] may | |
be there, but by focusing on it, sometimes to the exclusion of | |
everything else, you amplify it. And what you react to in another, | |
you strengthen in yourself. | |
Nonreaction to the ego in others is one of the most effective ways | |
not only of going beyond the ego in yourself but also of dissolving | |
the collective human ego. But you can only be in a state of | |
nonreaction if you can recognize someone's behavior as coming from | |
the ego, as being an expression of the collective human dysfunction. | |
When you realize it's not personal, there is no longer a compulsion | |
to react as if it were. By not reacting to the ego, you will often | |
be able to bring out the sanity in others, which is the unconditioned | |
consciousness as opposed to the conditioned. [Interesting | |
distinction between conditioned and unconditioned consciousness.] | |
At times you may have to take practical steps to protect yourself | |
from deeply unconscious people. This you can do without making them | |
into enemies. Your greatest protection, however, is being [more] | |
conscious. Another word for non-reaction is forgiveness. To forgive | |
is to overlook, or rather to look through. You look through the ego | |
to the sanity that is in every human being as her or his essence. | |
And the ego's greatest enemy of all is, of course, the present | |
moment, which is to say, life itself. | |
Complaining is not to be confused with informing someone of a mistake | |
or deficiency so that it can be put right. And to refrain from | |
complaining doesn't necessarily mean putting up with bad quality or | |
behavior. There is no ego in telling the waiter that your soup is | |
cold and needs to be heated up--if you stick to the facts, which are | |
always neutral. [The selection of the facts may not be neutral.] | |
Whenever you notice that voice [that complains about something], you | |
will also realize that you are not that voice, but the one who is | |
aware of it. In the background, there is the awareness. In the | |
foreground, there is the voice, the thinker. The moment you become | |
aware of the ego in you, it is strictly speaking no longer the ego, | |
but just an old, conditioned mind-pattern. Ego implies unawareness. | |
[Resentment] may also be accompanied by a stronger emotion such as | |
anger or some other form of upset. In this way, it becomes more | |
highly charged energetically. Complaining then turns into | |
reactivity, another of the ego's ways of strengthening itself. [Some | |
people] are addicted to upset and anger as others are to a drug. | |
Through reacting against this or that they assert and strengthen | |
their feeling of self. | |
A long-standing resentment is called a grievance. A grievance will | |
also contaminate other areas of your life. For example, while you | |
think about and feel your grievance, its negative emotional energy | |
can distort your perception of an event that is happening in the | |
present or influence the way in which you speak or behave toward | |
someone in the present. One strong grievance is enough to | |
contaminate large areas of your life and keep you in the grip of the | |
ego. | |
Don't try to let go of the grievance. Forgiveness happens naturally | |
when you see that it [the grievance] has no purpose other than to | |
strengthen a false sense of self, to keep the ego in place. | |
Complaining as well as faultfinding and reactivity give the ego a | |
feeling of superiority on which it thrives. When you complain, by | |
implication you are right and the person or situation you complain | |
about or react to is wrong. There is nothing that strengthens the | |
ego more than being right. Being right is identification with a | |
mental position... For you to be right, of course, you need someone | |
else to be wrong, and so the ego loves to make wrong in order to be | |
right. In other words: You need to make others wrong in order to get | |
a stronger sense of who you are. | |
What do doctrines, ideologies, sets of rules, or stories all have in | |
common? They are made up of thought. Thought can at best point to | |
the truth, but it never IS the truth. That's why Buddhists say "The | |
finger pointing at the moon is not the moon." All religions are | |
equally false and equally true, depending on how you use them. You | |
can use them in the service of the ego, or you can use them in the | |
service of the Truth. If you believe only your religion is the | |
Truth, you are using it in the service of the ego. Used in such a | |
way, religion becomes ideology and creates an illusory sense of | |
superiority as well as division and conflict between people. In | |
service of the Truth, religious teachings represent signposts or maps | |
left behind by awakened humans to assist you in spiritual awakening, | |
that is to say, in becoming free of identification with form. | |
There is only one absolute Truth, and all other truths emanate from | |
it. Can the Truth be put into words? Yes, but the words are, of | |
course, not it. They only point to it. | |
The Truth is inseparable from who you are. Yes, you ARE the Truth. | |
If you look for it elsewhere, you will be deceived every time. The | |
very Being that you are is Truth. Laws, commandments, rules, and | |
regulations are necessary for those who are cut off from who they | |
are, the Truth within. They prevent the worst excesses of the ego, | |
and often they don't even do that. | |
By far the greater part of violence that humans have inflicted on | |
each other is not the work of criminals or the mentally deranged, but | |
of normal, respectable citizens in the service of the collective ego. | |
One can go so far as to say that on this planet "normal" equals | |
insane. What is it that lies at the root of this insanity? Complete | |
identification with thought and emotion, that is to say, ego. | |
The particular egoic patterns that you react to most strongly in | |
others and misperceive as their identity tend to be the same patterns | |
that are also in you, but that you are unable or unwilling to detect | |
within yourself. In that sense, you have much to learn from your | |
enemies. Anything that you resent and strongly react to in another | |
is also in you. But it is no more than a form of ego, and as such, | |
it is completely impersonal. It has nothing to do with who that | |
person is, nor has it anything to do with who you are. | |
In certain cases, you may need to protect yourself or someone else | |
from being harmed by another, but beware of making it your mission to | |
"eradicate evil," as you are likely to turn into the very thing you | |
are fighting against. Fighting unconsciousness will draw you into | |
unconsciousness yourself. Unconsciousness, dysfunctional egoic | |
behavior, can never be defeated by attacking it. Even if you defeat | |
your opponent, the unconsciousness will simply have moved into you, | |
or the opponent reappears in a new disguise. Whatever you fight, you | |
strengthen, and what you resist, persists. | |
For example, despite the war against crime and drugs, there has been | |
a dramatic increase in crime and drug-related offenses in the past | |
twenty-five years. The war against disease has given us, amongst | |
other things, antibiotics. At first, they were spectacularly | |
successful, seemingly enabling us to win the war against infectious | |
diseases. Now, many experts agree that the widespread and | |
indiscriminate use of antibiotics has created a time bomb and that | |
antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria, so-called super bugs, will | |
in all likelihood bring about a reemergence of those diseases and | |
possibly epidemics. According to the Journal of the American Medical | |
Association, medical treatment is the third-leading cause of death | |
after heart disease and cancer in the United States. | |
As I was walking with a friend through a beautiful nature reserve | |
near Malibu in California, we came upon the ruins of what had been | |
once a country house, destroyed by a fire several decades ago. As we | |
approached the property, long overgrown with trees and all kinds of | |
magnificent plants, there was a sign by the side of the trail put | |
there by the park authorities. It read: DANGER. ALL STRUCTURES ARE | |
UNSTABLE. I said to my friend, "That's a profound sutra [sacred | |
scripture]." And we stood there in awe. Once you realize and accept | |
that all structures (forms) are unstable, even the seemingly solid | |
material ones, peace arises within you. This is because the | |
recognition of the impermanence of all forms awakens you to the | |
dimension of the formless within yourself, that which is beyond | |
death. Jesus called it "eternal life." | |
There are many subtle but easily overlooked forms of ego that you may | |
observe in other people, and more important, in yourself. For | |
example, you are about to tell someone the news of what happened. If | |
you are alert enough, present enough, you may be able to detect a | |
momentary sense of satisfaction within yourself just before imparting | |
the news, even if it is bad news. It is due to the fact that for a | |
brief moment there is, in the eyes of the ego, an imbalance in your | |
favor between you and the other person. For that brief moment, you | |
know MORE than the other. The satisfaction that you feel is of the | |
ego, and it is derived from feeling a stronger sense of self relative | |
to the other person. Many people are addicted to gossiping partly | |
for this reason. | |
The well-known phenomenon of "name dropping," the casual mention of | |
who you know, is part of the ego's strategy of gaining a superior | |
identity in the eyes of others and therefore in its own eyes through | |
association with someone "important." The absurd overvaluation of | |
fame is just one of the many manifestations of egoic madness in our | |
world. | |
# Chapter 4, Role-playing: The Many Faces of the Ego | |
An ego that wants something from another will usually play some kind | |
of role to get its "needs" met, be they material gain, a sense of | |
power, superiority, or specialness, or some kind of gratification, be | |
it physical or psychological. [Interesting distinction between egoic | |
needs and non-egoic needs.] Usually people are completely unaware of | |
the roles they play. They ARE those roles. [Therein the utility of | |
Karen McLaren's archetypes: bringing those roles to a conscious | |
level.] | |
A shy person who is afraid of the attention of others is not free of | |
ego, but has an ambivalent ego that both wants and fears attention | |
from others. So the shy person's fear of attention is greater than | |
her or his need of attention. Behind every negative self-concept is | |
the hidden desire of being the greatest or better than others. Many | |
people fluctuate between feelings of inferiority and superiority, | |
depending on situations or the people they come into contact with. | |
Whenever you feel superior or inferior to anyone, that's the ego in | |
you. | |
In the early stages of many so-called romantic relationships, | |
role-playing is quite common in order to attract and keep whoever is | |
perceived by the ego as the one who is going to "make me happy, make | |
me feel special, and fulfill all my needs." However, role-playing is | |
hard work, and so those roles cannot be sustained indefinitely, | |
especially once you start living together. When those roles slip, | |
what do you see? Unfortunately, in most cases, not yet the true | |
essence of that being, but that which covers up the true essence: the | |
raw ego divested of its roles, with its pain-body, and its thwarted | |
wanting which now turns into anger, most likely directed at the | |
spouse or partner for having failed to remove the underlying fear and | |
sense of lack that is an intrinsic part of the egoic sense of self. | |
What is commonly called "falling in love" is in most cases an | |
intensification of egoic wanting and needing. You become addicted to | |
another person, or rather to your image of that person. It has | |
nothing to do with true love, which contains no wanting whatsoever. | |
When you play roles, you are unconscious. When you catch yourself | |
playing a role, that recognition creates a space between you and the | |
role. It is the beginning of freedom from the role. | |
Some pre-established roles we could call social archetypes. The | |
hippie movement that originated on the West Coast of the United | |
States in the 1960s and then spread throughout the Western world came | |
out of many young people's rejection of social archetypes, of roles, | |
of pre-established patterns of behavior as well as egoically based | |
social and economic structures. They refused to play the roles their | |
parents an society wanted to impose on them. [Turn on, tune in, drop | |
out.] | |
If you are awake enough, aware enough, to be able to observe how you | |
interact with other people, you may detect subtle changes in your | |
speech, attitude, and behavior depending on the person you are | |
interacting with. [Yes, this was strange to observe when i was a | |
child.] | |
Instead of human beings, conceptual mental images are interacting | |
with each other. The more identified people are with their | |
respective roles, the more inauthentic the relationships become. | |
"How are you?" "Just great. Couldn't be better." True or false? In | |
many cases, happiness is a role people play, and behind the smiling | |
façade, there is a great deal of pain. | |
"Just fine" is a role the ego plays more commonly in America than in | |
certain other countries where being and looking miserable is almost | |
the norm and therefore more socially acceptable. [That's because of | |
America's recent history of immigration from many nations. People | |
who could not understand each other's languages lived in proximity. | |
So they reverted to a more fundamental language: body language. They | |
pretended to be "just fine" as a universal way of putting each other | |
at ease, of expressing "I am not an axe murderer. You are safe. I | |
wish you peace."] | |
Many adults play roles when they speak to young children. They use | |
silly words and sounds. [This is natural, and this is how primates | |
learn. Other apes also use a "play face" when interacting with their | |
young.] They don't treat the child as an equal. [You bet they | |
don't!] | |
When being a parent becomes an identity, however, when your sense of | |
self is entirely or largely derived from it, the function easily | |
becomes overemphasized, exaggerated, and takes you over. [Isn't this | |
just giving your full attention to the task of parenting as best as | |
you know how?] | |
"If you think you are so enlightened," Ram Dass said, "go and spend a | |
week with your parents." That is good advice. The relationship with | |
your parents is not only the primordial relationship that sets the | |
tone for all subsequent relationships, it is also a good test for | |
your degree of Presence. The more shared past there is in a | |
relationship, the more present you need to be; otherwise, you will be | |
forced to relive the past again and again. | |
Wouldn't it be wonderful if you could spare them [your hypothetical | |
young children] from all suffering? No, it wouldn't. They would not | |
evolve as human beings and would remain shallow, identified with the | |
external form of things. Suffering drives you deeper. [This matches | |
Buddha's experience.] | |
Suffering has a noble purpose: the evolution of consciousness and the | |
burning up of the ego. When you accept suffering, however, there is | |
an acceleration of that process which is brought about by the fact | |
that you suffer consciously. You can accept suffering for yourself, | |
or you can accept it for someone else, such as your child or parent. | |
In the midst of conscious suffering, there is already the | |
transmutation. The fire of suffering becomes the light of | |
consciousness. | |
You may be doing all the right things and the best you can for your | |
child, but even doing the best you can is not enough. In fact, doing | |
is never enough if you neglect Being. | |
How do you bring Being into the life of a busy family, into the | |
relationship with your child? The key is to give your child | |
attention. There are two kinds of attention. One we might call | |
form-based attention. The other is formless attention. Form-based | |
attention is always connected in some way with doing or evaluating. | |
Form-based attention is of course necessary and has its place, but if | |
that's all there is in the relationship with your child, then the | |
most vital dimension is missing and Being becomes completely obscured | |
by doing, by "the cares of the world," as Jesus puts it. Formless | |
attention is the inseparable from the dimension of Being. How does | |
it work? | |
As you look at, listen to, touch, or help your child with this or | |
that, you are alert, still, completely present, not wanting anything | |
other than that moment as it is. In this way, you make room for | |
Being. In that moment, if you are present, you are not a father or | |
mother. You are the alertness, the stillness, the Presence that is | |
listening, looking, touching, even speaking. You are the Being | |
behind the doing. | |
You may love your child, but your love will be human only, that is to | |
say, conditional, possessive, intermittent. Only beyond form, in | |
Being, are you equal, and only when you find the formless dimension | |
in yourself can there be true love in that relationship. The | |
Presence that you are, the timeless I Am, recognizes itself in | |
another, and the other, the child in this case, feels loved, that is | |
to say, recognized. | |
> There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so. | |
> --William Shakespeare | |
Negativity is not intelligent. It is always of the ego. The ego may | |
be clever, but it is not intelligent. Cleverness pursues its own | |
little aims. Intelligence sees the larger whole in which all things | |
are connected. Cleverness is motivated by self-interest, and it is | |
extremely short-sighted. Most politicians and businesspeople are | |
clever. Very few are intelligent. [I doubt this.] Whatever is | |
attained through cleverness is short-lived and always turns out to be | |
eventually self-defeating. Cleverness divides; intelligence | |
includes. [I don't buy this distinction. For example, | |
discrimination divides between what is right or wrong for ourselves | |
in this moment. So it would count as an intelligence that divides.] | |
All of the above are assumptions, unexamined thoughts that are | |
confused with reality. They are stories the ego creates to convince | |
you that you cannot be at peace now or cannot be fully yourself now. | |
Being at peace and being who you are, that is, being yourself, are | |
one [and the same thing]. | |
How to be at peace now? By making peace with the present moment. | |
The present moment is the field on which the game of life happens. | |
It cannot happen anywhere else. Once you have made peace with the | |
present moment, see what happens, what you can do or choose to do, or | |
rather what life does through you. There are three words that convey | |
the secret of the art of living, the secret of all success and | |
happiness: One With Life. | |
What is reality? Whatever is. Buddha called it tatata--the suchness | |
of life, which is no more than the suchness of this moment. | |
To end the misery that has afflicted the human condition for | |
thousands of years, you have to start with yourself and take | |
responsibility for your inner state at any given moment. [In other | |
words, you must be able to respond to it.] That means now. Ask | |
yourself, "Is there any negativity in me at this moment?" Then, | |
become alert, attentive to your thoughts as well as your emotions. | |
Watch out for the low-level unhappiness in whatever form that I | |
mentioned earlier, such as discontent, nervousness, being "fed up," | |
and so on. Watch out for thoughts that appear to justify or explain | |
this unhappiness but in reality cause it. The moment you become | |
aware of a negative state within yourself, it does not mean you have | |
failed. It means that you have succeeded. Until that awareness | |
happens, there is identification with inner states, and such | |
identification is ego. | |
[That was a profound paragraph. It touches on Buddha's first noble | |
truth: There is suffering. And then relates it to a tantric/yogic | |
truth: There is bliss.] | |
Most people have moments when they are free of ego. Those who are | |
exceptionally good at what they do may be completely or largely free | |
of ego while performing their work. They may not know it, but their | |
work has become a spiritual practice. It comes as no surprise that | |
those people who work without ego are extraordinarily successful at | |
what they do. | |
People unknowingly sabotage their own work when they withhold help or | |
information from others or try to undermine them lest they become | |
more successful or get more credit than "me." Cooperation is alien | |
to the ego, except when there is a secondary motive. The ego doesn't | |
know that the more you include others, the more smoothly things flow | |
and the more easily things come to you. | |
When you are ill, your energy level is quite low, and the | |
intelligence of the organism may take over and use the remaining | |
energy for the healing of the body, and so there is not enough left | |
for the mind, that is to say, egoic thinking and emotion. The ego | |
burns up considerable amounts of energy. | |
One of the ways in which the ego attempts to escape the | |
unsatisfactoriness of personal selfhood is to enlarge and strengthen | |
its sense of self by identifying with a group--a nation, political | |
party, corporation, institution, sect, club, gang, football team. | |
A collective ego manifests the same characteristics as the personal | |
ego, such as the need for conflict and enemies, the need for more, | |
the need to be right against others who are wrong, and so on. A | |
collective ego is usually more unconscious [less conscious] than the | |
individuals that make up that ego. | |
Enlightened collectives will fulfill an important function in the | |
arising of the new consciousness. | |
# Chapter 5, The Pain-Body | |
In addition to the movement of thought, although not entirely | |
separate from it, there is another dimension to the ego: emotion. | |
This is not to say that all thinking and all emotion are of the ego. | |
They turn into ego only when you identify with them and they take you | |
over completely, that is to say, when they become "I." | |
The physical organism, your body, has its own intelligence, as does | |
the organism of every other life-form. And that intelligence reacts | |
to what your mind is saying, reacts to your thoughts. So emotion is | |
the body's reaction to your mind. You don't run your body. The | |
[built-in] intelligence does. | |
The fundamental difference between an instinctive response and an | |
emotion is this: An instinctive response is the body's direct | |
response to some external situation. An emotion, on the other hand, | |
is the body's response to a thought. | |
Indirectly, an emotion can also be a response to an actual situation | |
or event, but it will be a response to the event seen through the | |
filter of a mental interpretation, the filter of thought, that is to | |
say, through the mental concepts of good and bad, like and dislike, | |
me and mine. | |
Although the body is very intelligent, it cannot tell the difference | |
between an actual situation and a thought. It reacts to every | |
thought as if it were a reality. [This can result in a feedback | |
loop, or in other words, a vicious or virtuous cycle.] | |
Almost every human body is under a great deal of strain and stress, | |
not because it is threatened by some external factor but from within | |
the mind. The body has an ego attached to it, and it cannot but | |
respond to all the dysfunctional thought patterns that make up the | |
ego. Thus, a stream of negative emotion accompanies the stream of | |
incessant and compulsive thinking. | |
There is a generic term for all negative emotions: unhappiness. | |
Positive emotions strengthen the immune system, invigorate and heal | |
the body. But we need to differentiate between positive emotions | |
that are ego-generated and deeper emotions that emanate from your | |
natural state of connectedness with Being. | |
Positive emotions generated by the ego already contain within | |
themselves their opposite into which they can quickly turn. | |
Ego-generated emotions are derived from the mind's identification | |
with external factors, which are, of course, all unstable and liable | |
to change at any moment. The deeper emotions are not really emotions | |
at all but states of Being. Emotions exist within the realm of | |
opposites. States of being can be obscured, but they have no | |
opposite. They emanate from within you as the love, joy, and peace | |
that are aspects of your true nature. | |
Two zen monks, Tanzan and Ekido were walking along a country road | |
that had become extremely muddy after heavy rains. Near a village, | |
they came upon a young woman who was trying to cross the road, but | |
the mud was so deep it would have ruined the silk kimono she was | |
wearing. Tanzan at once picked her up and carried her to the other | |
side. | |
The monks walked on in silence. Five hours later, as they were | |
approaching the lodging temple, Ekido couldn't restrain himself any | |
longer. "Why did you carry that girl across the road?" he asked. | |
"We monks are not supposed to do things like that." | |
"I put the girl down hours ago," said Tanzan. "Are you still | |
carrying her?" | |
Now imagine what life would be like for someone who lived like Ekido | |
all the time, unable or unwilling to let go internally of situations, | |
accumulating more and more "stuff" inside, and you get a sense of | |
what life is like for the majority of people on our planet. What a | |
heavy burden of past they carry around them in their minds. | |
[I don't have to imagine.] | |
Any negative emotion that is not fully faced and seen for what it is | |
in the moment it arises does not completely dissolve. It leaves | |
behind a remnant of pain. This energy field of old but still | |
very-much-alive emotion that lives in almost every human being is the | |
pain-body. The collective pain-body is probably encoded within every | |
human's DNA, although we haven't discovered it there yet. | |
Every newborn who comes into this world already carries an emotional | |
pain-body. [Sounds similar to the doctrine of original sin.] An | |
infant with only a light pain-body is not necessarily going to be a | |
spiritually "more advanced" man or woman than somebody with a dense | |
one. In fact, the opposite is often the case. People with heavy | |
pain-bodies usually have a better chance to awaken spiritually than | |
those with a relatively light one. | |
The pain-body is addicted to unhappiness. It may be shocking when | |
you realize for the first time that there is something within you | |
that periodically seeks emotional negativity, seeks unhappiness. [I | |
perceived it as a child. The way i perceived it, people who were too | |
comfortable became bored and they stirred up drama in order to make | |
their own lives more interesting. Once their situation was | |
sufficiently dire, they would either die or stop stirring up drama.] | |
In most people, the pain-body has a dormant and an active stage. The | |
pain-body awakens from dormancy when it gets hungry, when it is time | |
to replenish itself. Alternatively, it may get triggered by an event | |
at any time. The pain-body that is ready to feed can use the most | |
insignificant event as a trigger... | |
It is not so much that you cannot stop your train of negative | |
thoughts, but that you don't want to. This is because the pain-body | |
at that time is living through you, pretending to be you. And to the | |
pain-body, pain is pleasure. It eagerly devours every negative | |
thought. If that sounds to you like a psychic parasite, you are | |
right. That's exactly what it is. | |
If you have ever lived with a cat, you will know that even when the | |
cat seems to be asleep, it still knows what is going on, because at | |
the slightest unusual noise, its ears will move toward it, and its | |
eyes may open slightly. Dormant pain-bodies are the same. On some | |
level, they are still awake, ready to jump into action when an | |
appropriate trigger presents itself. | |
In intimate relationships, pain-bodies are often clever enough to lie | |
low until you start living together and preferably have signed a | |
contract committing yourself to be with this person for the rest of | |
your life. You don't just marry your husband or wife, you also marry | |
her or his pain-body--and your spouse marries yours. It would be | |
hard to find a partner who does not carry a pain-body, but it would | |
perhaps be wise to choose someone whose pain-body is not excessively | |
dense. | |
Some people carry dense pain-bodies that are never completely | |
dormant. Through their reactivity, relatively insignificant matters | |
are blown up out of all proportion as they try to pull other people | |
into their drama by getting them to react. Unaware of the pain they | |
carry inside, by their reaction, they project the pain into events | |
and situations. Due to a complete lack of self-awareness, they | |
cannot tell the difference between an event and their reaction to the | |
event. To them, unhappiness and even the pain itself is out there in | |
the event or situation. Being unconscious of their inner state, they | |
don't even know that they are deeply unhappy, that they are suffering. | |
You can only go beyond it by taking responsibility for your inner | |
state now. There is only one perpetrator of evil on the planet: | |
human unconsciousness. That realization is true forgiveness. With | |
forgiveness, your victim identity dissolves, and your true power | |
emerges--the power of Presence. Instead of blaming the darkness, you | |
bring in the light. | |
# Chapter 6, Breaking free | |
The beginning of freedom from the pain-body lies first of all in the | |
realization that you HAVE a pain-body. Then, more important, in your | |
ability to stay present enough, alert enough, to notice the pain-body | |
in yourself as a heavy influx of negative emotion when it becomes | |
active. When it is recognized, it can no longer pretend to be you | |
and live and renew itself through you. | |
It is your conscious Presence that breaks the identification with the | |
pain-body. When you don't identify with it, the pain-body can no | |
longer control your thinking and so cannot renew itself anymore by | |
feeding on your thoughts. The pain-body in most cases does not | |
dissolve immediately, but once you have severed the link between it | |
and your thinking, the pain-body begins to lose energy. The energy | |
that was trapped in the pain-body is transmuted into Presence. In | |
this way, the pain-body becomes fuel for consciousness. | |
Many acts of violence are committed by "normal" people who | |
temporarily turn into maniacs. Does this mean that people are not | |
responsible for what they do when possessed by the pain-body? My | |
answer is: How can they be? How can you be responsible when you are | |
unconscious, when you don't know what you are doing? | |
When you can't stand the endless cycle of suffering anymore, you | |
begin to awaken. So the pain-body too has its necessary place in the | |
larger picture. | |
Not all unhappiness is of the pain-body. Some of it is new | |
unhappiness, created whenever you are out of alignment with the | |
present moment, when the Now is denied in one way or another. When | |
you recognize that the present moment is always already the case and | |
therefore inevitable, you can bring an uncompromising inner "yes" to | |
it and so not only create no further unhappiness, but, with inner | |
resistance gone, find yourself empowered by Life itself. | |
Pain-body and ego are close relatives. They need each other. When | |
you are completely trapped in the movement of thought and the | |
accompanying emotion, stepping outside is not possible because you | |
don't even know that there is an outside. You are trapped in your | |
own movie or dream, trapped in your own hell. To you it is reality | |
and no other reality is possible. And as far as you are concerned, | |
your reaction is the only possible reaction. | |
When you recognize your own pain-body as it arises, you will also | |
quickly learn what the most common triggers are that activate it, | |
whether it be situations or certain things other people do or say. | |
When those triggers occur, you will immediately see them for what | |
they are and enter a heightened state of alertness. Within a second | |
or two, you will also notice the emotional reaction that is the | |
arising pain-body, but in that state of alert Presence, you won't | |
identify with it, which means the pain-body cannot take you over and | |
become the voice in your head. If you are with your partner at the | |
time, you may tell her or him, "What you just said (or did) triggered | |
my pain-body." Have an agreement with your partner that whenever | |
either of you says or does something that triggers the other person's | |
pain-body, you will immediately mention it. In this way, the | |
pain-body can no longer renew itself through drama in the | |
relationship and instead of pulling you into unconsciousness, will | |
help you become fully present. | |
Every time you are present when the pain-body arises, some of the | |
pain-body's negative emotional energy will burn up, as it were, and | |
become transmuted into Presence. The rest of the pain-body will | |
quickly withdraw and wait for a better opportunity to arise again, | |
that is to say, when you are less conscious. The pain-body needs | |
your unconsciousness. It cannot tolerate the light of Presence. | |
But it is not the pain-body, but the identification with it that | |
causes the suffering that you inflict on yourself and others. It | |
takes no time at all to stop identifying with the pain-body. When | |
the pain-body is activated, know that what you are feeling is the | |
pain-body in you. This knowing is all that is needed to break your | |
identification with it. | |
Your sense of who you are determines what you perceive as your needs | |
and what matters to you in life--and whatever matters to you will | |
have the power to upset and disturb you. You can use this as a | |
criterion to find out how deeply you know yourself. What matters to | |
you is not necessarily what you say or believe, but what your actions | |
and reactions reveal as important and serious to you. So you may | |
want to ask yourself the question: What are the things that upset and | |
disturb me? If small things have the power to disturb you, then who | |
you think you are is exactly that: small. That will be your | |
unconscious belief. | |
If peace is really what you want, then you will choose peace. If | |
peace mattered to you more than anything else, you would remain | |
nonreactive and absolutely alert when confronted with challenging | |
people or situations. You would immediately accept the situation and | |
thus become one with it rather than separate yourself from it. Then | |
out of your alertness would come a response. | |
Who you think you are is also intimately connected with how you see | |
yourself treated by others. Many people complain that others do not | |
treat them well enough. "I don't get any respect, attention, | |
recognition, acknowledgment," they say. "I'm being taken for | |
granted." Who they think they are is this: "I am a needy 'little me' | |
whose needs are not being met." This basic misperception of who they | |
are creates dysfunction in all their relationships. They believe | |
they have nothing to give and that the world or other people are | |
withholding from them what they need. If the thought of lack has | |
become part of who you think you are, you will always experience | |
lack. Rather than acknowledge the good that is already in your life, | |
all you will see is lack. The fact is: Whatever you think the world | |
is withholding from you, you are withholding from the world. You are | |
withholding it because deep down you think you are small and that you | |
have nothing to give. | |
Try this for a couple of weeks and see how it changes your reality: | |
Whatever you think people are withholding from you--praise, | |
appreciation, assistance, loving care, and so on--give it to them. | |
You don't have it? Just act as if you had it, and it will come. | |
Then, soon after you start giving, you will start receiving. You | |
cannot receive what you don't give. Outflow determines inflow. This | |
was expressed by Jesus: "Give and it will be given to you. Good | |
measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put | |
into your lap." | |
See the fullness of life all around you. The warmth of the sun on | |
your skin, the display of magnificent flowers outside a florist's | |
shop, biting into a succulent fruit... The fullness of life is there | |
at every step. | |
Ask yourself often: "What can I give here; how can I be of service to | |
this person, this situation?" | |
Jesus puts it like this: "For to the one who has, more will be given, | |
and from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away." | |
Many people have a secret fear that they are bad. But nothing you | |
can find out about yourself is you. Nothing you can know ABOUT you | |
is you. | |
Most people define themselves through the content of their lives. | |
Whatever you perceive, experience, do, think, or feel is content. | |
What is there other than content? That which enables the content to | |
be--the inner space of consciousness. | |
The cosmos is not chaotic. The very word cosmos means order. But | |
this is not an order the human mind can ever [completely] comprehend, | |
although it can sometimes glimpse it. | |
J. Krishnamurti, the great Indian philosopher and spiritual teacher, | |
spoke and traveled almost continuously all over the world for more | |
than fifty years attempting to convey through words--which are | |
content--that which is beyond words, beyond content. At one of his | |
talks in the later part of his life, he surprised his audience by | |
asking, "Do you want to know my secret?" Everyone became very alert. | |
Many people in the audience had been coming to listen to him for | |
twenty or thirty years and still failed to grasp the essence of his | |
teaching. Finally, after all those years, the master would give them | |
the key to understanding. "This is my secret," he said. "I don't | |
mind what happens." | |
The most important, the primordial relationship in your life is your | |
relationship with the Now, or rather with whatever form the Now | |
takes, that is to say, what is or what happens. If your relationship | |
with the Now is dysfunctional, that dysfunction will be reflected in | |
every relationship and every situation you encounter. The ego could | |
be defined simply in this way: a dysfunctional relationship with the | |
present moment. It is at this moment that you can decide what kind | |
of relationship you want to have with the present moment. | |
Once you have decided you want the present moment to be your friend, | |
it is up to you to make the first move: Become friendly toward it, | |
welcome it no matter in what disguise it comes, and soon you will see | |
the results. The decision to make the present moment into your | |
friend is the end of the ego. Time is what the ego lives on. The | |
stronger the ego, the more time takes over your life. Almost every | |
thought you think is then concerned with the past or future, and your | |
sense of self depends on past for your identity and on the future for | |
its fulfillment. | |
There are three ways in which the ego will treat the present moment: | |
* As a means to an end | |
* As an obstacle | |
* As an enemy | |
When you treat the present moment as a means to an end, you are never | |
fully here because you are always busy trying to get elsewhere. | |
When you treat the present moment as a problem, you see life as a | |
problem and you come to inhabit a world of problems that all need to | |
be solved before you can be happy. | |
When you treat the present moment as an enemy, you hate what you are | |
doing, complain about your surroundings, curse things that are | |
happening or have happened, have an internal dialog of accusing and | |
blaming, and argue with what already is. | |
You cannot make the egoless state into a future goal and then work | |
toward it. All you get is more dissatisfaction, more inner conflict, | |
because it will always seem that you have not arrived yet, have not | |
"attained" that state yet. | |
When we speak of the elimination of time, we are, of course, not | |
referring to clock time, which is the use of time for practical | |
purposes, such as making an appointment or planning a trip. What we | |
are speaking of is the elimination of psychological time, which is | |
the egoic mind's endless preoccupation with the past and future and | |
its unwillingness to be one with life by living in alignment with the | |
inevitable ISness of the present moment. | |
Nonresistance is the key to the greatest power in the universe. | |
Through it, consciousness (spirit) is freed from its imprisonment in | |
form. Inner nonresistance to form--whatever is or happens--is a | |
denial of the absolute reality of form. Resistance makes the world | |
and the things of the world appear more real, more solid, and more | |
lasting than they are, including your own form identity, the ego. It | |
endows the world and the ego with a heaviness and an absolute | |
importance that makes you take yourself and the world very seriously. | |
The play of form is then misperceived as a struggle for survival, | |
and when that is your perception, it becomes your reality. | |
Form means limitation. We are here not only to experience | |
limitation, but also to grow in consciousness by going beyond | |
limitation. There may be limitations in life that you have to learn | |
to live with. They can only be overcome internally. Everyone will | |
encounter them sooner or later. Those limitations either keep you | |
trapped in egoic reaction, which means intense unhappiness, or you | |
rise above them internally by uncompromising surrender to what is. | |
That is what they are here to teach. The surrendered state of | |
consciousness opens up the vertical dimension in your life, the | |
dimension of depth. Something will then come forth from that | |
dimension into this world, something of infinite value that otherwise | |
would have remained unmanifested. | |
The joy of Being, which is the only true happiness, cannot come to | |
you through any form, possession, achievement, person, or | |
event--through anything that happens. That joy cannot COME to | |
you--ever. It emanates from the formless dimension within you, from | |
consciousness itself and thus is one with who you are. | |
When you are seemingly diminished in some way and remain in absolute | |
nonreaction, not just externally but also internally, you realize | |
that nothing real has been diminished, that through becoming "less," | |
you have become more. This is what Jesus means when he says, "Deny | |
yourself" or "Turn the other cheek." | |
This does not mean, of course, that you invite abuse or turn yourself | |
into a victim of unconscious people. [Is that so?] Sometimes a | |
situation may demand that you tell someone to "back off" in no | |
uncertain terms. Without egoic defensiveness, there will be power | |
behind your words, yet no reactive force. If necessary, you can also | |
say no to someone firmly and clearly, and it will be what I call a | |
"high-quality no" that is free of all negativity. | |
If you don't become speechless when looking out into space on a clear | |
night, you are not really looking, not aware of the totality of what | |
is there. You are probably only looking at the objects and perhaps | |
seeking to name them. If you have ever experienced a sense of awe | |
when looking into space, perhaps even felt a deep reverence in the | |
face of this incomprehensible mystery, it means you must have | |
relinquished for a moment your desire to explain and label and have | |
become aware not only of the objects in space but of the infinite | |
depth of space itself. You must have become still enough inside to | |
notice the vastness in which these countless worlds exist in. The | |
feeling of awe is not derived from the fact that there are billions | |
of worlds out there, but the depth that contains them all. | |
There is something within you that has affinity with space; that is | |
why you can be aware of it. When you are aware of space, you are not | |
really aware of anything, except awareness itself--the inner space of | |
consciousness. Through you, the universe is becoming aware of | |
itself! What you see, hear, feel, touch, or think about is only one | |
half of reality, so to speak. It is form. In the teaching of Jesus, | |
it is simply called "the world," and the other dimension is "the | |
kingdom of heaven" or "eternal life." | |
Some years ago when visiting China, I came upon a stupa on a | |
mountaintop near Guilin. It had writing embossed in gold on it, and | |
I asked my Chinese host what it meant. "It means Buddha," he said. | |
"Why are there two characters rather than one?" I asked. "One," he | |
explained, "means 'man.' The other means 'no.' And the two together | |
means 'Buddha.'" I stood there in awe. The character for Buddha | |
already contained the whole teaching of the Buddha, and for those who | |
have eyes to see, the secret of life. Here are the two dimensions | |
that make up reality, thing-ness and no-thingness, form and the | |
denial of form, which is the recognition that form is not who you are. | |
# Chapter 8, The discovery of inner space | |
Most people's lives are cluttered up with things: material things, | |
things to do, things to think about. Space consciousness means that | |
in addition to being conscious of things--which always comes down to | |
sense perceptions, thoughts, and emotions--there is an under-current | |
of awareness. Awareness implies that you are not only conscious of | |
things (objects), but you are also conscious of being conscious. If | |
you can sense an alert inner stillness in the background while things | |
happen in the foreground--that's it! This dimension is there in | |
everyone, but most people are completely unaware of it. | |
Whenever you are upset about an event, a person, or a situation, the | |
real cause is not the event, person or situation but a loss of true | |
perspective that only space can provide. You are trapped in object | |
consciousness, unaware of the timeless inner space of consciousness | |
itself. "I am never upset for the reason I think." | |
Space consciousness has little to do with being "spaced out." Both | |
states are beyond thought. This they have in common. The | |
fundamental difference, however, is that in the former, you rise | |
above thought; in the latter, you fall below it. | |
If you are not spending all your waking life in discontent, worry, | |
anxiety, depression, despair, or consumed by other negative states; | |
if you are able to enjoy simple things like listening to the sound of | |
the rain or the wind; if you can see the beauty of clouds moving | |
across the sky or be alone at times without feeling lonely or needing | |
the mental stimulus of entertainment; if you find yourself treating a | |
complete stranger with heartfelt kindness without wanting anything | |
from her or him... it means that a space has opened up, no matter how | |
briefly, in the otherwise incessant stream of thinking that is the | |
human mind. When this happens, there is a sense of well-being, of | |
alive peace, even though it may be subtle. The intensity will vary | |
from a perhaps barely noticeable background sense of contentment to | |
what the ancient sages of India called ananda--the bliss of Being. | |
Because you have been conditioned to pay attention only to form, you | |
are probably not aware of it except indirectly. For example, there | |
is a common element in the ability to see beauty, to appreciate | |
simple things, to enjoy your own company, or to relate to other | |
people with loving kindness. This common element is a sense of | |
contentment, peace, and aliveness that is the invisible background | |
without which these experiences would not be possible. | |
Why is it the "least thing" that makes up "the best happiness"? | |
Because true happiness is not CAUSED by the thing or event, although | |
this is how it first appears. The thing or event is so subtle, so | |
unobtrusive, that it takes up only a small part of your | |
consciousness--and the rest is inner space, consciousness itself | |
unobstructed by form. In other words, the form of little things | |
leaves room for inner space. And it is from inner space, the | |
unconditioned consciousness itself, that true happiness, the joy of | |
Being, emanates. To be aware of little, quiet things, however, you | |
need to be quiet inside. A high degree of alertness is required. | |
If you have a compulsive behavior pattern such as smoking, | |
overeating, drinking, TV watching, Internet addiction, or whatever it | |
may be, this is what you can do: When you notice the compulsive need | |
arising in you, stop and take three conscious breaths. This | |
generates awareness. Then for a few minutes be aware of the | |
compulsive urge itself as an energy field inside you. Consciously | |
feel the need to physically or mentally ingest or consume a certain | |
substance or the desire to act out some form of compulsive behavior. | |
Then take a few more conscious breaths. After that you may find that | |
the compulsive urge has disappeared--for the time being. Or you may | |
find that it still overpowers you, and you cannot help but indulge or | |
act it out again. Don't make it into a problem. Make the addiction | |
part of your awareness practice in the way described above. As | |
awareness grows, addictive patterns will weaken and eventually | |
dissolve. | |
[This reminds me of a story: Surendra, a devotee of Sri Ramakrishna, | |
would not give up drinking. Sri Ramakrishna suggested that before | |
drinking alcohol, he should first offer some to Mother Kali, and then | |
drink it, being careful not to get drunk. Surendra never became | |
intoxicated again.] | |
Your inner body is not solid but spacious. It is not your physical | |
form but the life that animates the physical form. It is the | |
intelligence that created and sustains the body, simultaneously | |
coordinating hundreds of different functions of such extraordinary | |
complexity that the human mind can only understand a tiny fraction of | |
it. When you become aware of it, what is really happening is that | |
the intelligence is becoming aware of itself. | |
As much as possible in everyday life, use awareness of the inner body | |
to create space. This means part of your attention or consciousness | |
remains formless, and the rest is available for the outer world of | |
form. Whenever you "inhabit" your body in this way, it serves as an | |
anchor for staying present in the Now. | |
# Chapter 9, Your inner purpose | |
As soon as you rise above mere survival, the question of meaning and | |
purpose becomes of paramount importance in your life. ...the true or | |
primary purpose of your life cannot be found on the outer level. It | |
does not concern what you do but what you are... | |
So the most important thing to realize is this: Your life has an | |
inner purpose and an outer purpose. Inner purpose concerns Being and | |
is primary. Outer purpose concerns doing and is secondary. Inner | |
and outer, however, are so intertwined that it is almost impossible | |
to speak of one without referring to the other. | |
Your inner purpose is to awaken. Your outer purpose can change over | |
time. Finding and living in alignment with the inner purpose is the | |
foundation for fulfilling your outer purpose. It is the basis for | |
true success. Without that alignment, you can still achieve certain | |
things through effort, struggle, determination, and sheer hard work | |
or cunning. But there is no joy in such endeavor, and it invariably | |
ends in some form of suffering. | |
Awakening is a shift in consciousness in which thinking and awareness | |
separate. For most people it is not an event but a process they | |
undergo. The initiation of the awakening process is an act of grace. | |
You don't have to become worthy first. That's why Jesus associated | |
with all kinds of people, not just the respectable ones. | |
Many people who are going through the early stages of the awakening | |
process are no longer certain what their outer purpose is. What | |
drives the world no longer drives them. Seeing the madness of our | |
civilization so clearly, they may feel somewhat alienated from the | |
culture around them. Some feel that they inhabit a no-man's-land | |
between two worlds. They are no longer run by the ego, yet the | |
arising awareness has not yet become fully integrated into their | |
lives. Inner and outer purpose have not merged. | |
...the outer purpose alone is always relative, unstable, and | |
impermanent. This does not mean that you should not be engaged in | |
those activities. It means you should connect them to your inner, | |
primary purpose, so that a deeper meaning flows into what you do. | |
The great arises out of small things that are honored and cared for. | |
Everybody's life really consists of small things. Greatness is a | |
mental abstraction and a favorite fantasy of the ego. The paradox is | |
that the foundation for greatness is honoring the small things of the | |
present moment instead of pursuing the idea of greatness. The | |
present moment is always small in the sense that it is always simple, | |
but concealed within it lies the greatest power. Like the atom, it | |
is one of the smallest things yet contains enormous power. | |
# Chapter 10, A new earth | |
If you look within rather than only without, however, you discover | |
that you have an inner and an outer purpose, and since you are a | |
microcosm reflection of the macrocosm, it follows that the universe | |
too has an inner and outer purpose inseparable from yours. The outer | |
purpose of the universe is to create form and experience the | |
interaction of forms--the play, the dream, the drama, or whatever you | |
choose to call it. Its inner purpose is to awaken to its formless | |
essence. Then comes the reconciliation of outer and inner purpose: | |
to bring that essence--consciousness--into the world of form and | |
thereby transform the world. The ultimate purpose of that | |
transformation goes far beyond anything the human mind can imagine or | |
comprehend. And yet, on this planet at this time, that | |
transformation is the task allotted us. | |
Reality is a unified whole, but thought cuts it up into fragments. | |
This gives rise to fundamental misperceptions, for example. that | |
there are separate things and events, or that THIS is the cause of | |
THAT. Every thought implies a perspective, and every perspective, by | |
its very nature, implies limitation, which ultimately means that it | |
is not true, at least not absolutely. Only the whole is true, but | |
the whole cannot be spoken or thought. | |
As an illustration of relative and absolute truth, consider the | |
sunrise and sunset. When we say the sun rises in the morning and | |
sets in the evening, that is true, but only relatively. In absolute | |
terms, it is false. Only from the limited perspective of an observer | |
on or near the planet's surface does the sun rise and set. If you | |
were far out in space, you would see that the sun neither rises nor | |
sets, but that it shines continuously. And yet, even after realizing | |
that, we can continue to speak of the sunrise or sunset, still see | |
its beauty, paint it, write poems about it, even though we now know | |
that it is a relative rather than an absolute truth. | |
The notion of "my own life" is, of course, another limited | |
perspective created by thought, another relative truth. There is | |
ultimately no such thing as "your" life, since you and life are not | |
two, but one. | |
[Death] carries great potential for spiritual awakening... Since | |
there is very little spiritual truth in our contemporary culture, not | |
many people recognize this as an opportunity, and so when it happens | |
to them or to someone close to them, they think there is something | |
dreadfully wrong, something that should not be happening. ... the | |
more spiritually ignorant you are, the more you suffer. | |
[In the West] Most decrepit and old people are shut away in nursing | |
homes. Dead bodies ... are hidden away. Try to see a dead body, and | |
you will find that it is virtually illegal, except if the deceased is | |
a close family member. In funeral homes, they even apply makeup to | |
the face. You are only allowed to see a sanitized version of death. | |
[When death is only an abstract concept, we are totally unprepared | |
for the dissolution of form that awaits us.] When it approaches, | |
there is shock, incomprehension, despair, and great fear. | |
It is precisely through the onset of old age, through loss or | |
personal tragedy, that the spiritual dimension would traditionally | |
come into people's lives. That is to say, their inner purpose would | |
emerge only as their outer purpose collapsed and the shell of the ego | |
would begin to crack open. In most ancient cultures, there must have | |
been an intuitive understanding of this process, which is why old | |
people were respected and revered. | |
We believe that a young child should not have to face death, but the | |
fact is that some children do have to face the death of one of both | |
parents through illness or accident--or even the possibility of their | |
own death. | |
What is lost on the level of form is gained on the level of essence. | |
The brain does not create consciousness, but consciousness creates | |
the brain, the most complex physical form on earth, for its | |
expression. When the brain gets damaged, it does not mean you lose | |
consciousness. It means consciousness can no longer use that form to | |
enter this dimension. You cannot lose consciousness because it is, | |
in essence, who you are. You can only lose something that you have, | |
but you cannot lose something that you are. | |
Awakened doing is the alignment of your outer purpose--what you | |
do--with your inner purpose--awakening and staying awake. Not WHAT | |
you do, but HOW you do what you do determines whether you are | |
fulfilling your destiny. And how you do what you do is determined by | |
your state of consciousness. A reversal of your priorities comes | |
when the main purpose for doing what you do becomes the doing itself, | |
or rather, the current of consciousness that flows into what you do. | |
That current of consciousness is what determines quality. [In other | |
words] In any situation and in whatever you do, your state of | |
consciousness is the primary factor; the situation and what you do is | |
secondary. | |
Three ways in which consciousness can flow into what you do: | |
* Acceptance | |
* Enjoyment | |
* Enthusiasm | |
Acceptance means: For now, this is what this situation, this moment, | |
requires me to do, and so I do it willingly. Performing an action in | |
the state of acceptance means you are at peace while you do it. If | |
you can neither enjoy nor bring acceptance to what you do--stop. | |
Otherwise you are not taking responsibility for... your state of | |
consciousness.. for life. | |
When you make the present moment, instead of past and future, the | |
focal point of your life, your ability to enjoy what you do--and with | |
it the quality of your life--increases dramatically. Joy is the | |
dynamic aspect of Being. When the creative power of the universe | |
becomes conscious of itself, it manifests as joy. You don't have to | |
wait for something "meaningful" to come into your life so that you | |
can finally enjoy what you do. There is more meaning in joy than you | |
will ever need. | |
Don't ask your mind for permission to enjoy what you do. All you | |
will get is plenty of reasons why you can't enjoy it. "Not now," the | |
mind will say. "Can't you see i'm busy? There's no time. Maybe | |
tomorrow you can start enjoying..." That tomorrow will never come | |
unless you begin enjoying what you are doing now. | |
When you say, I enjoy doing this or that, it is really a | |
misperception. It makes it appear that the joy comes from what you | |
do, but that is not the case. Joy does not come from what you do, it | |
flows into what you do and thus into the world from deep within you. | |
You will enjoy any activity in which you are fully present, any | |
activity that is not just a means to an end. It isn't the action you | |
perform that you really enjoy, but the deep sense of aliveness that | |
flows into it. That aliveness is one with who you are. This means | |
that when you enjoy doing something, you are really experiencing the | |
joy of Being in its dynamic aspect. That's why anything you enjoy | |
doing connects you with the power behind all creation. | |
Here's a spiritual practice that will bring empowerment and creative | |
expansion into your life. Make a list of a number of everyday | |
routine activities that you perform frequently. Include activities | |
that you may consider uninteresting, boring, tedious, irritating, or | |
stressful. But don't include anything that you hate or detest doing. | |
That's a case for either acceptance or for stopping what you do. | |
... Then, whenever you are engaged in those activities, let them be a | |
vehicle for alertness. Be absolutely present in what you do and | |
sense the alert, alive stillness within you in the background of the | |
activity. You will soon find that what you do in such a state of | |
heightened awareness, instead of being stressful, tedious, or | |
irritating, is actually becoming enjoyable. To be more precise, what | |
you are enjoying is not really the outward action but the inner | |
dimension of consciousness that flows into the action. This is | |
finding the joy of Being in what you are doing. If you feel your | |
life lacks significance or is too stressful or tedious, it is because | |
you haven't brought that dimension into your life yet. Being | |
conscious in what you do has not yet become your main aim. | |
Enthusiasm means there is a deep enjoyment in what you do plus the | |
added element of a goal or a vision that you work toward. When you | |
add a goal to the enjoyment of what you do, the energy-field or | |
vibrational frequency changes. A certain degree of what we might | |
call structural tension is now added to enjoyment, and so it turns | |
into enthusiasm. At the height of creative activity fueled by | |
enthusiasm, there will be enormous intensity and energy behind what | |
you do. You will feel like an arrow that is moving toward the | |
target--and enjoying the journey. | |
To an onlooker, it may appear that you are under stress, but the | |
intensity of enthusiasm has nothing to do with stress. [Except that | |
it may share some of the same hormonal soup.] | |
The word enthusiasm comes from ancient Greek--en and theos, meaning | |
God. And the related word enthousiazein means "to be possessed by a | |
god." With enthusiasm you will find that you don't have to do it all | |
by yourself. In fact, there is nothing of significance that you CAN | |
do by yourself. Sustained enthusiasm brings into existence a wave of | |
creative energy, and all you have to do then is "ride the wave." | |
Enjoyment of what you are doing, combined with a goal or vision that | |
you work toward, becomes enthusiasm. Even though you have a goal, | |
what you are doing in the present moment needs to remain the focal | |
point of your attention; otherwise you will fall out of alignment | |
with universal purpose. | |
At the core of all Utopian visions lies one of the main structural | |
dysfunctions of the old consciousness: looking to the future for | |
salvation. The only existence the future actually has is as a | |
thought form in your mind, so when you look to the future for | |
salvation, you are unconsciously looking to your own mind for | |
salvation. You are trapped in form, and that is ego. | |
What did Jesus tell his disciples? "Heaven is right here in the | |
midst of you." | |
In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus makes a prediction that to this day | |
few people have understood. He says, "Blessed are the meek, for they | |
shall inherit the earth." In modern versions of the Bible, "meek" is | |
translated as humble. Who are the meek or the humble, and what does | |
it mean that they shall inherit the earth? | |
The meek are the egoless. They are those who have awakened to their | |
essential true nature as consciousness and recognize that essence in | |
all "others," all life-forms. They live in the surrendered state and | |
so feel their oneness with the whole and the Source. They embody the | |
awakened consciousness that is changing all aspects of life on our | |
planet, including nature, because life on earth is inseparable from | |
the human consciousness that perceives and interacts with it. That | |
is the sense in which the meek will inherit the earth. | |
A new species is arising on the planet. It is arising now, and you | |
are it! | |
author: Tolle, Eckhart, 1948- | |
detail: gopher://gopherpedia.com/0/A_New_Earth | |
LOC: BL624 .T635 | |
tags: book,non-fiction,self-help,spirit | |
title: A New Earth | |
# Tags | |
book | |
non-fiction | |
self-help | |
spirit |