The Eckhart Tolle School of Awakening

Session 4
Eckhart Tolle

SIBYL CHAVIS: Welcome back to The Eckhart Tolle School of Awakening day two. We hope
you had a really lovely evening. Just a couple of announcements here before we get started.
Similar to yesterday, the event chat will be turned off during the session. And if you do have any
technical questions, or need any assistance, you can reach out again to [email protected].

Finally, I know many of you have asked, and we wanted to confirm that tomorrow, the course
website will be up and running, and you'll receive an email from us with details and everything
that you need to get started with the additional course materials. And with that, it's my pleasure
to welcome Eckhart. Welcome, Eckhart.

ECKHART TOLLE: Thank you, Sibyl. Welcome, everybody, to our Sunday session. I suppose
unless you're in Australia or New Zealand, it must be Monday there. And here we are in the
present moment. So we might as well start by becoming more acutely aware of the present
moment, instead of overlooking it.

But what does that really mean, to become acutely aware of the present moment? What are the
deeper implications of that? Obviously, the present moment is not something that you can
perceive with your senses, because you say, "Where is that?" To most people, of course, the
present moment is just an abstract concept. You cannot see it anywhere, or smell it, or touch it,
or hear it.
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So what does it even mean when we say present moment? And what does it really mean to
become aware of the present moment? And that simple question can take you very deep. You
could regard it as a kind of meditation.

Becoming aware of this moment, first of all, the first thing that you realize is, this moment is
whatever you're perceiving at this moment. There are sense perceptions in this moment. Now, I
don't think we could call those sense perceptions the present moment, but they arise in the
present moment.

So every sense perception is inseparable from the present moment. You can only perceive it
now-- see, hear, touch, smell, and so on. So whatever you're perceiving now, is happening in the
present moment. I don't think you could call it the present moment. You see it, my image, but the
body that you see is not the present moment.

But you see it in the present moment. And you see other things wherever you are sitting, your
surroundings. You hear my voice. And maybe there are some other sounds in the background,
who knows. All that is appearing in the present moment.

So you can start by giving attention to sense perception. A very helpful portal into the present
moment is sensory perception in itself. It's not the present moment, obviously. Because you can't
perceive it with the senses. But it is a portal into, so to speak, into a deeper dimension, becoming
aware of sense perceptions, more acutely aware of sense perceptions.

Hearing, seeing, perhaps other senses are involved, touch, smell. Well, you're not eating or
drinking anything. So the taste may not be involved right now. And holding your attention, it's
relatively easy right now, because most of your attention is probably on what you see and what
you hear, and it's all pointing you continuously to whatever is arising in the present moment.

So it's fairly easy right now, it should be, to be aware of sense perceptions, and then just see if
you can expand a little bit, and be peripherally aware also of others, not just of the screen, but
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your surroundings. So I can see there's a wall behind the little computer screen. There's a room.
There's the sky. There's a desk in which I'm sitting.

And there's a totality of this room, a part of which I see. There's a screen behind me, which we
got at IKEA a couple of weeks ago, works quite well. So this, the totality of this, and just
acknowledging sense perceptions. Now, you may notice you're thinking less when you
acknowledge sense perceptions. You're not thinking that much, because you cannot be acutely
aware of sense perception and do a lot of thinking at the same time.

I mentioned that yesterday, when I talked about not immediately interpreting everything that you
perceive. So we're practicing just perceiving. But then there may also be other things arising in
the present moment, in addition to sense perceptions. Feelings perhaps, you may feel something,
good or bad, who knows. We don't want to label it at all. It just is.

You might feel it, but perhaps, an intensification of the feeling of aliveness, perhaps. Or perhaps,
some remnant of anxiety, who knows, or some heaviness that you feel, because there's certain
problems in your life situation that kind of are lingering there in your inner space. Perhaps you
feel that, or perhaps not.

Perhaps some feeling of fearful feeling, of something that you may or will have to deal with
tomorrow, or whatever it is, these things. And whatever it was arising on the level of emotional
feeling at this moment, that's what is. So we become aware of the outer and the inner.

And thoughts also come and go. Perhaps, not as many as usual, because your attention is now on
sense perceptions, and whatever you may feel. You may not really feel anything particular.
That's fine right now. And thoughts may come, fragments of thoughts, or entire thoughts.

And thoughts have a certain gravitational pull. They say, "Come this way." The thought is a little
energy formation that arises in your mind, little entity, energy entity. And it wants to grow. It
says, "Think more about this." And it wants to pull you along. I call it the gravitational pull of
every thought.
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And if you keep your attention on sense perceptions, then you are less likely to be seduced by the
gravitational pull, and to succumb to the gravitational pull of thoughts. So you can become aware
of thoughts, but you don't have to follow them. Just allow them to arise and then subside.

So in a way, those three things, sense perceptions, thoughts, and emotions, make up your entire
life experience, so it seems. What do you call your life is a mixture. Now, what goes into this
mixture of sense perceptions? Thoughts, thoughts of course include memories, the conditioning
of your mind, and so on.

What goes into this mixture of sense perceptions, which are all your experiences. You experience
everything through your senses, every relationship. Everything is experienced through sensory
perception. But what kind of sensory perceptions, you go into this thing that you call your life,
that varies from person to person, of course. So you have some sense perceptions, thoughts, and
emotions. Those things make up your life, what you call your life. "That's my life."

So these elements are there for every person, just different. Of course, what it is that you
perceive with your senses varies from person to person. That's fine. And all of these things can
only be arising in the present moment, even memories. "I remember 20 years ago, that was"-- but
even that, you're remembering it now. And when it happened it was now too, and get away from
it.

"That was so nice 13 years ago, I was there. I wish I was there now." OK, well, it's all just now.
It was now then. It's now now. But it's easy to forget. It's now. Now, all these things are your
experiences, one could say, your life, what you call your life, consists of experiences, emotions,
sensory perceptions, all the drama.

Everybody has drama in their lives to a greater or lesser degree. And comedy, whatever you
have, a mixture of drama and comedy. And all those things make up your life, what people call
"my life." I call that-- all that is the foreground of your life, the foreground.

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Now, the background to all sensory experience, and thoughts, emotions, the background is
obviously, something that doesn't change. The background to every experience that happens in
the foreground is-- now, what term do we use to point to it, to talk about it?

The background that never changes. We could say it's the light of consciousness, the space of
consciousness. And in that space of consciousness, everything arises and passes away,
continuous fluctuation of forms, external forms, thought forms, emotional forms, a continuous
stream of forms. That's your life.

But who or what is aware of this continuous stream in the foreground. There is an awareness
without which this would not be possible. The light of consciousness, and this light of
consciousness is ultimately, I call it sometimes the background to all experience, which is not
subject to any fluctuation. Because in itself, it's space. It's not content. Everything else is content.

The foreground is content that fills up your life. And that may be sometimes satisfying, and other
times, not satisfying. Sometimes, it's quite pleasant. Whatever fills up your life is a pleasant
mixture of things, sensory perception, sensory experience, emotions, and so on. And at other
times, it can become unpleasant.

And for some people, it may even be predominantly unpleasant, whatever they experience as
their life, the content that makes up their life. For many people, there's probably more people on
the planet for whom it is unpleasant than it is pleasant. But that's how it is.

Foreground, background now, this background, the amazing thing is, you can become aware of
this background while you are experiencing the foreground, even right now, not at some future
moment. Right now, you become aware of the background that is the space for whatever you're
experiencing in the foreground right now, which is what you see, and what you hear.

And when you get a glimpse of that, that's enormously-- can't find a word for it-- joyful or
liberating to know that there is this background that never changes. It's not subject to time, has
no age, or gender, or race, or whatever. It's not a person.
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And that is the simple way of becoming liberated from being trapped in the foreground, that
what you call your life, being trapped there, and can't get out of it. And the thing is, the
foreground-- because it's continuously fluctuating, cannot satisfy you for very long. Even a great
beautiful experience, it arises, and it goes. Or if it is a beautiful experience stays for too long, it
loses its capacity to satisfy you.

The foreground is inherently unsatisfying, except for brief moments, which are ultimately
delusional. This is why the Buddha said, both happiness and unhappiness are dukkha. Dukkha
means suffering. That it's the superficial happiness that is derived from whatever happens in the
foreground of your life.

Well, happiness and unhappiness are dukkha. Dukkha is translated usually as suffering, but can
also be translated as unsatisfactoriness, unhappiness, or misery, or whatever you want to call it.
many People can verify that in their own experience, that happiness and unhappiness are dukkha.
Just remember your wedding and your divorce, if that happened in your life. They go together.

So now, this background, what else can we say about it? And why do we talk about it in? These
words are pointers to help you become more deeply aware of the background.

Well, we started by saying, "What does it mean to become aware of the present moment?" And
that's what it is in itself. Becoming aware of the present moment is becoming aware of the
background to all experience.

You can't think about it. Now, but all that also means, becoming aware of the present moment,
also means becoming aware of yourself, who or what you are beyond the content of your life,
who or what you are beyond the person, the personal sense of self, the essence of who you are.
Sometimes I call it the "Deep I," as opposed to the "Surface I."

Now, that means that the present moment, and who you essentially are, are one and the same. So
that means, one could say, you are the present moment in its essence. So to become more deeply
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aware of the present moment really means to become deeply aware of yourself, not the content
that makes up your so-called life, but life itself, the underlying one life, the one consciousness,
the space for it all.

And so the present moment then, is not what happens. Whatever happens, happens in the space,
the time and space of the present moment. So the present moment is the space for it, but it's not
what happens.

What happens is-- well, the Buddha called it impermanent, because it continuously changes.
Jesus pointed to it by saying it is the realm where moths, the little moths, moths and rust
consume, and thieves break in and steal. That is the impermanent realm of content, where the
moths eat up wool and garments and stuff, they eat it up.

So Jesus says, this is the realm, the dimension, where moths and rust, rust, even the strongest
metal eventually gets consumed by rust. Where moths and rust consume, and thieves break in
and steal. So he doesn't say-- he didn't a concept like impermanence. I mean, it's a great concept,
but it's much more tangible when he said, where moths and rust consumes, and thieves break in
and steal.

It's the foreground, the content of your life, that appears in the foreground, is very unstable. And
so we often get the illusion of stability. But it's not stable. Sometimes it seems stable for a while,
and then we get shocked that it's not. Suddenly, something happens to disrupt everything.

And so if you want to-- what does Oprah say, "Live your best life," or something. She has that
expression, live. I think it's "Live your best life," or something like that. That's not a bad thing.
But don't just attempt to succeed at that endeavor on the dimension of the foreground of your
life.

Yes, it's good to acknowledge that dimension also, of course. You can't escape it. You
acknowledge that, I mentioned. And it is also fine to want to experience more things, explore
new things, attain, achieve, learn. It's all good. But it's not enough. It's not enough for a truly
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fulfilled life. And not only it's not enough, you'll end up in frustration. No matter what it is, if
you never become aware of the background, whatever happens in the foreground will always
prove ultimately, sooner or later, unsatisfying. And often, more than unsatisfying.

So here we come to the limitations of all experience, which doesn't mean we should turn away
from experiencing. But be aware of the limitations of whatever it is you are experiencing in your
life, and whatever it is that you achieve. It's all good-- learn, achieve, experience. But be aware
of the limitations of all experience. And all experience is what we could call the content of your
life.

And the content is not enough for a truly fulfilled life, can never be. Which again, I have to add,
it does not mean you should neglect that dimension, no. But there's no ultimate fulfillment to be
found there. So if you're active on that dimension, it's perfectly fine and good. But if you're
looking for something in that dimension that it cannot give you, that is a delusion, and leads to
suffering.

So if you're looking for ultimate happiness, or fulfillment, or finding your true self by
rearranging the content of your life, move somewhere where it's just a perfect place, and have
everything just perfect, and then the perfect partner, and the perfect family, and everything is just
arranged. You can't hold it together for very long, and then it suddenly crumbles again.

Not that you shouldn't. It's all good to pursue good things. Yes, but the world, which is a world
of experience-- as I sometimes put it in very simple terms, the world cannot make you happy,
that the world is all the stuff that you experience as the content of your life. The world cannot
make you happy, except briefly, and then it turns out to be a delusion.

Now, the world not only cannot make you happy, it's not even here to make you happy. So what
is it for? It's here to frustrate you, to lead you to frustration and suffering, so that you awaken to
the deeper dimension, which is the background.

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Now, that's an amazing realization. "The world is not here to make me happy. What? I thought
all my life-- I'm just, not me, I'm just acting out. I thought all my life there was something wrong
either with me or with the world, because it didn't make me happy. I must have gotten it all
wrong. There's nothing wrong with me, that the world didn't make me happy. And there's
nothing wrong with the world, because it didn't make me happy. They don't go together."

Now, just a very liberating realization, that the world not only cannot make you happy, it's not
even designed to make you happy. It's designed to awaken you. And then now, what does it
mean to awaken? It simply means-- to use the terminology that we're using here now in this
session, to awaken means to become aware of yourself as the background, the conscious
awareness, the space.

That is inherently satisfying, regardless of what appears in the foreground. And you'll notice that
change, then you'll notice that in your life, that you no longer demand great and exciting
experiences to make you feel alive. You become more content with the small things, the small
things of life, the little things, because sometimes, the little things make it easier to become
aware of the background. And then you appreciate the little things, the small things.

And the big things can sometimes take your attention away from the background, a huge,
intense, sensory experience. You go to a night club, or something like that, and you're
bombarded with lights and sounds. What else is a big thing? Well, anything that is very noisy, so
to speak, but that takes your attention completely into the foreground of your life.

There's an interesting thing I saw yesterday, or the other day. I don't very often read. You may
have heard of Confucius, a Chinese sage. Don't be confused by Confucius, a Chinese sage who
lived about the same time as the Buddha. The teachings are not as immediately inspiring as
some. So you have to look, and you'll find the deeper stuff there, but there is some deeper stuff
there.

And so he said, "The common person marvels at uncommon things. A wise person marvels at the
commonplace." A common person, meaning ultimately, unconscious or completely identified
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with the foregrounds. So the common person marvels at uncommon things. The unconscious
person is completely identified with the foreground, is looking for some great, new, sensory
experience, and gets very dissatisfied, and bored, and restless.

"What's going on? There's nothing happening. What's the next fix? I need to fix, because there's
so much discontent that I feel, because the foreground is not satisfying enough. There is not
enough going on." So the common person, meaning the unconscious person, always marvels at
uncommon things. Oh, wow, look at that. Wow. And even taking drugs is an attempt to generate
uncommon things, a great experience.

And a wise person marvels at the commonplace, the simple things. Now, does the wise person
have the ability to marvel at-- to marvel means to appreciate, to acknowledge it all. Because
there's not just the commonplace, the simple thing, like looking at the trees outside.

I'm looking out of the window, and it's windy, and the trees are moving in the wind. They're
swaying back and forth. Oh, beautiful. And whatever it is that you can see. Now, why is it so
satisfying? Because there's not just the trees moving back and forth. There's also the background.

And then you can look at anything, perceive anything. And there's not just the thing. There's also
the formless background. So there's not just the form. There's also the formless, the two
dimensions, form and formlessness, wow.

Now, when we say the world isn't here to make you happy, or cannot make you happy, that
initially sounds like a negative message to anybody who has no spiritual inside whatsoever. And
of course, that sounds very negative. That's why the academics who studied Buddhism, western
professors of theology, and oriental studies, and whatever, who studied Buddhism, they say,
Buddhism is a negative, life denying, religion or teaching.

But it's not, of course. It denies the absolute reality of the foreground. That's all. And it's as if
you only know the foreground, you are going to suffer again, and again, and again, and again. No
matter how you rearrange the foreground of your life, it will not stop your suffering. Because
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you are attached to the foreground, the content of your life, you're attached to it. But it fluctuates
constantly.

So there's constant frustration. It's like sand running through your fingers. "I want to hold onto
this." You can't. So to attach yourself means also to derive your sense of identity from the
foreground. You derive your identity of who you are, your sense of self, from the content of your
life.

The content of your life includes the bodies, also, the external body is a part of the content of
your life too. Everything that arises as an experience, sensory experience, thought, emotion, is
the content of your life. So if you derive your identity from the foreground, then basically it
means, no matter what you achieve on that dimension, you're not going to make it.

We use an expression, "Am I going to make it?" If all you know is the foreground of your life,
and the content of your life, you're not going to make it. Meaning, you're not going to succeed at
the art of living. And so the little paradox arises as you realize that the world, which is the
foreground for your life, all your life experience cannot make you happy, and ultimately,
unsatisfying.

And you realize that, not as a belief that you adopt, something you believe in, but as an actual
realization in the depths of your being. Because you become aware of the background. And from
there, you're there in the foreground, and the paradox is, the moment you are aware of the
background, and then you drop the demand that the foreground and whatever happens should
make you happy. When you drop this demand of the world, then the world is actually
experienced as a much happier place.

And the things of the world are actually appreciated much more deeply, because you have
dropped the demand that they should make you happy, or fulfilled, or tell you who you are, or
make you complete. So that's a little paradox. So we are not life denying. We are just going
deeper.

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So the moment you no longer place this demand upon the world, which of course, includes other
people, situations that you encounter, places that you go to. You tell places, "I'm going to be
happy there." Well, have a look. Try it. Situations, places, achievements, attainments,
possessions, people-- have I said people-- demanding, "Make me happy!" You don't need them
to make you happy anymore, but you don't deny that realm of experience.

That would be the wrong way to go. You don't deny. This has been attempted in many religious
and spiritual traditions, complete denial of sensory experience, complete denial of any
satisfaction, and sensory experience, asceticism, fasting, abstaining from everything from food
and sex, and any sensory pleasure whatsoever. Well, this has been attempted.

I can see why they attempted it. I can see their reasoning behind it. And in a few cases, it may
have worked, very few. I can't even think of anyone who through denying themselves sensory
experience totally have achieved awakening.

The Buddha tried it for several years. And then he said, "It's not working." And then he sat under
a tree, and said, "I surrender." And he started eating and drinking again. And his disciples left
him. They said, "He lost it. He is eating and drinking again." And his moment of his
enlightenment came then.

So the paradox is, the world is actually a quite benign place, where there are lots of things that
you can appreciate very deeply, a place of great beauty, too. If you no longer expect the
impossible from the things of this world, including people. Have I said people? Yes.

"Make me happy." Place that demand on anybody, and any other human being, is a recipe for
unhappiness, obviously. To place a demand on any situation, attainment, fulfillment, "Make me
happy," it's a recipe for unhappiness. Even a place, you go to a place, the most desirable place
you can think of, "Make me happy." You always find something unsatisfying there.

And if you don't, you become so bored with that place, that you're longing to get away. You can't
really spend more than a year lying on the beach every day under a palm tree and still be happy.
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You say, "What's happening to me? I've become a beach bum. Is that it? Not another sunny day.
I can't stand it anymore. I need some problem. Give me some problem, please." And then you
create it.

So the ultimate-- it's a very simple spiritual practice, which is, after a while, is no longer a
spiritual practice. It becomes second nature, a natural way of being in this world, is being aware
of the background as yourself, as the present moment, as the space, as the light of consciousness,
in this moment right now. Stillness is another word we can use. These are just pointers.

Now, it often happens that humans are not ready for this realization until they reach a certain
point. And very often, that point is reached when the foreground, the experience of the
foreground, becomes extremely, extremely unpleasant through, for example, great loss. Content
that they had identified with as my life, the content, something very significant and fundamental
from the content of their life, that they called my life, is removed.

It could be loss of all possessions. It could be loss of status, opposition in the world after sending
the wrong tweet. You suddenly get canceled, so you suddenly lose position and status. It could
also be an accident that incapacitates you physically. It could be death of a loved one, somebody
close to you dying, or becoming very seriously ill. It could be your becoming aware of your own
mortality approaching very fast.

These things that suddenly remove things from the content of your life, loss, calamity,
tribulation, to use kind of Biblical terms, calamity and tribulation. Old Testament, New
Testament, maybe too, apocalypse, end of the Bible, calamity, tribulation. Those things that
completely shake up what you say, call, my life, which is the stuff that you derive your sense of
who you are from. That is your life.

You don't realize that what we call your life is only the content. But your life is a deeper thing,
another thing. Your life is the formless background. So it often happens that people who
experience great loss of whatever kind in their lives, suddenly, they suffer of course, usually,
they suffer tremendously at first.
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And sometimes, it happens that they can't stand the suffering anymore, and a point of surrender
happens, and acceptance. And in that acceptance, something opens up within them, and they
become suddenly aware of a dimension of inner peace, and that's the background. They lost
everything, and they feel suddenly very peaceful.

That was described in the Bible as "the peace that passes all understanding." You cannot
understand why they feel peaceful in that situation. Of course, it doesn't work with everybody,
only a certain percentage of humans who experience great loss are able to go beyond
identification with the content of their life, able to become aware of the formless.

Because the world of forms, content, has become so unpleasant, and that they cannot live in that
dimension anymore. And of course, some humans commit suicide at that point, before they ever
reach the deeper realization. And that's a great pity. Because if you are close to suicide,
potentially, you are also close to awakening. So why go that way?

That doesn't make you any way useful. Why not go through the awakening? Commit suicide to
the fictitious sense of who you are. That's a good suicide, the fictitious person, let go of
identification with the content of your life, and realize who you are in your essence. And that's
the meaning of the phrase, "Die before you die." Or one could also say, "Find death before death
finds you." Wow.

Because death is going to find you. And when it comes, it's not tomorrow. It's today. It's now.
Even just awareness of your mortality can be something that takes you deeper. It helps you dis-
identify from the content of your life

Now, every human knows that they are going to die. But it's an abstract thing in their heads.
They don't really believe it. They say, "Yeah, of course I'm going to die one day, a long time in
the future." And it's not until somebody close to them dies suddenly, or they suffer an accident,
or something, or come close to death, sometimes, though their parents, father, mother dies, or
brother, sibling, or whatever.
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Suddenly, they become aware of mortality. They truly realize that they are mortal. They're going
to die too. And that again, is when you experience great loss, death. Suddenly, instead of
contracting into egoic resistance, there is an opening into the formless dimension.

And that is also why it's very important not to deny death, because death is the end of form. A
form dissolves. And every form lives here on this dimension, a form dissolves. That which
animates the form, which is consciousness, consciousness takes on a form. Then consciousness
withdraws, the form collapses.

And it is very important to become familiar with death. In the conventional sense, death is the
short-lived nature, the fleeting nature, of all life forms. In the Western world, and even parts of
the non-so-called Western world, have kind of gone this way now.

They're very scared of death, but don't talk about it, don't mention death. It's a very unhealthy
thing. And death is regarded as the greatest injustice, and the worst possible thing that should
never be happening to anybody. It's just awful.

And it's a taboo. You are not allowed to see a dead body, unless it's a very close relative. Try to
see a dead body, very hard. And so, you realize if you live in the West-- in India, to some extent,
I think it's still easier to see dead bodies. But if you live in the West, and even some parts of the
East now, you'll live under the delusion that there are no dead bodies, that it's an anomaly if
somebody dies almost.

Not realizing that every day people die continuously on the planet Earth, every second somebody
dies. And even a bit more than that, which means right now somebody dies, right now, dies, and
now, and now, and now, and now, and now. So there are dead bodies everywhere, except they're
hidden away.

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And the beginning of the Buddha's awakening was, part of it, was when he saw his first dead
body. But he was already a young man. He was in childhood. He was very protected in a wealthy
family, very wealthy background, wealthy family.

And then he saw a dead body for the first time. It was the greatest shock to him. And then he
said, "Well, how is it possible? What happened to this person?" When they said, "That happens
to everyone, it's going to happen to you too."

He said, "What? Then everything is meaningless. Nothing makes sense. If everything is destined
to dissolve and die, what's the point of it all?" And that's the ultimate kind of nihilistic way, if
you say, there is no point. So he didn't say there is no point. He asked a question. "If everything
is destined to die and dissolve, is there anything beyond?"

He asked the question. He did not fall into the nihilistic perspective of arriving at an erroneous
conclusion, and saying, "It's all just try to get as much sensory pleasure as you can out of life,
and then you go anyway." He didn't go to there. He asked a question. And that was the beginning
of his spiritual search. Is there anything beyond this? He didn't know.

It only took several years to search to find the timeless, took him several years. And then he
found-- he didn't ever use the term god. He didn't use that term. Because it could be misleading.
But he sometimes a term is used-- I don't know whether-- I believe it Buddha used it, Amaravati,
meaning, the deathless dimension, the deathless dimension.

And what is the deathless Amaravati? The deathless dimension is the background to all
experience. And so, he found it, and not by denying or fighting the stuff in the foreground,
sensory experience. He tried that, didn't work.

So that's the suffering for humans, and all lifeforms. It's ultimately, something to be transcended,
but it has a function, an important function, in the evolutionary process of humanity. Because
suffering is the awakener. Suffering arises due to attachment to the foreground, deriving your

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ultimately, illusory sense of identity from the stuff in the foreground of your life. That brings
suffering.

And also, it brings it brings suffering because you become diluted by this false sense of self,
which then takes action in order to strengthen itself, egoically motivated action, in order to
strengthen itself. And a lot of the egoically motivated action that it takes in order to find a more
fulfilled identity where it cannot be found.

A lot of that action is dysfunctional, and brings suffering to themselves and to other humans,
often violent suffering. The ego's need for enemies, the ego's need for emphasizing how other the
other is, all that is part of seeking a stronger sense of identity where it cannot be found, through
having more enemies. So it's all so very simple.

Now, we need to be very careful because the clever human mind has invented all kinds of things
to fill up the foreground of your life with even more stuff, even more content. So that there's no
opportunity for finding some space in a moment when nothing is going on in your life, as being
almost eliminated.

Because nobody, almost nobody, sits anywhere or stands anywhere contemplating. Very rarely,
do you find anybody sitting somewhere and just being there, content, quietly content in the
present moment, taking it all in. No, they are doing something else.

More stuff going in, content, more and more, another tweet. Who is it this time? Well, text
message, bing, bing, bing. And if nothing's coming in-- you have to go-- you can't just stand
there and wait for the elevator, and come off the foreground, and become aware of the
background. But you're waiting for the elevator.

No, you can't. Because everybody has got their phones out. So you pull yours out, too. You don't
know why. But everybody else is scrolling down while they're waiting, so you're doing it too,
because you want to fit in. You don't know what you're looking for. You're not looking for

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anything, just anything will do just to fill you up a little bit more with useless content, taking
away all opportunity for finding that inner space.

And the fictitious self feels strengthened. With every text message it gets, it feels, "Oh,
somebody is texting me." And then you read it, "What's up?" And then some other mostly
meaningless communication.

Occasionally, it's helpful, and it's great. But a lot of the time, it just provides useless content in
order to make it much more difficult for you to find that which is beyond content. You're
continuously absorbed in generating useless content for your mind.

Now, that's something to be aware of, so that you don't succumb to that, and get seduced into a
kind of addiction, which that's what it is, through that it requires a high degree of alertness to
become immune, to become aware of the dangers. So that you use it when it's needed, but not to
fill up every moment of your life.

Go to any waiting room, waiting whatever you may be waiting for anywhere, virtually
everybody is looking at their phones. Everybody is scrolling something. And more and more,
you accumulate more and more stuff, clutter, a nice word for it, mental clutter. And the more
mental clutter you accumulate, the less aware you become of space, the inner space, the
background. It virtually becomes impossible to be aware of it.

Therefore, I recommend to limit your time. Use it when it's needed, but not when it's not needed.
Give yourself space. As I often have said and say, when you're waiting for something, because
it's surprising how much time we spend waiting for things.

It could be the smallest thing, you're waiting for the water to boil to make a cup of tea, or you're
waiting for somebody to arrive, or you're waiting on the telephone, because you're trying to get
through to your bank. It could take a long time. "We appreciate your call, but we are not here
now. We'll get to you very soon." Waiting for the elevator, standing in the elevator, waiting for a
taxi, the train, the bus.
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All kinds of waiting. And this is just a small-scale waiting. I'm not talking of the big waiting that
humans have, waiting for the big thing to change their lives, waiting for the ideal person-- "the
person I'm meant to be with for the rest of my life, I'm just waiting." Or waiting for the big break
to make it.

The small-scale waiting, use that to become aware of the background. While you're waiting for
anything, use it as a wonderful opportunity for becoming aware of the Beingness, the Stillness,
the alert Stillness, the background through that particular experience. Then waiting is no longer
an unpleasant thing. It's actually a great opportunity.

Waiting at the traffic lights. It's red. Oh, great opportunity. There, the red light is the foreground
of your experience, the cast, the foreground of your experience, and then you are aware of the
background. Traffic jams, great opportunity for coming into the present moment, become aware
of yourself, the inner space. So use waiting.

And also, so that is helpful. You have to invite the realization of the background realization, so to
speak. Invite it into your life as much as possible. And because it's there. The background is
always already there. It's just the foreground is too noisy, too cluttered, so you can't be aware of
it.

But it's there. You don't have to make it happen. You have to discover it, discover that it's
already there. That's why sometimes some ancient teachers have said to disciples, "You're
already enlightened. You just don't know it." And in a deeper sense, that's true. That dimension is
already present in every human. They just don't know it. So you are enlightened, but you don't
know it. It's one way of putting it.

I used the example in The Power of Now of a beggar sitting on an old box, a big box, for several
years begging. "Please, can you spare a dime? Please, I need some for food." And then one day
somebody asks, "What are you sitting on?" "This old box."

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"What's inside?" He says, "I don't know. I've never looked. There's probably nothing much
inside." "Why don't you have a look?" And it's filled with gold. I use that as an analogy in The
Power of Now.

So he's been sitting on this box full of gold, and begging for scraps, not realizing the enormous
wealth. All analogies are a little defective, because the analogy is taken from the physical world,
but that's fine. So you're sitting on this box full of gold, asking for scraps. "Please give me a bit
more." And not realizing he's already sitting on the most enormous wealth that could be, and that
is discovering the inner dimension.

So waiting periods, and anything natural is very helpful, as I've said many times before.
Anything, give attention to anything that is not human-made. Ultimately, even human-made
things are fine to contemplate and appreciate, but nature can free you from the conceptualizing
mind more easily when you give it full attention.

So nature can save you from insanity. If you feel there's turmoil in your mind, and so on, go to
nature. Nature can free you from going completely crazy if you give it attention. None of you, of
course, are in danger of going completely insane, because you're already awake or awakening,
obviously, to the dimensions from which all sanity arises.

But anything natural, you have to give it attention. And then it's easy to feel the background
when you look at a flower, or tree, or the sky. So stay with it for a few moments, and realize that
you're looking at the sky. Who is looking? Who or what is looking at the sky? The question does
not have a conceptual answer. Who am I that's looking at the sky?

The answer is in the realization of the background, the background awareness. The answer is not
a concept. The answer is a realization of who you are as conscious awareness. Wow. And so
when you go into nature, there's always not just that which you're perceiving out there. There's
more to it. There's also the perceiving consciousness. You have to bring the two together.

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So nature alone does not free you. But nature can be a reflection, so to speak, of the deeper
essence of who you are. Nature exists pre-mind. It's a different manifestation of consciousness.
Nature has no concept. Animals have no concept.

Even looking at a dog or cat can be a moment of liberation when you give your fullest attention,
and you can sense when you look into the eyes of a dog or a cat, these are the two animals that
tend to live close to humans. You look at the eyes of a dog or a cat, and you may be able to sense
their Beingness, but their Beingness is your Beingness too.

And so suddenly, something in you loves the dog. What is that? It's the consciousness that you
are recognizing, the consciousness of the dog. And it's easier sometimes to see it in the dog than
in another human. Because the other human is burdened by a density of conceptualization, ego.

So it's harder sometimes to penetrate to the essential Beingness of the other human, and
recognize that the other human is no other, ultimately. But with the animal, it's sometimes easier.
And the love what you respond to, what you love in a dog or cat, is ultimately not the outer form,
the fur, although it's soft and lovely, or what's behind the fur, well, the bones, tissue, blood, is
that what you love? No.

What you love in the dog is the unseen, the unseen consciousness in the dog. And who loves it?
It's the recognition. You recognize ultimately, you share consciousness. Because every life form
is a manifestation of the one consciousness. So you don't love the form. You never love the form.
Your true love is always of the recognition of the formless as yourself.

In humans too, true love in humans is that recognition of that dimension in the other. And
suddenly, the other is no longer totally other. And then you love nature, because you recognize in
nature something that is deep. I already pointed to it yesterday-- something that is deeper than
what you perceive. Although, what you perceive with your senses is beautiful, but the true
beauty comes from a deeper place when you appreciate that beauty in a tree, or in a forest.

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You can take one individual life form from nature, and give that attention, at one tree, one blade
of grass, one flower. Or you can take totality of a landscape also. Let's say you're standing on a
hill, and you see the forest there. Or you're standing on a beach, and you see the vast expanse of
the ocean and the sky.

So whether you focus momentarily on one life form in nature, you pick up a pebble, a stone, and
you feel it, you sense it. Or you can use the totality of this. Both are very helpful. You can see
whether you give attention to one small life form, or the totality of the landscape.

And then you see there's something that is beyond sensory perception, that the animating
presence behind all the life forms in nature. You begin to sense the animating presence that is the
life of the tree, the life of the sky, the life of all the entire ocean, everything that lives in the
ocean. There's an animating presence that is one with your presence.

And then the beauty of nature deepens then. Because it's not just a superficial thing where the
mind says, "Oh, look, what a nice flower." Yes, of course it's a nice flower. It's more than a nice
flower, much more than that. And you don't immediately find a concept to describe it, because
then, the ability to perceive it more deeply diminishes.

Krishnamurti once said, the spiritual teacher, "The moment you teach a child the name of the
bird, he or she will never see that bird again." Meaning, the concept obscures or diminishes your
ability to have an in-depth perception of that being. Because the concept dismisses it
immediately. Because the concept gives you the illusion that you know what it is.

But all you know is a mental concept, or a word, a few sounds that your vocal chords produce.
It's a blackbird. It's a nightingale. Oh, OK. Now you know what it is. No, you don't. You stay
with not knowing, and give it your attention, and then you penetrate more deeply into the
mystery of that bird, which is one with the mystery of who you are.

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And so concepts, of course, we need them on our surface dimension. We need to operate with
concepts. But concepts are a hindrance if you want to go more deeply into the formless
dimension. And the concept becomes a barrier.

So again, being able to move between form and formlessness in this world, yes, you need the
ability to use concept, but don't become trapped in a conceptual reality. That's a horrible trap.
And there are millions of humans who are completely trapped in a conceptual reality, including
of course, a conceptual sense of who they are, and manufacturing of conceptual sense of self for
everybody they meet and know, reducing people to concepts, after you've reduced yourself to a
concept.

So escape from a conceptual reality. Your life purpose is to be able to move within the world of
concepts, but not be trapped in it. It's quite challenging. But much more vitally important than
anything else in your life, whatever that may be the personal level. It's fine to escape from the
world of concept, but don't lose your ability to handle concepts.

Now, here I'm not emphasizing-- I'm not saying how to increase your ability to handle concepts.
You can go to all kinds of institutions that can teach you to handle concepts better. Here, we're
emphasizing liberating yourself from the world of concepts.

Because you are very good at concepts. Everybody is. Even if they are not educated, they are still
full of concepts. So here is escaping from a conceptual reality to find a deeper infinitely more
alive reality that is within you, and without.

And nature is a very great help. And if you only give it attention, and then always whenever
you're aware of nature, you're aware of that, and at the same time, the background. And then the
beauty of nature deepens, and then you realize that the beauty is not a surface phenomenon. It
emanates from that deeper place, the deeper place of the unconditioned consciousness that shines
through the form.

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Sometimes, artists are able to also express it in paintings, and so on. There are certain, for
example, impressionist masters of the 19th century, they often painted very ordinary-- here, we
come back to-- they didn't usually paint extraordinary landscapes. There's nothing wrong with
that. They painted the most ordinary landscapes, just there's a little footpath there, and there's a
field there. There's a few flowers, and one tree.

Nobody would have looked at it. There's nothing much, totally the commonplace, Confucius
said, to the commonplace. And then they paint this picture, and then people go into art galleries
and say, "Wow." But if they go into nature, they will never look at it.

The artist went there and they saw it, and something responded to it. And he wanted to put it
onto a canvas. So people go to appreciate the art, because they have this concept, "This is great
art." If nobody had told them this is great art, they probably wouldn't be looking at the picture
either. So somebody has told them, "This is a great impressionist painting, and it was bought by
this gallery for $40 million." "Wow, look at that."

And then they go on to nature. They don't see much there. They could go past the same
landscape and say, "OK, nothing here." So you have to be alert. You don't look for the
spectacular. When spectacular comes, it's fine. It's seeing the beauty that is in every-- the
aliveness that is in every blade of grass, in every movement of the branches of a tree, the
quivering of a leaf.

So, but when you go into nature, or even if you're not in nature, there's the sky. I love sky. I love
taking photos of the sky. It's like, wow. And perhaps, one day I'll show them on the screen. It's
ever changing. Every few minutes, a different work of art is being created there, the great artist
in the sky. Amazing.

And the sky, of course, was used by Jesus as an analogy for the inner space of consciousness. In
this session, we called it the background, the inner space of consciousness when Jesus used the
expression, "the kingdom of heaven." Heaven is the sky. In many languages, heaven and sky are

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the same words. I believe in French, German, Spanish. I think they're the same word. Heaven
and sky are the same word.

So he's pointing to the vast spaciousness of what people can perceive with their senses, in order
to talk about something that cannot be perceived with the senses. In order to talk about an inner
reality, Jesus used an analogy. The closest he could find in the outer world to talk about this
inner dimension was the vast expanse of the sky. And therefore, he used the expression the
kingdom of heaven, or the kingdom of the sky.

And kingdom, in my translation, is dimension. The dimension of spaciousness. And then they
asked him, "Where is the kingdom of heaven, and when is it going to come?" Of course, they
didn't understand what he was talking about, obviously.

So he said, "You're completely wrong. The kingdom of heaven does not come with signs to be
perceived." You cannot say it's over here or over there, because it is within you. In other words,
you cannot make it into an object of knowledge. It's not a thing.

Everything else is a thing. Your life is filled up with things. But the one thing that is not a thing,
is that. And the closest you could find in the sense perceived world was to look at the sky,
because the sky also is not a thing. You cannot touch it. You could never reach the sky.

If you go up in a rocket and say, "When are we going to reach the sky?" And suddenly, you're in
outer space and say, "Where was the sky? I didn't see it." There is no sky as such. So it's the best
analogy one could find to describe this other dimension, obviously, was the vast spaciousness of
the sky.

So very, very skillful way. And yet, very few people understood what he was talking about. To
this day, they are asking, "When is the kingdom of heaven going to come? When am I going to
get there? Where is it?" Completely forgetting that he said, "it does not come with signs to be
perceived. You cannot say it's over here, or it's over there. For truly, I tell you, it is within you."
Simple.
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Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for being, sharing this space with us. All over the planet,
humans are tuning in to this dimension. It's part of the awakening of humanity. We're not making
it happen. We are allowing it to happen. We're allowing this realization to arise in the human
consciousness. Thank you.

© Eckhart Tolle, Kim Eng ℗ Eckhart Teachings Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this transcript may be used or
reproduced in any manner without written permission from Eckhart Teachings Inc.

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