June 2005
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June 1st 2005
From Consciousness -- A Liberating Effect
As long as you perceive that anyone is holding you back, you have not taken full responsibility for your own liberation. Liberation means that you stand free of making demands on others and on life to make you happy.
When you discover yourself to be nothing but Freedom, you stop setting up conditions and requirements that need to be satisfied in order for you to be happy.
It is in the absolute surrender of all conditions and requirements that Liberation is discovered to be who and what you Are. Then the love and wisdom that flow out of you have a liberating effect on others.
Adyashanti -- The Impact of Awakening
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June 2nd 2005
From Consciousness -- Working Out Your Stuff
Many people think the purpose of relationship is to work out their stuff, but I don't think that's what relationships are for. I think working out your stuff is your own job, not the relationship's.
You work yourself out. You're alone in finding Freedom, in finding the Beloved. That's up to you. When you're clear on this, relationship can flower.
If you aren't, then you're always using each other to work stuff out, and you become two tools: I point out your junk, you point out mine, and we pretend like that's a good thing.
Adyashanti -- The Impact of Awakening
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June 3rd 2005
From Consciousness -- Awaken from the Dream
Awakening to the truth of Unity means to awaken from the dream of a personal self and personal others, to the realization that there is no other.
Many spiritual seekers have had glimpses of the absolute Unity of all existence, but few are capable of or willing to live up to the many challenging, implications inherent in that revelation.
The revelation of Unity, that there is no other, is a realization of the ultimate non-personal nature of all that seems so very personal. Applying this realization to the arena of personal relationships is something that most seekers find extremely challenging.
This is the number one reason why so many seekers never come completely to rest in the freedom of the Self Absolute.
Adyashanti -- The Impact of Awakening
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June 4th 2005
From Consciousness -- Freedom in Relationship
There is a freedom that can be discovered in relationship, whether it be with spiritual community or with another individual, where something much bigger than any individual is born.
What I am speaking about is an intimacy that flowers in the presence of Truth. The depth of this intimacy can be a vehicle through which oneness is experienced.
For some, this degree of intimacy is positive beyond belief; for others, it is the cause of mistrust and fear. True intimacy always threatens the sense of separateness.
Adyashanti -- The Impact of Awakening
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June 5th 2005
From Consciousness -- Going Beyond
Our formeridentification with the personal self and the suffering that it entailed isn't a problem,any more than being a child isn't a problem.
When we become adults, we don't look back and say, "Well, being a child was a complete waste of time!" We leave being a child behind, but we don't assume it was a mistake.
The personal self is not our adversary but simply something we leave behind and go beyond.
Unfortunately, few people go beyond the separate sense of I. When the time is right, others around us will start to question the sense of I. Keep this inquiry open for them by keeping it open and alive within yourself.
Adyashanti -- The Impact of Awakening
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June 6th 2005
From Consciousness -- Look Beyond the Form
As long as you are unaware of Being, the reality of other humans will elude you, because you have not found your own.
Your mind will like or dislike their form, which is not just their body but includes their mind as well. True relationship becomes possible only when there is an awareness of Being.
Coming from Being, you will perceive another person's body and mind as just a screen, as it were, behind which you can feel their true reality, as you feel yours.
So, when confronted with someone else's suffering or unconscious behavior, you stay present and in touch with Being and are thus able to look beyond the form and feel the other person's radiant and pure Being through your own.
Eckhart Tolle -- Practicing the Power of Now
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June 7th 2005
From Consciousness -- A Deep Bond Between Us
At the level of Being, all suffering is recognized as an illusion. Suffering is due to identification with form. Miracles of healing sometimes occur through this realization, by awakening Being-consciousness in others -- if they are ready.
Compassion is the awareness of a deep bond between yourself and all creatures. Next time you say, "I have nothing in common with this person," remember that you have a great deal in common:
A few years from now two years or seventy years, it doesn't make much difference both of you will have become rotting corpses, then piles of dust, then nothing at all. This is a sobering and humbling realization that leaves little room for pride.
Is this a negative thought? No, it is a fact. Why close your eyes to it? In that sense, there is total equality between you and every other creature.
Eckhart Tolle -- Practicing the Power of Now
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June 8th 2005
From Consciousness -- Die Before You Die
One of the most powerful spiritual prectices is to meditate deeply on the mortality of physical forms, including your own. This is called: Die before you die.,
Go into it deeply. Your physical form is dissolving, is no more. Then a moment comes when all mind-forms or thoughts also die. Yet you are still there the divine presence that you are. Radiant, fully awake.
Nothing that was real ever died, only names, forms, and illusions.
At this deep level, compassion becomes healing in the widest sense. In that state, your healing influence is primarily based not on doing but on being. Everybody you come in contact with will be touched by your presence and affected by the peace that you emanate, whether they are conscious of it or not.
Eckhart Tolle -- Practicing the Power of Now
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June 9th 2005
From Consciousness -- A Vast Peace
When you are fully present and people around you manifest unconscious behavior, you won't feel the need to react to it, so you don't give it any reality.
Your peace is so vast and deep that anything that is not peace disappears into it as if it had never existed. This breaks the karmic cycle of action and reaction.
Animals, trees, flowers will feel your peace and respond to it. You teach through being, through demonstrating the peace of God.
You become the "light of the world," an emanation of pure consciousness, and so you eliminate suffering on the level of cause. You eliminate unconsciousness from the world.
Eckhart Tolle -- Practicing the Power of Now
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June 10th 2005
From Consciousness -- True Surrender
It is the quality of your consciousness at this moment that is the main determinant of what kind of future you will experience, so to surrender is the most important thing you can do to bring about positive change.
Any action you take is secondary. No truly positive action can arise out of an unsurrendered state of consciousness.
To some people, surrender may have negative connotations, implying defeat, giving up, failing to rise to the challenges of life, becoming lethargic, and so on.
True surrender, however, is something entirely different. It does not mean to passively put up with whatever situation you find yourself in and to do nothing about it. Nor does it mean to cease making plans or initiating positive action.
Eckhart Tolle -- Practicing the Power of Now
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June 11th 2005
From Consciousness -- The Pain Gap.
Surrender is the simple but profound wisdom of yielding to rather than opposing the flow of life.
The only place where you can experience the flow of life is the Now, so to surrender is to accept the present moment unconditionally and without reservation. It is to relinquish inner resistance to what is.
Inner resistance is to say "no" to what is, through mental judgment and emotional negativity. It becomes particularly pronounced when things "go wrong,"
Which means that there is a gap between the demands or rigid expectations of your mind and what is. That is the pain gap.
Eckhart Tolle -- Practicing the Power of Now
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June 12th 2005
From Consciousness -- The Oneness That Shines Through
The oneness that shines through when two are in selfless relationship could be thouht of as a third entity. No longer is the relationship the primary focus; instead, it is the oneness that perfumes each moment of it.
True relationship not only elicits this oneness, but it is dedicated to it above all else. So when you're truly meeting, it is the one essence that shines through.
When I say "oneness," I am not speaking so much about a flavor of oneness, which a group of people may share. I'm speaking about the perception that the other is myself, and about the joy and love that arises from this perception.
Adyashanti -- The Impact of Awakening
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June 13th 2005
From Consciousness -- Sex and Enlightenment
With the dawning of enlightenment, sex either happens or it doesn't, but it is no longer the central focus of relationship.
The oneness is the focus, and sex can either continue or not continue depending upon the destiny of the individuals involved. One stops defining the relationship by the content of its sexuality.
Everything has its time and place. At one time you can be naturally called to celibacy, and at another called to non-celibacy. Each can have its purpose and need not be judged. Whether or not one is celibate means absolutely nothing.
Do not deny or indulge; simply follow your nature. This is the best course of action.
Adyashanti -- The Impact of Awakening
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June 14th 2005
From Consciousness -- Salvation For All.
The hope for the environment does not lie in the hands of the environmentalists. They simply sit on the opposite side of the duality from those who destroy the environment. They are culprits in continuing a type of violence that is the very root of what causes us to destroy the environment.
The hope for the environment lies in the realization that all beings and all things are yourself, including those who oppose you.
Until your vision and compassion is big enough to include those who oppose you, you are simply contributing to the continuation of destructiveness. The end of separation is the salvation for all.
Adyashanti -- The Impact of Awakening
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June 15th 2005
From Consciousness -- The Courage to Question
Most people come to spiritual teachers and teachings with a host of hidden beliefs, ideas, and assumptions that they unconsciously seek to be confirmed.
Even if they are willing to question these beliefs they almost always replace the old concepts with new, more spiritual ones -- thinking that these new concepts are far more real than the old ones.
Keep questioning right down to the marrow, until the questioner dissolves -- leaving only a passing draft where there was once a solid illusion called me.
Adyashanti -- The Impact of Awakening
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June 16th 2005
From Consciousness -- Nothing But Awakeness
Even those who have had deep spiritual experiences and awakenings beyond the mind will, in most cases, continue to cling to superstitious ideas and beliefs.
This is an unconscious effort to grasp for the security of the known, the accepted, or the expected. It is this grasping for security, in all its inner and outer forms, that limits the perspective of enlightenment and maintains an inwardly divided condition which is the cause of all suffering and confusion.
In order to fully awaken to the fact that you are nothing but Awakeness itself, you must want to know the truth more than you want to feel secure.
Adyashanti -- The Impact of Awakening
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June 17th 2005
From Consciousness -- Distorting Ideas and Beliefs
Shortly after I began teaching, I noticed that almost everyone coming to see me held a tremendous number of superstitious ideas and beliefs that were distorting their perceptions and limiting their scope of spiritual inquiry.
What was most surprising was that even those who had had deep and profound experiences of spiritual awakening continued to hold onto superstitious ideas and beliefs which severely limited their depth of experience and expression of true awakening.
Over time, I began to see how delicate and challenging it was for most seekers to find the courage to question any and all ideas and beliefs about the true nature of themselves, the world, others, and even enlightenment itself.
Adyashanti -- The Impact of Awakening
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June 18th 2005
From Consciousness -- When Things Go Wrong
If you have lived long enough, you will know that things "go wrong" quite often. It is precisely at those times that surrender needs to be practiced if you want to eliminate pain and sorrow from your life.
Acceptance of what is immediately frees you from mind identification and thus reconnects you with Being. Resistance is the mind.
Surrender is a purely inner phenomenon. It does not mean that on the outer level you cannot take action and change the situation.
In fact, it is not the overall situation that you need to accept when you surrender, but just the tiny segment called the Now. For example, if you were stuck in the mud somewhere, you wouldn't say: "Okay, I resign myself to being stuck in the mud." Resignation is not surrender.
Eckhart Tolle -- Practicing the Power of Now
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June 19th 2005
From Consciousness -- Refraining From Labeling
You don't need to accept an undesirable or unpleasant life situation. Nor do you need to deceive yourself and say that there is nothing wrong with it. No. You recognize fully that you want to get out of it. You then narrow your attention down to the present moment without mentally labeling it in any way.
This means that there is no judgment of the Now. Therefore, there is no resistance, no emotional negativity. You accept the "isness" of this moment.
Then you take action and do all that you can to get out of the situation. Such action I call positive action. It is far more effective than negative action, which arises out of anger, despair, or frustration.
Until you achieve the desired result, you continue to practice surrender by refraining from labeling the Now.
Eckhart Tolle -- Practicing the Power of Now
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June 20th 2005
From Consciousness -- Becoming Hard and Rigid
Non-surrender hardens your psychological form, the shell of the ego, and so creates a strong sense of separateness. The world around you and people in particular come to be perceived as threatening.
The unconscious compulsion to destroy others through judgment arises, as does the need to compete and dominate. Even nature becomes your enemy and your perceptions and interpretations are governed by fear.
The mental disease that we call paranoia is only a slightly more acute form of this normal but dysfunctional state of consciousness. Not only your psychological form but also your physical form -- your body -- becomes hard and rigid through resistance. Tension arises in different parts of the body, and the body as a whole contracts. The free flow of life energy through the body, which is essential for its healthy functioning, is greatly restricted.
Eckhart Tolle -- Practicing the Power of Now
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June 21st 2005
From Consciousness -- Accessing Your Beingness
Certain forms of physical therapy can be helpful in restoring the free flow of life energy through the body, but unless you practice surrender in your everyday life, those things can only give temporary symptom relief since the cause -- the resistance pattern has not been dissolved.
There is something within you that remains unaffected by the transient circumstances that make up your life situation, and only through surrender do you have access to it.
It is your life, your very Being -- which exists eternally in the timeless realm of the present.
Eckhart Tolle -- Practicing the Power of Now
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June 22nd 2005
From Consciousness -- Infused With Being
If you find your life situation unsatisfactory or even intolerable, it is only by surrendering first that you can break the unconscious resistance pattern that perpetuates that situation.
Surrender is perfectly compatible with taking action, initiating change, or achieving goals. But in the surrendered state a totally different energy, a different quality, flows into your doing.
Surrender reconnects you with the source-energy of Being, and if your doing is infused with Being, it becomes a joyful celebration of life energy that takes you more deeply into the Now.
Through nonresistance, the quality of your consciousness and, therefore, the quality of whatever you are doing or creating is enhanced immeasurably. The results will then look after themselves and reflect that quality. We could call this "surrendered action."
Eckhart Tolle -- Practicing the Power of Now
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June 23rd 2005
From Consciousness -- Learn From Nature
In the state of surrender, you see very clearly what needs to be done, and you take action, doing one thing at a time and focusing on one thing at a time.
Learn from nature: See how everything gets accomplished and how the miracle of life unfolds without dissatisfaction or unhappiness.
That's why Jesus said: "Look at the lilies, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin."
Eckhart Tolle -- Practicing the Power of Now
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June 24th 2005
From Consciousness -- Come Out of Hiding
In almost every person, every religion, every group, every teaching, and every teacher, there are ideas, beliefs, and assumptions, which are overtly or covertly not open to question.
Often these unquestioned beliefs hide superstitions, which are protecting something that is untrue, contradictory, or being used as justification for teachings and behaviors that are less than enlightened.
The challenge of enlightenment is not simply to glimpse the awakened conditioned, nor even to continually experience it. It is to be and express it as your self in the way you move in the world.
In order to do this, you must come out of hiding behind any superstitious beliefs and find the courage to question everything. Otherwise, you will continue to hold onto superstitions that distort your perception and expression of that which is only ever AWAKE.
Adyashanti -- The Impact of Awakening
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June 25th 2005
From Consciousness -- Realize and Be
The aim of my teaching is enlightenment -- awakening from the dream state of separateness to the reality of the One. In short, my teaching is focused on realizing what you are.
You may find other elements in my teaching which simply arise as a response to people's particular needs of the moment, but fundamentally I'm only interested in you waking up.
Enlightenment means waking up to what you truly are and then being that. Realize and be, realize and be. Realization alone is not enough. The completion of Self realization is to be, which means to act, do, and express what you realize.
This is a very deep matter, a whole new way of life living in and as reality instead of living out the programmed ideas, beliefs, and impulses of your dreaming mind.
Adyashanti -- Emptiness Dancing
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June 26th 2005
From Consciousness -- Realize Reality Right Now
The truth is that you already are what you are seeking. You are looking for God with his eyes. This truth is so simple and shocking, so radical and taboo that it is easy to miss among your flurry of seeking.
You may have heard what I am saying in the past and you may even believe it, but my question is, have you realized it with your whole being? Are you living it?
Wake up! You are all living Buddhas (or Christs). You are the divine emptiness, the infinite no-thing. This I know because I am what you are, and you are what I am.
Let go of all ideas and images in your mind, they come and go and aren't even generated by you. So why pay so much attention to your imagination when reality is for the realizing right now?
Adyashanti -- Emptiness Dancing
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June 27th 2005
From Consciousness -- Embody What You Are
Don't think that awakening is the end. Awakening is the end of seeking, the end of the seeker, but it is the beginning of a life lived from your true nature.
That's a whole other discovery -- life lived from oneness. Embodying what you are; being a human expression of oneness.
There is no question of you becoming the One; you are the One. The question is, are you a conscious expression of the One? Has the One awakened to itself?. Have you remembered what you really are? And if you have, are you living it? Are you really living consciously as the One?
All my talks are about awakening or life lived after awakening. No matter what I seem to be talking about, I'm really talking about one of these two things.
Adyashanti -- Emptiness Dancing
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June 28th 2005
From Consciousness -- Becoming Grace-Prone
When we really start to take a look at who we think we are, we become very grace-prone. We start to see that while we may have various thoughts, beliefs, and identities, they do not individually or collectively tell us who we are.
A mystery presents itself: we realize that when we really look at ourselves clearly and carefully, it is actually astounding how completely we humans define ourselves by the content of our minds, feelings, and history.
Many forms of spirituality try to get rid of thoughts, feelings, and memories -- to make the mind blank, as if that were a desirable or spiritual state. But to have the mind blank is not necessarily wise.
Instead, it is more helpful to see through thoughts and to recognize that a thought is just a thought, a belief, a memory. Then we can stop binding consciousness or spirit to our thoughts and mental states.
Adyashanti -- Emptiness Dancing
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June 29th 2005
From Consciousness -- A Simple Presence of Awakeness
It is paradoxical that the more this spirit or consciousness starts to taste itself, not as a thought or idea or belief, but as just a simple presence of awakeness, the more this awakeness is reflected everywhere.
The more we wake up out of bodies and minds and identities, the more we see that bodies and minds are actually just manifestations of that same spirit, that same presence.
The more we realize that who we are is totally outside of time, outside of the world, and outside of everything that happens, the more we realize that this same presence is the world -- all that is happening and all that exists.
It is like two sides of a coin.
Adyashanti -- Emptiness Dancing
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June 30th 2005
From Consciousness -- Focus on the Now
If your overall situation is unsatisfactory or unpleasant, separate out this instant and surrender to what is. That's the flashlight cutting through the fog. Your state of consciousness then ceases to be controlled by external conditions. You are no longer coming from reaction and resistance.
Then look at the specifics of the situation. Ask yourself, "Is there anything I can do to change the situation, improve it, or remove myself from it?" If so, take appropriate action.
Focus not on the hundred things that you will or may have to do at some future time but on the one thing that you can do now. This doesn't mean you should not do any planning. It may well be that planning is the one thing you can do now. But make sure you don't keep running "mental movies" that continually project yourself into the future, and so lose the Now.
Any action you take may not bear fruit immediately. Until it does. do not resist what is.
Eckhart Tolle -- Practicing the Power of Now
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