The Seer

As you may know by now, Pearl and I have had to curtail group gatherings at Gurukula pending our anticipated move to Melbourne, However, Martine Tiller is keen to continue the Eckhart Tolle and Adyashanti group gatherings in Perth and is presently looking for a suitable venue. At this stage, Martine is considering two get-togethers each month.

If you were a regular attender at Gurukula, you’ll remember the wonderful support given over the years by our dear friends, Noel and Marion. As they are no longer able to help in this way, Martine would like to hear from any who would be willing to assist her set up the room and help with the refreshments etc.

If you’d like to be a helper or just attend the ongoing Eckhart Tolle and/or Adyashanti DVD groups in Perth, please contact Martine on (08) 9444 5917 or via martinetiller@yahoo.com

The ‘Headless Way’ group will continue to meet once a month at Julie Hillin’s home. For details and to get on the group mailing list, contact Sam Blight on 0412 039 050.

Our house is still on market, though, unless we get an acceptable offer soon, we may withdraw it for a month or two till economic conitions improve. Please note, we will continue to offer counselling services until we actually move, but our bookstore has been suspended until further notice.

Thanks again for many wonderful expressions of love and appreciation we’ve received over the past six weeks … we will try to acknowledge all these individually in due course.

The recent rescue of the miners in Chile, broadcast live to over 1 billion people worldwide, had built in to it a sense of Presence. Perhaps that presence was transmitted by the Chilean President who looked deeply into the eyes of each miner as he emerged from deep inside the earth.

Or perhaps it was the way family members greeted these men who survived the longest underground entrapment from a mining accident that seemed so certain to take their lives. Or perhaps it was the collective energy of so many people all over the planet wishing and praying for the miners’ safety and then seeing these wishes come true as the best possible of all outcomes – every miner brought back alive and well.

Inside this Presence of Being lives other virtues like Cooperation, Compassion and the Brotherhood of Man. Deep inside this experience lives the teachings of Jesus beamed out to world from a country that is 70% Catholic. During this rescue mission, we truly saw one man being another brother’s keeper.

And the whole world watched, in unison. For 22 hours the world was joined in a shared, emotional moment of good will. Every viewer, onlooker, family member and rescue worker were participating in a New Earth moment. And the whole world watched.

In this New Earth moment, we became a planet and a people where care and consideration are resident dwellers of open and caring hearts; where the highest elected official of a country stands with his wife in parkas in the freezing cold all night to hold the space for safety and survival; and where each rescued miner is greeted like an equal by dignitaries and ordinary people alike.

We are capable of this kind of New Earth moment every day. It is the power of Now, fueled by genuine care and love for one another, infinite and all penetrating in every moment.

~ by Eckhart Tolle www.opraheckhart.com

Dear Raphael,

Thanks for clarifying your situation for me … I now have a better idea of where you are in your life-experience.

With regard to the feelings of depression etc. which have arisen in your awareness over the past eight years, I take it that you’ve been having some therapy or counselling for this condition and that this is helping you return to a more normal state of wellness. Is that so, or have you been following some form or ’self-healing’? If you feel comfortable about it, you may like to tell me something of how the improvement came about.

One important thing we all need to know is that inner peace does not come about as a result of thinking or because one ‘masters’ one’s thoughts etc. If that were so, only highly intelligent people would experience inner peace and content, but that is obviously not so.

Peace is lost the moment we resist the way things are. We either want something we don’t have, don’t want something we do have or pass judgement by convincing ourselves that things ’should’ be different to what they are.

So, the way to find inner peace is to be able to accept the way things are at any given moment. That doesn’t mean you can’t try to improve your situation if you feel it is a bad one, but at least you can say to yourself, “Well, this is the way things are right now … is there anything I can do about it?” And if there is, do it.

I and many thousands of others, many known to me personally, have found the writings of Eckhart Tolle very helpful and indeed, quite liberating, in getting free of mind-made suffering and finding lasting inner peace. Eckhart is not the only teacher sharing this timeless wisdom but he is one of the clearest.

I would strongly suggest that you persevere not only with his book, ‘The Power of Now’, but also that you get and read his second major book, ‘A New Earth’. Eckhart has read both these books onto CD disks and I’d recommend that you get hold of these if you can and listen to them. There’s something about Eckhart’s voice that helps the understanding of these life-changing teachings.

Whether you read or listen, do not try to ‘comprehend’ everything Eckhart is saying. Just pass over the bits you can’t grasp straight away, just as you would put aside a bit of tough gristle while eating an otherwise enjoyable and nutritious meal. I myself could not understand everything Eckhart said at the first reading, but later, as I reread his books, it all became wonderfully clear and freeing.

What Eckhart is trying to say about time is essentially this … instead of feeling regret or guilt about the past, and/or anxiety or dread about the future (psychological time), we can just focus on this present moment, or, if you like the Now, enjoy what it has to offer, or at the very least, make the best of whatever is happening for us.

Actually, he is trying to help us to see that we are really beings of pure consciousness or awareness, that can never become injured or ill. Illnesses can and do happen to our body and mind structures, but these are temporary episodes, and do not affect our true nature, which simply observes all these comings and goings in and around our person.

When we discover who we really are, instead of what we appear to be or other people tell us we are, then we find that we can find new and creative ways to manage the arising challenges of our unique life-experience. Healing happens naturally when we don’t fight with what is at any given time and simply allow it to be. It’s a bit like allowing a cloud to be a cloud and knowing that it will eventually pass … and maybe other clouds will appear etc. and so on.

All the great sages point to the truth that there is a great providence guiding our lives and that ultimately, we aren’t separate from it in any way. That’s why the saint, Julian of Norwich, was able to say with such confidence centuries ago: “All will be well, and all will be well, and all manner of things will be well.”

So, Raphael, of course you have everything to look forward to, but don’t let that fact keep you from experiencing the wonder and richness of THIS moment, and the ‘next’ one, and etc. etc. etc.

“It is a sacred moment when there is a meeting beyond the person, beyond the personal sense of self. When there’s no thought as you look into the eyes of another person… through awareness not through thinking… and then the meeting is sacred because that meeting is the realization of not two, but one.”

~ Eckhart Tolle

BTW: In a Speaking of Faith radio show, host, Krista Tippett, interviews Eckhart and he shares his youthful experience of depression and despair — suffering that led him to his own spiritual breakthrough, and ultimately, freedom and peace of mind. He also explains his view of what he calls “the pain body” — the accumulated emotional pain that may influence us and our relationships in negative ways. And Tolle talks about spirit and God, and what those concepts mean to him.

Watching television is the favorite leisure activity or rather non-activity for millions of people around the world. The average American, by the time he is sixty years old, will have spent fifteen years staring at the TV screen. In many other countries the figures are similar.

Many people find watching TV “relaxing.” Observe yourself closely and you will find that the longer the screen remains the focus of your attention, the more your thought activity becomes suspended, and for long periods you are watching the talk show, game show, sitcom, or even commercials with almost no thought being generated by your mind. Not only do you not remember your problems anymore, but you become temporarily free of yourself – and what could be more relaxing than that?

So does TV watching create inner space? Does it cause you to be present? Unfortunately, it does not. When you are watching television, the tendency is for you to fall below thought, not rise above it. Television has this in common with alcohol and certain other drugs. While it provides some relief from your mind, you again pay a high price: loss of consciousness. Like those drugs, it too has a strong addictive quality.

One solution to this problem is to stop watching TV altogether. But this is not very likely. A more practical and realistic solution is to watch TV as consciously as possible. How do we do this?

Avoid watching programs and commercials that assault you with a rapid succession of images that change every two or three seconds or less. Excessive TV watching and those programs in particular are largely responsible for attention deficit disorder, a mental dysfunction now affecting millions of children worldwide. A short attention span makes all your perceptions and relationships shallow and unsatisfying. Whatever you do, whatever action you perform in that state, lacks quality, because quality requires attention.

Frequent and prolonged TV watching not only makes you unconscious, it also induces passivity and drains you of energy. Therefore, rather than watching at random, choose the programs you want to see. Whenever you remember to do so, feel the aliveness inside your body as you watch.

Alternatively, be aware of your breathing from time to time. Look away from the screen at regular intervals so that it does not completely take possession of your visual sense. Don’t turn up the volume any higher than necessary so that the TV doesn’t overwhelm you on the auditory level. Use the mute button during commercials. Make sure you don’t go to sleep immediately after switching off the set or, even worse, fall asleep with the set still on.

~ Eckhart Tolle

PS. In a recent radio show interview with Krista Tippett, Eckhart shares his youthful experience of depression and despair — suffering that led him to his own spiritual breakthrough, and ultimately, freedom and peace of mind. He also explicates his view of what he calls “the pain body” — the accumulated emotional pain that may influence us and our relationships in negative ways. And Eckhart talks about spirit and God, and what those concepts mean to him. To listen, >>>Click Here

by Richard Rohr, OFM

“Although Eckhart Tolle is arousing great interest today, many think he is a novelty, New Age, or even non-religious. The process — and that is what it is — that he is teaching, can be traced through the Greek and Latin traditions of contemplation, the apophatic tradition in particular, and the long history of what was sometimes called “The Sacrament of the Present Moment” (Brother Lawrence, OCD, Francisco de Osuna, OFM, Jean Pierre de Caussade, S.J.).

Eckhart Tolle is teaching a form of natural mysticism or contemplative practice. He is NOT asking you to believe anythin. He is asking you to TRY something! You will know if it is true, if you try it, and you will not know if it is true or false, if you don’t try it. No point in arguing it theoretically or in the abstract.

For Tolle, Being, Consciousness, God, Reality are all the same thing, which is not all bad, when you come to think of it. Of course, his very point is that you cannot think of it at all, you can only realize it. I would not call him pantheistic (all things are God) as much as panentheistic (God is IN all things).

I must join with Paul who in preaching to the secular Athenians, said “God is not far from any of us, since it is in him that we live, and move, and have our very being.” (Acts 17:28). That is an excellent foundation for trusting Tolle’s natural mysticism. We are also preaching to a largely secular world, and must find a language that they can understand and draw from, as Paul did, and not insist that they learn our vocabulary before we can even talk to them or hear them. “How else can we ever be ?all things to all people.” (1 Corinthians 9:22) or dare to think that we can “preach the Gospel to all creation.” (Mark 16:16):”

~ To read Rohr’s complete article, >>>Click Here,

You can also hear Eckhart Tolle in a rare, recent interview on Namaste Radio. Some of the topics Eckhart discusses include: the current state of the world, living in the Now, how to raise present-minded children, sex and the pain body, what it takes to be a great leader and more. To listen, just >>>Click Here.

Question: How long does it take to become free of the pain-body?

Eckhart: It depends both on the density of an individual’s pain-body as well as the degree or intensity of that individual’s arising Presence. But it is not the pain-body, but identification with it that causes the suffering that you inflict on yourself and others. It is not the pain-body but identification with the pain-body that forces you to relive the past again and again and keeps you in a state of unconsciousness.

So a more important question to ask would be this: “How long does it take to become free of identification with the pain-body?” And the answer to that question: It takes no time at all. 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. And when identification with it ceases, the transmutation begins.

The knowing prevents the old emotion from rising up in your head and taking over not only the internal dialogue, but also your actions as well as interactions with other people. This mean the pain-body cannot use you anymore and renew itself through you. The old emotion may then still live in you for a while and come up periodically. It may also still occasionally trick you into identifying with it again and thus obscure the knowing, but not for long.

Not projecting the old emotion into situations means facing it directly within yourself. It may not be pleasant, but it won’t kill you. Your Presence is more than capable of containing it. The emotion is not who you are.

When you feel the pain-body, don’t fall into the error of thinking there is something wrong with you. Making yourself into a problem – the ego loves that. The knowing needs to be followed by accepting. Anything else will obscure it again.

Accepting means you allow yourself to feel whatever it is you are feeling at that moment. It is part of the isness of the Now. You can’t argue with what is. Well, you can, but if you do, you suffer. Through allowing, you become what you are: vast, spacious. You become whole. You are not a fragment anymore, which is how the ego perceives itself. Your true nature emerges, which is one with the nature of God.

Jesus points to this when he says, “Be ye whole, even as your Father in Heaven is whole.” The New Testament’s “Be ye perfect” is a mistranslation of he original Greek word, which means whole. This is to say, you don’t need to become whole, but be what you already are – with or without the pain-body.

~ by Eckhart Tolle

Question: How do I maintain a sense of presence when I’m in the company of another person? How do I bring presence into conversation?

Eckhart: It’s not easy. The moment you start talking, the two minds come together and so they strengthen each other. A flow starts, a stream of thought. A moment ago you were present, and then somebody starts talking. What applies here is the loss of space during the conversation. Both participants of the conversation have lost any sense of space.

There are only the words, the mind, the verbalization, the stream of thinking that becomes sounds. They are taken over by that. It has its own momentum — almost a little entity, a stream, that doesn’t want to end. Often, it generates emotions in the body. That strengthens it, amplifies it.

If the mental stream triggers emotions, which it often does, especially when talking about other people, what they did, failed to do, did to you, did to others, criticisms, gossip, all kinds of emotional [things], the ego comes in. When you can criticize another, the ego feels a little bit stronger. By diminishing another, in the delusional system of the ego, you have enhanced your own self-image a little bit. Any criticism of another is a part of that energy stream.

And then emotions come, and they amplify the thoughts. It’s the loss of space.For you to regain space, without saying “I’m not talking anymore”, one thing is necessary for you — which is the realization that you’ve lost space. Without that, there’s nothing you can do — when you’re so taken over by a stream of thought, that you don’t even know you’ve been taken over by a stream of thought — there’s nothing you can do.

“Forgive them, for they know not what they do”. They are unconscious. They are the stream of thought. And as the stream of thought, you don’t want it to end — because you don’t want your own end. Every entity wants to remain in form for as long as possible.If there’s the slightest realization that you’ve lost space, at that moment you have a choice.

What is your choice? Your choice is to bring some presence, some space, into the stream of thought. But how do you do that? It’s coming at you not only from within your own mind, but it’s coming at you from the other person too. The awareness is there, and it may only last three seconds, and then it’s gone again. So you have to use those two or three seconds, where you realize the loss of space, and do something in that space where you have some freedom to act.

By a conscious choice, you take your attention out of thinking — but you have to anchor it somewhere else, otherwise it won’t work. So you choose your breath, or your body, or some other sense perception around you that you become aware of. When you are actually talking to another person, it’s probably easiest to either use your breath or your inner body.

Practice this beforehand, when conditions are easier, so that you can do it once it’s necessary. Go into your inner body, feel that your energy field is alive. And you’ll notice, you’re not thinking anymore. You can still listen. The amazing thing is that you can listen to another person, without thinking, easily, beautifully. You are listening, but part of your attention is on your energy field — so you’ve taken attention away from your thoughts.

There is a sense of aliveness in the background. It’s ultimately formless; it’s already the doorway into the formless. Feel that while you sit there and listen, and you’ve stepped out of the stream of thinking. Then, the quality of the interaction immediately changes. The other person may not consciously notice what’s happening, and may carry on for a while.

It also does not mean that you cannot respond anymore. But how you respond and the quality of your response changes, too. You are no longer contributing to the negative nature, which is often the case, in conversations. A certain amount of stillness, then, will also be a part of the words that you speak. It’s so subtle that the other person probably will not notice it, consciously.

So hang on to the inner body, let it be the anchor, and then you become present. If you lose it again, if the other person says something challenging, then after a little while you remember — and you go back into the inner body. That’s a powerful anchor, and then everything changes from there. It takes continuous practice.

~ by Eckhart Tolle

When the ego is at war, know that it is no more than an illusion that is fighting to survive. That illusion thinks it is you. It is not easy at first to be there as the witnessing Presence, especially when the ego is in survival mode or some emotional pattern from the past has become activated, but once you have had a taste of it, you will grow in Presence power, and the ego will lose its grip on you.

And so a power comes into your life that is far greater than the ego, greater than the mind. All that is required to become free of the ego is to be aware of it, since awareness and ego are incompatible.

Awareness is the power that is concealed within the present moment. This is why we may also call it Presence. The ultimate purpose of human existence, which is to say, your purpose is to bring that power into this world. And this is also why becoming free of the ego cannot be made into a goal to be attained at some point in the future. Only Presence can free you of the ego, and you can only be present Now, not yesterday or tomorrow. only Presence can undo the past in you and thus transform your state of consciousness.

What is spiritual realization? The belief that you are spirit? No, that’s a thought. A little closer to the truth than the thought that believes you are who your birth certificate says you are, but still a thought. Spiritual realization is to see clearly that what I perceive, experience, think, or feel is ultimately not who I am, that I cannot find myself in all those things that continuously pass away.

The Buddha was probably the first human being to see this clearly, and so anata (no self) became one of the central points of his teaching. And when Jesus said, “Deny thyself,” what he meant was : Negate (and thus undo) the illusion of self. If the self – ego – were truly who I am, it would be absurd to “deny” it.

What remains is the light of consciousness in which perceptions, experiences, thoughts, and feelings come and go. That is Being, that is the deeper, true I. When I know myself as that, whatever happens in my life is no longer of absolute but only of relative importance. I honor it, but it loses its absolute seriousness, its heaviness.

The only thing that ultimately matters is this: Can I sense my essential Beingness, the I Am, in the background of my life at all times? To be more accurate, can I sense the I Am that I Am at this moment? Can I sense my essential identity as consciousness itself? Or am I losing myself in what happens, losing myself in the mind, in the world?

~ by Eckhart Tolle

“You are the light of the world. You are the consciousness that illuminates the world. Know yourself as that, and that’s freedom, liberation, awakening, the end of suffering and madness. And it’s happening right here.”

~ Eckhart Tolle