On Being
The Power of Now, by Eckhart Tolle, first homily.
This is not a book report.
I am currently reading a small, but important work by Eckhart Tolle called “The Power of Now”. It is not a religious book. It is not a pop-psychology book. It is a spiritual book.
Religion and psychology are symptoms. The spiritual looks behind the results to what is core and eternal.
I would normally read through an entire work before writing anything; before commenting. But, in this case I find the message too powerful to wait on. I fear time is not my ally. My big, thinking brain will numb to the learning and override the import through aggregation, comparison and summarization if I don’t act now.
‘Now’ is an important concept, you see.
Instead I am going to take the time and look at it in pieces. I am going to scrape the resin from the fresh good wounds on my soul and chew it a bit. This may end up being a bit like a serial, or a critical piece in the true sense of criticism, not the negative sense it has today.
Let us both, you and I, see what comes from this conversation.
This will allow me to the space to treat the whole work as the moving meditation that it is. I think it is a fitting approach to this work. I think it honors this work.
The work itself is laid out in a conversation. Like classic spiritual teachings. This style goes back to Plato’s dialogues with Socrates, Buddha and Jesus. A series of questions that the author, or teacher proposes and then explores.
It is one of those of those spiritual works of inner observation that has a hard time getting published, but somehow finds its way into the world with its message anyhow. Editors and agents can’t’ get their heads around it. But, like Walden or Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, they find their way into the light and change the way we think.
I would categorize, if forced to do so, this book as ‘enlightening’. It is enlightening because it illuminates the inner workings of our ‘being’. Words are hard to choose because the stuff being described is beyond, or behind the working mind. It is the stuff of essence and soul. Stuff that words are blunted tools of discovery.
But, I will do my best, with my blunted tools and my unskilled paws, because that is what I have to work with; now.
I would caution that the enlightenment effect of this work is going to be measured by our ability and experience. For those who have studied or considered these concepts it will resonate. For those without the experience or inclination it will just be a thick slice of mumbo jumbo.
When the student is ready, the teacher appears.
Enough preamble; let’s get into it.
The stage is set by the teacher letting us know that he is not going to teach us anything. He is going to reveal that which is already within us.
What is that core thing that is within us? He labels it ‘Being’. Being is our true self and is part of a broader pool of being that all people and all things share.
He says that you could refer to it as ‘god’, but he makes the case that the word ‘god’ has been used to mean so many different things that it is no longer usable. It just has too much baggage.
You can’t ‘find’ or ‘acquire’ Being. You can only get glimpses of Being by stripping away the things that block you from it. Only when you can shake off the thinking mind, with its false constructs of future, past, fear and ego can you be in the ‘now’ and then you may get a glimpse of the essential Being.
The first and primary thing that prevents us from Being is thinking. “Thinking has become a disease.”
This is where he hooked me. Up to that point it was standard spiritualism. Even the concept of quieting the mind to find the inner peace is no big revelation. But tying that together with the way thinking creates emotion and ego and the pain and fear whirlwind – this was all very practical and fits with my experience.
Thinking is not only a constant state for me, it is closely tied to my ego. I’m sure you have had this same experience if you have ever tried to practice meditation. You sit and try to find the quiet place, but you are unable to silence your mind. You focus on your breathing or your mantra, but your mind, your thoughts race around inside your head like panicked cockroaches.
And what are these thought of? Sometimes they are benign, like “hey, blueberry scones are pretty tasty…” but, often they find their way into the future or the past. They start to be the things you have to do. They start to turn into worries and regrets.
These thoughts then find their way to some event in the past that makes you ashamed or some event in the future that makes you afraid. The thoughts, the thinking fuel emotions. The emotions fuel the fear and anger and sadness.
You think, “What the hell? I sat down to meditate and now I’m a basket case of anxiety about the future and sadness about the past!”
We are so good, so trained, at thinking it prevents us from discovering our true selves. All this thinking is exhausting. There is an underlying ego-belief that you are smart and you can think your way to happiness or awareness. That just fuels the endless loop. You think in circles, flaming emotions and never get anywhere.
Eckhart tells us that we may think we are using our minds, but if we can’t find the ‘off’ switch then our minds are using us.
How do you stop thinking? 900 words into this piece and I will now tell you something useful! You begin to let go of your thinking and the emotions it causes by becoming the observer. You simply begin observing the thinker.
You watch the thoughts impartially as the drift into the past and remind you of an event that you regret and make you feel ashamed. You watch the thinker as it compares you to a more successful person and creates regret. You watch the thinker as it reads the news and becomes angry.
Because that thinker is not you. You are watching the thinker. And when you become aware of the thinker, the thoughts and the patterns they start to lose their momentum. The wheel doesn’t automatically spin through the old patterns, the broken records. The emotions become less intense and damaging. They are emotions of the thinker, not of you.
By observing the thinker, you find quiet. In this quiet you may get a glimpse of something bigger. Something universal.
I’m going to leave it there for this episode, this session, this homily.
Take this simple practice into your life. Just observe the thinker. I have been doing this all week and have found it powerful and refreshing in practical situations. For example, not being able to sleep because of anxiety over things in the future or past and watching the thinker stir up the emotion. Or, sitting in a conference room with customers and feeling the ego need to control the situation and instead returning to the now to be empathetic and speak openly and honestly.
Homily and homework my friends.