“Things arise and she lets them come; things disappear and she lets them go” Tao Te Ching. Take the analogy of a room: a room is made up of walls, but it’s the inner space that we use. Where people and things come and go, events occur and end, etc. “We hammer wood for a house, but it is the inner space that makes it livable. We work with being, but non-being is what we use. " Tao Te Ching. Here’s another signpost: Who is aware or knows of the forms that arise and disappear in your space of consciousness? Who’s looking or aware of the thoughts, emotions, reactions and sensations in your body? Who experiences the environment you are in through sense perceptions? It’s the ever-present ‘I Am’ or “knowing” or experiencer, without which there will be no experience.

No form or experience or event or condition lasts. Buddha made it a central part of his teaching. He called it anicca; state of impermanence. Only the background, the ever-present awareness that is aware of the fleetingness of all forms, doesn’t go through any change. You are that eternal awareness. Once you truly see the transitory and unstable nature of all forms, relationships, events and experiences, you will not give them importance and significance that they don’t have. Or put impossible demands on them to fulfill you, make you happy, feel safe or tell you who you are. World of forms, the drama or the play, cannot give you those things. Suffering arises when you seek long lasting happiness, contentment and yourself in the world and mind.

“World is not there to make you happy but to make you conscious. " Eckhart Tolle. Do you think more stuff, content, knowledge or better thinking is going to save the world and liberate you from suffering and dream of form? Isn’t wisdom that humanity needs the most right now? Wisdom is not a product of thought but arises from the formless dimension within. You will only lose yourself in content, world, endless doing and thinking (or analysis). So doesn’t matter how sharp we think, how cultivated our minds are, how much knowledge we have, its ultimately going to be limited.

The Still depth that holds the infinite number of planets, stars, galaxies, etc. is also in you. As you are not some meaningless fragment in an alien, uncaring universe, briefly suspended between birth and death then ultimate annihilation[6] X Research source Tolle, Eckhart. The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment. Vancouver, BC: Namaste Publishing, 1999. Page 104 . Underneath your name and form, you are one with the infinity of God or ‘One Consciousness’ or Being. To get a glimpse of the ‘space of awareness’ or stillness within yourself, become aware of awareness and/or feel the inner body. Read Inhabit Your Inner Body More Deeply for a deeper insight on this. “There was something formless and perfect before the universe was born. It is serene, empty, solitary, unchanging, infinite, eternally present. . . It is the mother of the universe. " Tao Te Ching.

Consider the miracle of birth; it’s the consciousness or the life that first appears in the womb and then human form begins to develop. Your form grows stronger with time and as it grows old, it becomes weak, frail, dies, turns to dust, and then nothing at all. You go back to where you came from, just a few years ago. Does it seem similar to universe and the objects in it? Can you also see the same pattern in breathing? Inhaling (expansion) and exhaling (contraction). All “things” and phenomena intrinsically follow the same pattern, expansion (growth) and contraction (decay), because they are bound to the law of impermanence. [8] X Research source Tolle, Eckhart. The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment. Vancouver, BC: Namaste Publishing, 1999. Page 86 . So why seek yourself in mind and transient forms, and give them importance or significance that they don’t have?

It’s the illusion created by limited view of our sense perceptions and thinking that makes the things and events seem rigid, serious and separate. [11] X Research source Power of Now, Eckhart Tolle, Pg 79 . With fear and desire being inevitable consequences of this ethereal illusion. Space consciousness. Most people pay attention to the forms and objects in the space, but who pays attention to the space itself? The infinite and eternal Emptiness that is the essence of all there is and the life that enables all forms to be. [12] X Research source Tolle, Eckhart. The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment. Vancouver, BC: Namaste Publishing, 1999. Page 67 Perhaps space is not interesting and the mind, which only knows of content, the known, looks for interesting ’things’. Even when it looks for space, it makes the endless nothingness into an object. Analogy: if everything around you was green, then there would be no green. There needs to be another color so that ‘green’ can stand out. Similarly, if there were no objects in space then there would be no space. It would be emptiness or nothingness. There need to be at least two reference points in space to measure distance, so an object can stand out. [13] X Research source Power of Now, Eckhart Tolle, Pg 136 . Hence, there must be something ‘unfleeting’ or unchanging in order to recognize the fleetingness of all forms. Otherwise it would not be[14] X Research source Stillness Speaks, Eckhart Tolle, Pg 34 . “Yet mystery and manifestations arise from the same source. This source is called darkness. Darkness within darkness. The gateway to all understanding. ” Tao Te Ching.

Realizing yourself as the formless awareness behind the content of your mind and abiding in that state is ‘dying before you die’ or death is ’end of suffering’ or enlightenment. It’s because awareness is timeless and unchanging. Your essential nature. So even if all forms around you (including your body, relationships, things you have etc. ) grow weak or change or disappear, your conscious presence remains unchanged. Once you see this truth, you realize that there is no death, but just a form dissolving. Why do people who have been through near-death experience lose the fear of death? It’s the journey home. Meditate upon this. “There’s something in you that remains unchanging despite the transient circumstances in your life. That’s the life that you are. " Eckhart Tolle. “The Master gives himself up to whatever the moment brings. He knows that he is going to die, and he has nothing left to hold on to: no illusions in his mind, no resistances in his body. " Tao Te Ching. Your body and forms (psychological, personality, relationships and objects) that you identify with, can dissolve at any time. This is a deep and humbling realization that leaves little room for the ego. [17] X Research source Stillness Speaks, Eckhart Tolle, Pg 112 . Death will be painful as long as you cling to the illusion. That is to say, as long as you identify with forms and seek yourself in them. This doesn’t mean to not have things, look for relationships, enjoy experiences and pleasures of this world etc. We need to honor the world of forms and not despise it. Realizing at the same time that no possession, things, pleasure, relationship or experience of this world can give you long lasting fulfilment. Relinquishing identification with forms means to deeply realize that seeking fulfilment, happiness and yourself in the mind and world of forms lies at the root of suffering. Also, seeking is the antithesis of happiness.

The inner equivalent of external noise and pollution is the incessant, compulsive and often negative activity of thoughts, reactions and emotions in you. Once you see this with clarity, you start taking responsibility of your inner self. That is to say, you don’t pollute your inner space with negativity. That’s when external reality naturally transforms without any doing on your part because world is just a reflection. This is the miracle of |surrender. Eckhart Tolle — “If you get the inside right, the outside will fall into place. Primary reality is within; secondary reality without. "

Can you feel the inner energy field or alive ‘spaciousness’ of your body? Energy field of your hands, legs, hips, pelvis region, abdomen, shoulders, neck, face, head and so on. That’s the formless life you are that runs your incredibly complex body and sustains it. Can you be aware of awareness that enables the content in the foreground to be? Can you be aware of the silence or stillness underneath that enables the sounds to be? These questions and practices help create a gap between incessant thinking, thus making way for sacred and formless presence to shine through. When you are in touch with inner space, that is essentially you, you are connected with something so vast, joyous, immeasurable and sacred that world, mind and events become insignificant in comparison to it. [18] X Research source A New Earth, Eckhart Tolle, Pg 22 . A playfulness arises. And it’s not a selfish but selfless state. “If you don’t realize the source, you stumble in confusion and sorrow. When you realize where you come from, you naturally become tolerant, disinterested, amused, kindhearted as a grandmother, dignified as a king. " Tao Te Ching. So be aware of the inner space as much as you can. In other words, be aware of your inner body and awareness. It is highly recommended that you read Stay Rooted in Being for more depth on this.

To know who you are in essence, Ego needs to be dissolved i. e. you need to dis-identify from your mind. Which is not a doing but an alert seeing. As seeing is freeing yourself from the dysfunction of mind. Its because seeing is a new dimension of consciousness that is not part of thinking. It is highly recommended that you read Dissolve the Ego (According to Eckhart Tolle’s Teachings) for more depth. “When you recognize illusion as illusion, it dissolves” Eckhart Tolle.

Try this: recall something that you did or experienced in reality. Now recall something you did or experienced in a dream. When you recalled both of the scenarios, did you notice any difference in the way the images or sounds from the memory appeared? Most probably not. Contextually they were both the same. Some images and sounds, which are thoughts[22] X Research source A New Earth, Eckhart Tolle, Pg 292 [23] X Research source A New Earth, Eckhart Tolle, Pg 113 . Were they ever real? Similarly, for a dying person, their whole life seems as if it was a dream. Just like images and objects in a dream disappear, similarly in reality, objects, people and experiences disappear as if they had never been. All you had was a vague memory of them. And even memory, which arises as a thought form, fades and disappears. Again, suffering arises when you seek yourself or long-lasting fulfillment in fleeting things, thoughts, relationships and circumstances, which they can’t provide. If you didn’t realize this, you will be condemned to chase after transient things, sensory or sexual pleasures, relationships, and experiences, one after another, with an unconscious expectation that they will provide you long lasting fulfilment. Have you noticed that normal ups and downs in a dream do not affect you that much and keep you asleep? However, it’s the nightmare that has the potential to wake you up. Similarly in ‘reality’, it’s the normal ups and downs that keep you in the grip of ego (dream of form) but when you face a limit situation or deep loss such as disability, death of a loved one or your own impending death, major illness, failure or rejection, meaninglessness etc. and the world doesn’t make sense anymore, you go through a living nightmare. That’s when one has a stronger motivation to wake up or get out of it[24] X Research source Tolle, Eckhart. The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment. Vancouver, BC: Namaste Publishing, 1999. Page 218,225 . That’s why suffering has a noble purpose, as it has potential to crack open the shell of the ego by forcing you to surrender and wake up from the ‘dream of matter’ i. e dream of mind. This is also part of the reason why most enlightened people on our planet once had a heavy pain body. Space of awareness. What you are experiencing right now through sense perceptions is the projection of the subjective external world, dance of atoms and molecules, in your space of consciousness. [25] X Research source A New Earth, Eckhart Tolle, Pg 292 . It’s an illusion that what you are experiencing is ‘outside’ or separate from you. Doesn’t make sense? While you are dreaming your mind populates the ‘space of consciousness’, the substratum, with content, smell, touch, sounds, people, environment, etc. Like a screen that gets populated by a projector. This projection is a reflection of your inner state. Similarly, ‘in reality’, it’s the projection of the subjective external world through limited view of sense perceptions that populates your space of consciousness. In unenlightened state, you see and act on the reality through conditioned mind, voice of the past, which has a compulsive need to react, conceptualize, fragment, resist, analyze and label ‘what is’. Plus, content is all you know as formless dimension becomes completely obscured. There’s a unity between the observer (you) and the observed (world)[26] X Research source Tolle, Eckhart. The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment. Vancouver, BC: Namaste Publishing, 1999. Page 166 . Your ‘state of consciousness’ determines how you perceive and act on the world, and what kind of situations, things and people you attract. For example: If you believe that the world is a cold-hearted place, then that belief or paradigm, based on mental conditioning, will be reflected all around you and you will attract more situations and people like that. In addition, you will have a very selective perception i. e you will see only those parts, events and people that will confirm your belief. Like when you see through a green lens, things around seem green.

How can you realize the totality then? Or how to see things holistically? By stepping out of your mind. That is to say, by perceiving through inner space or knowing or awareness, without any mental interpretation. Read Inhabit Your Inner Body More Deeply for more. This is the feeling of inner space that Einstein pointed to when he said “The scientist’s religious ‘feeling’ takes the form of a rapturous amazement at the harmony of natural laws, which reveals an intelligence of such superiority that in comparison with it all systematic thinking of human being is an utterly insignificant reflection. This feeling is the guiding principle of my work”. When the world is not perceived through inner space, it is seen as a threatening place. People in particular.

Research has proven that 2-to-3-year old children can identify the time as ’now’ or ’not now’ [29] X Research source but as they grow up in this ego-driven world, they start getting lost in the psychological time i. e useless, negative, worrysome, repetitive and compulsive thoughts about past and future. Thus get farther from their true self that is always here and Now. Have you heard people or yourself say something like “the day I achieve that I will be at peace and my future will be secure”? That day usually never comes. It’s a mind-made delusion which says happiness and/or peace lie in the future, but of course, future comes as present moment and whatever happened in the past, happened in the present moment. [30] X Research source Tolle, Eckhart. “A new Earth. “Vancouver,BC:Penguin, 2005. Page 45,124 Consider this, even if you are thinking about past or future, they are no more than thoughts that you are thinking in the Now. “Time isn’t precious at all, because it is an illusion. What you perceive as precious is not time but the one point that is out of time: the Now. That is precious indeed. The more you are focused on time—past and future—the more you miss the Now, the most precious thing there is. ” Eckhart Tolle. Even if you achieved what you intended to, it will not give you a long-lasting fulfillment, and there will still be a void because dissatisfaction, desire, resistance etc. are in the very structure of ego. “Ego wants to want more than it wants to have. " Eckhart Tolle. So no possessions, achievements, pleasures, experiences or relationship can satisfy it, except temporarily. We spoke about this earlier. Then you would be really in trouble as you won’t be able to delude yourself that achieving goals, pleasures, relationships, possessions and so on will fulfill you. Even if you could, it will become harder and harder. [31] X Research source Tolle, Eckhart. The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment. Vancouver, BC: Namaste Publishing, 1999. Page 46 “I have seen everything that is done under the sun, and behold, all is vanity and a striving after wind. " ‎Ecclesiastes 1:14. However, even feeling frustration after repetitive cycles of achievement and failure, pain and pleasure, high and low etc. is part of divine game, the leela. As it has the potential to force you to surrender and realize that no experience, relationship, pleasure or possession can satisfy you, except temporarily. So you don’t blindly chase after them with an unconscious expectation that they will fulfill you or relieve you of the background unease, that is part of human condition. “If you want to get rid of something, allow it to flourish. " Tao Te Ching

“Enter the Now, from there” Eckhart Tolle. That’s why it is said that you cannot make spiritual awakening or ’end of suffering’ into a future goal or all you will get is further suffering and frustration. As it will always seem that you never get there. This truth is realized first hand or not at all. No one can realize it for you.

Meditate upon this by closing your eyes. Can you feel that your body is alive and spacious? Can you observe that fleeting events, world, people, sense perceptions, physical sensations, thoughts and emotions are no more than the dance of energy arising and disappearing in your space of consciousness?[33] X Research source Stillness Speaks, Eckhart Tolle, Pg 109 Just like infinite number of fleeting planets, stars, galaxies etc. arising, floating and disappearing into the vast emptiness of space. Can you realize that body is an incredible misperception of your true reality[34] X Research source Tolle, Eckhart. “A new Earth. “Vancouver,BC:Penguin, 2005. Page 241,276 and all that there is is vibrantly alive and peaceful space?

We are talking about a quantum leap of consciousness; from thinking to awareness. [35] X Research source Tolle, Eckhart. “A new Earth. “Vancouver,BC:Penguin, 2005. Page 100 As once you truly see the madness and suffering nature of human mind and surrender to what is, then a higher intelligence emerges through you. Far more intelligent than the human mind. Along the intelligence comes joy and peace of One consciousness. Jesus’s saying “And the peace of God that bypasses all understanding will guard your hearts and minds. " points to this truth. However, you will not surrender or accept unless you truly had enough of suffering and/or see the dysfunctional nature of mind and/or realize that you are not your mind and/or have complete faith in the Life within and/or realize that world is not here to provide you long lasting happiness. Voluntary surrender or conscious choice to step out of the egoic mind is like a shortcut that saves time, as you wouldn’t have to go through the phase of pain and suffering, to become conscious[36] X Research source A New Earth, Eckhart Tolle, Pg 164 . Which is also called as ‘way of the cross’ in Christianity. However, do not doubt its efficacy; it still works. [37] X Research source Tolle, Eckhart. The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment. Vancouver, BC: Namaste Publishing, 1999. Page 105 . Suffering is necessary until you realize that it is not necessary. Spiritual dimension has traditionally arisen in one’s life not when something was added to them but when something was taken away in form of deep loss (like loss of job, status, skill, ability, assets, looks, relationship etc. ), suffering, old age, rejection, accident, death, failure, illness, etc. However, there’s growing number of people today who no longer need pain and suffering to awaken, as they are embracing the new state of consciousness, Being, voluntarily.

How to reconnect with your true self? By realizing your essence, disguised as a person. You don’t have to look outside but look within. This is how close you are to the infinite and eternal presence of God or One Consciousness. And now is the only point of access to it. You access it now, or not at all. Read Dissolve the Ego (According to Eckhart Tolle’s Teachings) for more depth. It is only at this point can you feel true oneness and make a real contribution to the world at the level of cause. It’s because only those who have transcended the world can bring about a better world. [39] X Research source Tolle, Eckhart. The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment. Vancouver, BC: Namaste Publishing, 1999. Page 134 “For the creation (universe) waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. " Romans 8:19. What does ‘children of God to be revealed’ mean? Consciousness becoming conscious of itself. That is to say, you becoming aware of your own essence or holiness or divinity. Whatever you want to call it, it still cannot be named and is infinitely more than these words (content), which are only pointers. Tao Te Ching pointed to the same truth “The Tao (consciousness) that can be told is not the eternal Tao. The name that can be named is not the eternal name. The unnameable is eternally real. Naming is the origin of all particular things”. Once you realize your primary purpose, external purpose becomes just a game that you may continue to play and honor because you enjoy it. That is to say, you no longer have the delusional expectation that achieving goals, success, acquiring possessions, experiences, pleasures, relationships etc. will provide you long lasting fulfillment or make you feel complete.

You can talk about these pointers, teach others, write about being spiritual, believe in them or not etc. , it would make no difference in your life unless you ’live’ as the reality of formless and timeless consciousness that you are in essence. Discovering and abiding in the state of Being is your primary purpose. As the spiritual dimension is meant to be lived. Missing this purpose of human existence is sin. Which is the original meaning of the word sin i. e to miss the mark. {“smallUrl”:“https://www. wikihow. com/images/thumb/d/df/Know-Your-True-Self-Step-10. jpg/v4-460px-Know-Your-True-Self-Step-10. jpg”,“bigUrl”:”/images/thumb/d/df/Know-Your-True-Self-Step-10. jpg/aid5213818-v4-728px-Know-Your-True-Self-Step-10. jpg”,“smallWidth”:460,“smallHeight”:345,“bigWidth”:728,“bigHeight”:546,“licensing”:"<div class="mw-parser-output">

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