What is God? | Eckhart Tolle Explains

Okay, now tell me the ultimate secret of God in the transcendent universe. You can't, it's absurd. I am is the word. All you can say is I am, but you don't add anything. Not this or that I am. In the Old Testament, God is asked, who are you? And that's perhaps the most profound sentence in the Old Testament is I am. That I am. Where God defines him, her itself as the I am, as the essence, identity of all forms. And also another beautiful sentence in the Old Testament. As you know, the Old Testament is a mixed. The New Testament, the Bible is a mixed bag of fantastic things and other things. But I like to look for the jewels that are there. Another beautiful statement that points to all this is be still and know that I am God. Be still and know that I am God. Now these words are all synonymous. Be refers to being. Still is a state of consciousness without thought, stillness. Being and stillness the same thing. And know. There is a deep knowing in that. In fact that is because that is the source of all intelligence. There is a deep knowing. But from the point of view of the conceptual mind, it looks like unknowing, it looks like ignorance because it's not knowing through concepts anymore. There's a deeper knowing. And this is where what we call wisdom arises, which is very different from intelligence. The IQ kind of intelligence, the wisdom that the world needs, not more intelligence, please, no, but, but wisdom, yes. Be still and know that I am. It is the I am, the I am of being God. Here we come to a difficult word, but they are all synonymous. What is God then? I rarely talk about God because you can't really. It's so transcendent that whatever you say would be very limited. As you know, human language and human thought is relatively limited. How can I make statements about the ultimate transcendent reality just by producing a few weird sounds with my vocal cords plus air pressure through my tongue and lips. Oh, the vowels. A, I, A, E, I, O, U, E, U, R. This is what language is. Okay, now tell me the ultimate secrets of God in the transcendent universe. You can't. It's absurd. Just produce a few sounds and that explains. No. However, I'll carry on talking. All we can do is give an analogy or like a poetic image of what God might be and how God relates to who you are. And that image is. Is that I prefer is the image of our. We can only use images from our sense perceived universe. The sun is a life giving thing. In our universe. The sun gives of itself ceaselessly for millions and millions of years, One could almost say eternally. It's not eternal, but as far as we are concerned, it's eternal. Without the sun, there would be no life nor physical life here. So the sun gives of itself. It emanates continuously. The very heat in your body ultimately comes from the sun. So the sun, if you use the sun as an analogy for the transcendent, the transcendent God. God has no location in space or time. God is neither there. Or if we have to say anything, we could say God is right here. Because it's transcendent to this dimension. So if we use this as analogy, the transcendent emanates into this dimension something that creates form, that creates life. And what it ultimately this thing that it emanates is consciousness. At first, very little at first, consciousness appears as if were frozen as minerals and stones. And then consciousness becomes as if it were liquid. If we use analogy of water, then it becomes vegetative. Life and consciousness gradually evolves. So one consciousness, more of it comes in. And then you get animal life, and then you get human life. It becomes ethereal. It is a human mind so emanating from the source of all life that is transcendent, of which you cannot say anything into this world. As the sun emanates light, the God emanates consciousness. And this brings about this universe. And in this universe, it's a process. It grows in the transcendent. We don't know anything about that. So the important thing is the ray of sunlight that you come, that hits your hand, you feel the warmth on your hand, that ray, it's not the sun. You couldn't say, I have the sun on my hand. I mean, if you got close to the sun, you would immediately disappear. But this ray of sunlight is still connected to the sun in some way. It is still part of the sun. We can't even say where the sun exactly ends. It doesn't really end anywhere. It doesn't have a clearly defined surface. It extends outward. So it emanates continuously. So what the source of all life emanates is consciousness. And you can sense that in yourself. When you can sense yourself as consciousness, the presence, then you realize this. The ripple on the surface of the ocean has realized that it is not only a ripple. I'm mixing analogies now. It's not only a ripple. More fundamentally, the ripple is the ocean. And suddenly the ripple is no longer fearful because it can sense its deep connectedness to that which is vast and all encompassing. And so the ripple suddenly lives in a Different way because it realizes its own timeless essence. Or the ray of sunlight could do the same. It could suddenly become aware that it is still connected and part of the sun. And you can sense in yourself the undoubted fact that you are conscious. But not only that, but we are creating a duality here that doesn't exist when we say that you are conscious. The essence of who you are is consciousness. So you are consciousness, and this consciousness is the brain. Yes. Mainstream science, most of it, will still tell you that consciousness is a byproduct of the physical brain. But mostly scientists avoid talking about consciousness because they don't know what to do with it. It does not make much sense in their universe. They say, well, it's a byproduct of the chemical activity in the brain. Okay, well, what does that mean, a more sensible thing? That some scientists are beginning to already embrace the possibility. They're mostly scientists who are close to retirement, so they have nothing to lose anymore. They, they are beginning to embrace the possibility that consciousness, that the brain, which undoubtedly is linked to consciousness, acts more like a receiver and a transmitter of consciousness than a generator of consciousness. So the brain is like a radio. The radio does not produce the music. The radio just transmits and then gives it form. And that could be, and I believe that is the relationship between the human brain and universal consciousness, which is. Is one. So there's not your consciousness and my consciousness. There's only one consciousness. And that one consciousness manifests as this flower too. And it manifests beautifully. It manifests as any life form. It even manifests as so called inanimate matter. It's just a totally different frequency. So the entire universe is really consists of one substance which is not a substance. It's one. The multitude, the manifold manifestations of life in this universe are all manifestations of the one and this one, the one that you can find. This is in the past. Only rare mystics have talked about it or realized it. But now it becomes more accessible. This is why here we are talking about it and not just talking about it. This one, which is the essence of, not just of who you are. The weird thing is the essence of who you are is one with the essence of the entire universe. So when you realize this essence, essence of yourself as consciousness, when the ripple realizes that it is also, and more fundamentally the ocean, then it's not only a realization of the ripple, it's a realization of the ocean too, through the ripple. So the consciousness that underlies this universe, which emanates from the one, is awakening through you. It's awakening. It wants to awaken. One cannot say much more about it because there's a limit to what one can say. But the most important thing is the realization within yourself of you are consciousness. And you need to be able to realize it is not that difficult to, as much as you can, step out of the stream of thinking so that you are not, throughout the day, that you are not trapped in this continuous torrent, this current that drags you along, one thought after another, and another and another. Invite gaps into your life in the stream of thinking. For example, by conscious perception, for example, if you wanted to do it now, bring a gap into the stream of thinking. I would say become aware of your sense perceptions. Look, listen, be alert. Look and listen. Be the alertness for the perception. No need to label what you are perceiving. Just look. Look at a flower, at a tree, at the sky. Look. And don't label it through concepts. And that's a wonderful way of inviting presence into your life. And then there's, in the background, there's a large stillness. And then in the foreground, the sense perceptions. That alert stillness is the essence of who you are, but it's also the essence of the universe. And that is wonderful, very simple spiritual practice as much as possible, especially when you're waiting somewhere, just for a moment. Conscious perception, no labeling it.