Access the Spiritual Dimension within You | A Meditation with Eckhart Tolle on Stillness

Well, I think an empty chair works just as well as me sitting in it. Because our meditation is about accessing the spiritual dimension within you, which the Buddha called emptiness. Not the best translation perhaps, of the original term. I think spaciousness would have been better translation or would be a better translation then emptiness. So finding that dimension within you, accessing that dimension and living your life with the awareness of that dimension, which means living your life with awareness rather than just with the mind. So usually people think that when somebody believes in God or angels or the afterlife that they are spiritual, it makes them spiritual, but that's not necessarily the case. And there are millions of people in this world who believe in God and have no access, have not found within themselves access to the spiritual dimension. So we are here, in the case of some of you who are perhaps new to this, so to speak, we are here for some of you to get perhaps a glimpse of it as you sit here and watch and listen. And I will endeavor to put you in touch with that depth within you without which your life is frustrating and without which everything you undertake, every endeavor and every activity, ultimately becomes frustrating. And for others, we are here just to deepen it, to provide a reminder on a conceptual level, but to deepen the dimension that they already have access to within so that it can be sustained in everyday life. One thing is accessing the spiritual dimension in a meditation setting like here and now, that's already a good thing. If you are able to do that when you sit still, become still inside. Another thing is to carry that with you, so to speak, so that it is there when you lead your life, when you do things, talk to people, interact even when you think, to have that in the background. So we have the two steps. One could almost say, first is you realize that within, when you're not being disturbed, like now, hopefully you're not being disturbed externally, although you may be disturbed as you sit here by your mind. That's quite possible. We. What is he talking about? Because the mind doesn't understand it. The conceptual mind alone is not sufficient to make this a satisfying experience for you, this 30, 40 minutes here. So for this to be a satisfying experience, you need to have at least a glimpse of what it is that I am pointing to. And a glimpse also of that which underlies the words. And that's ultimately not in me, but ultimately you can only glimpse that in you. There's a stillness behind the words as I speak, within myself. And there can be a stillness in you as you listen to the words. And that would already be a glimpse of the spiritual dimension. The realization that on the one hand, on one level, you have the auditory perception, you're listening to the words, you have the visual perception, you're seeing this image. And on another level, you also notice that there is some stillness inside you now where the mind is not active. You don't need to think right now to add something to this experience, so you can just let it be as it is. And so the dimension of stillness, which is the spiritual dimension, begins to arise in you. Or other way we can put it, you become aware that it's there now, it's always there. That's the strange thing, it's always there, all pervasive. And yet most people still don't know that. Of course, that's very much like telling a fish that there's something that's called water. And the fish says, well, I can't, I don't see anything called water. Where is that? Where is it? Can you point it out to me and say where? Can't see it? So this is my task, is to point out the water that you are swimming in and the water inside you. And that's the end of that analogy. As I pointed out at the beginning, the Buddha called the spiritual dimension emptiness, which would be better translated as spaciousness. And Jesus calls it the kingdom of heaven, which translated into modern terminology if you change the word kingdom, which is an old fashioned concept, to a dimension, which is a more modern concept, the dimension of heaven. And you can even translate heaven into a more modern concept to make it work for you as a pointer. So what is heaven in some words? Heaven and sky are the same word in some languages. What is the sky or the heaven is spaciousness. The dimension of spaciousness is the kingdom of heaven. So the Buddha calls it that, Jesus calls it that, and Time magazine calls it mumbo jumbo. That's also true from the perspective of the conceptual, conceptualizing mind. Because if you are totally trapped in concepts, thoughts, then it makes no sense. And the only thing you can conceive of as spiritual is some belief system. You say, oh, these people have belief systems, these are spiritual. People have all kinds of weird beliefs. And it's not that at all. So it's already there, it's already present within you. The strange thing is it's continuously overlooked because your attention is drawn into sensory perceptions. Experiencing with your senses, reaching out with your senses, listening, touching, smelling, seeing, everything demands your attention. And then your attention is drawn to even more strongly the interpretations of your mind. In other words, thought activity which actually can make you forget a large part of sensual perception. In modern humans, contemporary humans, there's more thought activity in them than sensory perceptions. So you're being drawn into, yes, sensory perception, even more so into mind activity and then also drawn into emotions that accompany mind activity. So you, you know, life consists, one could say basically of the three sense perceptions, thoughts and emotions. So. And what's overlooked is the deeper dimension within which all these, the three others exist. That's the spaciousness within you. It's always there. It's just a question of redirecting your attention to it. But that's not absolutely right to say that. But unfortunately language works like that. As you sit here, let's just go through it again. You're aware of sense perceptions, especially visual and auditory. Yes. There may be some thoughts arising in your mind. Now whatever thoughts arise in your mind here and now obviously are quite irrelevant, but that's another matter. There may be thoughts arising in your mind from time to time. So you're listening and you're thinking, what's he driving at? When are we going to start our meditation, etc. Mumbo jumbo thoughts come and go and you may have emotions, restlessness perhaps, or a thought about tomorrow, what's going to happen when I go there tomorrow? And you have an emotion associated with that. So as we sit here, notice there are these levels operating in you. And then you could ask yourself, who or what is it that notices these things? Who or what is it in me that notices that there is sense perceptions? What is it in me that is aware of sense perceptions, aware that they are thoughts, aware that there is an emotion and that's who you are at the level of the deeper level of the transcendent or the spiritual dimension, the awareness of all this, the still spacious consciousness in the background, so to speak, you could call it, just to briefly use an analogy, you're aware of the canvas on which your life is drawn, painted. An ancient question in spirituality is the question who am I? And if you look closely, you see that you are not your thoughts, you are not your sense perceptions, you are not your emotions. The gay come and go. What remains is consciousness awareness. That's the water that the fish didn't know about as far as you are concerned. And it's amazing, amazing thing that. Realize that there is a greater depth in you than your surface life that consists of tens, perceptions, thoughts and emotions in different. They come together in different forms. So every human has a somewhat different story of coming together of sense perceptions, thoughts and emotions. The Coming together of sense perceptions, thoughts and emotions form the human being, the person. And they come together in each person in a slightly or very different way. So it's a coming together of this that creates the temporary form that we call the person, but that can only exist in the light of consciousness. Without that, there's nobody, nothing there. So your life is a little bit like this. You're watching the screen. Let's say another analogy, a cinema screen. All kinds of things happen there. Of course, the screen is inside you. So, okay, let's imagine that there's a screen inside your mind. And on that screen your life is being enacted with thoughts and emotions and things happening, drama and this and that. Oh, wow, it's so interesting, or it's so dreadful, or I can't stand it anymore, or I want more of it, I haven't had enough yet, and so on. And suddenly you realize that there's a screen that's inside you, and you are the projector. You are the light of the project. And that changes, of course, fundamentally, the way in which you relate to the events on the screen. How does it do that? Well, you can see for yourself. If you really see that you are the light of the projector, it adds this dimension of awareness to what you are witnessing on the screen. It gives you a certain detachment from what happens because you realize that there is something much more essential or fundamental in you than all the things that are going on in that screen. And if you don't know that, you are totally drawn into the events on the screen. And for most people, sooner or later, the events on the screen turn into some kind of drama. Nothing lasts for very long. There's no real security in my life. Why do things always have to be so frustrating? But then you always look for more on the screen. You look for some kind of solution on the screen. It's never there. Pseudo solutions come from time to time, and happy moments. And then again, that's because you don't know who you are or what you are. It doesn't matter whether we call it who or what who or what you are, essentially, which is the light of consciousness, which is the projector, which can be sensed within you at any moment, like now, as an aware presence. It.