Growing in Presence Together | Q&A Eckhart Tolle

Thank you for this opportunity, for being here and allowing us to become more aware. And my question is a little bit of a follow up from what you've just said. I know you work with psychotherapists and therapists in helping others. And my question is, how can we follow up on the analogy of the caterpillar? How can we support others? How can we know if they are there? If they are not there, Is it possible to help? I don't know what the question is, but it's can we support someone in this process? You obviously are, and Kim is obviously supporting us. So is there different stages that we can support different people in different processes?

The moment the spiritual awakening, if we want to call it that, happens in you, which is the disidentification from the thinking mind and certain degree of arising of presence. Well, not the moment it happens, but a little bit after that. As this process continues, many people find that more and more people come. You meet people sometimes seemingly accidentally, or it might be people who you know already, who need you, who also are at a stage of readiness, but don't know it yet. And you may find and will find that these people are drawn to you. You may not immediately recognize them. In fact, you may think this person is not going to awaken in this lifetime. But you can get big surprises. Sometimes the most unlikely people can come to you and you know that it's happening. There's a moment usually when you notice there is a transmission either of presence as an energy field, or they ask you a question, you give an answer, and the answer has a certain power or aliveness to comes through you spontaneously because the question was a genuine question and there was an opening in the other person. If it's not a genuine question, if it's a question asked out of curiosity, what's that spiritual stuff all about that you do, or whatever, or tell me about that spirit stuff, but there's no real opening, then your answer will not be good. Or there may be no answer. But if it's a real question and there is some degree of presence in you, then there will be a real answer. And that's the helping then comes in two ways. One is through the energy that you emanate as you are present. The second is through what you say to them. And that is the beginning of you becoming a spiritual teacher. And many of you, some of you are already spiritual teachers, whether formally or not formally, some of you will become formal spiritual teachers because the world is in great need of you. Humans want you. They might not know it yet, but everybody, even if you do not become a formal spiritual teacher, you will do some teaching informally through everybody you meet because you spread your state of consciousness spreads to others. That applies both to unconscious people who spread their negativity or the viral infection of their minds, and to present people who spread presence. It's not that you are doing it. So an important obstacle could be if you think that you need to do something to help them. This is very seductive because it's a wonderful thing to help others. But the obstacle is you think that it is up to you to help them. It's not. In fact, you wouldn't know how to. I wouldn't know how to. So you have to allow it to happen by holding the presence. Especially when somebody comes to you, asks a question or you say something, hold the presence and then see what happens. So it's not you who is doing it. Sometimes I've met some people who said they've been asked to. First they saw some individuals help them. They are growing and growing in presence. And then somebody approached and said, can you give a talk to our little group? And then they came to me and said, I don't think I'm ready to give a talk to a group. Somebody asked me to give a talk to a group. I think I'm not ready. And I said, if you think you're ready, then that's not a good sign because there's probably a little ego in there that thinks I'm ready to be a spiritual teacher. Just come to me and I will heal you. But if you feel that the most powerful place, whether you with one person or with a group of people, the most powerful place is to not know. But you have to be comfortable with not knowing. If you're uncomfortable with not knowing what to say, what to do, then you go, oh dear, what am I to say? The mind says, quick, say something useful to this person. And then you think things you've read in a book. Well, Eckhart says that it doesn't mean you should never quote, but it's always more powerful if it comes from you. So it only comes if you are comfortable with. Enter that space of not knowing, which is basically you surrender thought. You just look at the person and you listen and then see what answer comes. Then see what you say, if anything. In some cases you might not say anything. So the help allow it to move through you. And that's a big relief. It means you don't have to do it. You only become a vehicle for it, an opening for it. You Become an opening for consciousness so you don't have to heal people, help people. I mean, you can help physically, that's a different matter. You can give somebody food or money to help, but at a deeper level, you can't do anything. So getting out of the way and then it will happen through you. In the Course in Miracles, it says the moment you become a student of the Course in Miracles, which, by the way, is a lovely teaching, but not for everybody. So don't believe that because I mention it now, you have to go and get it. It's great. For some people it's a beautiful spiritual work, but for others, it's not the right one. Nothing is right for everybody. Course in Miracles, however, says the moment you start studying the causing miracles, which really implies the moment you begin to disidentify from the conditioned mind, you become a teacher of God. Now, the ego, of course, would probably love that term. That is why I personally would not use it. But there is some truth in it. It's not a terminology that I would use, but the moment the presence arises, you begin to teach presence, but really presence does it through you.

Thank you.

Thank you. This mind made sense of self is also much more focused on the negative than the positive. To be free, you awaken to who you are beyond your history and your life situation.

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