Eckhart Tolle explains how people get trapped in reactive patterns with certain people or situations, like money or ex-partners. He teaches how to break the cycle by anchoring in your inner body and meeting others without past grievances, which can transform both of you.
We all know people who, you know exactly how they're going to react when you say, say a certain thing. If you've lived with somebody you know, when you say this, they're going to react that way or when that situation arises, they're going to react that way. This may happen to you too. They still. If you can isolate certain areas, certain pockets in your life, it's very important. Certain pockets in your life where you tend to become unconscious. There may be certain situations. Whenever that situation arises, it tends to draw you into unconsciousness. It could even be certain people. Whenever you meet that particular person, you act more unconsciously. You get drawn into an old reactive pattern of the ego. This could be, for example, if you are an adult, work very well and therefore of course trigger you. Maybe at work, just looking at them triggers you. And somebody triggers you, means he or she makes you unconscious, you become reactive. So if you know that in your life, so either people or situations, or it could be sometimes it happens when money is involved, people become very unconscious. Then let's say you're. You're trying to sell your condo or your house and then you're talking to the real time. This difficulties are rising. And suddenly the spiritual person who has been to 10 retreats with Eckhart gets very angry and upset with the what happened. So it's often people like realtors or lawyers, they often meet people at their most unconscious. So those professions could be potentially extremely enlightening because you really need to be present to deal with all those people you meet in unconscious states. All the people who go to court, of course, observe yourself, see where are the situations where I tend to lose become very reactive. And then when you go into those situations or meet those people, you meet to. What you need is before you need to know beforehand, okay, here we go. And then stay very, very present. Turn up the light. The dimmer switch. It's a bit like that. How do you do that? How do you turn up, how do you turn up the light? The dimmer switch. And you feeling. Feeling intensely. The energy field of your inner body helps to anchor you in presence. So when you go into situations like that. Okay, now I'm going to talk to my stockbroker. If you have one. I don't. But you stalk your. And you know from past experience that every time you talk to your stockbroker, you become reactive because you have in your mind fear is associated with money and money is associated with the idea of scarcity. And scarcity from your. Perhaps from your childhood is associated with the Idea of survival and all kinds of things are unconscious thoughts that still live in you. And so before you do, before you go into that situation, okay, I'm now calling us. This is my spiritual practice. The primary goal then in that, and any situation is to stay present. But when you go into situation where you're most likely to become unconscious, then turn up the light of presence just before you go in and while you're in it. And as I just said, it is very helpful to be intensely present within your inner energy field while you're talking. And then you, you realize there's a spaciousness because that is the doorway. A very good doorway into presence is to. Is the inner body. It's a doorway into presence, can be very help, very helpful doorway into presence. There's also the doorway into presence, of course, of totally accepting your experience of this moment. So if you can talk to your. Whoever it is you're talking to and just totally accept whatever he or she says in this moment, that's fine too. There are various doorways into presence, but it's presence, so. Or you meet your, your ex before the divorce happened, all those years, it's back in your mind and there's your ex and your he or she is. And it's not pleasant, your very unconscious ex. And then you have to be really, really present so that you don't go into the old reactive mode. And then you're meeting this person. It's almost without the past. That's an amazing thing. Without your, yes, you know the past, but in the moment of meeting that person, there's only you. There's not you as the personality. When you become really present, what emerges is that the other half of you emerges more. The personality becomes relatively unimportant. The other half, the unconditional presence, shines through. Then you're able to meet another human being. Even you might have shared a lot of unpleasant past with him or her, but you can meet this person when the other, the deep eye, shines through you. You meet the person through the deep eye, which means you meet this person without reference to the past. You have that ability, not you as a person, but that ability is in you, of meeting a human being. Even a human being with whom you share a lot of unpleasant past without reference to the past. So you're meeting that person in the present, fully in the present. That's an enormous thing. And I have, I know people who have practiced it, and many of them have reported back and said that sometimes, not always, and you're not doing it in order to achieve something else through is sufficient unto itself. However, almost miraculous transformations have happened in the other person. When you met the other person without reference to the past. So it's not that you want the other person to change. All that falls away. You're just not bringing the past into this encounter. And then it is not uncommon for the other person also, without them realizing what's happening, becoming freed at this moment at least from their heavy personality. And something beyond the personality in them also shines through. And that's a miracle of transformation. That's why sometimes people, when one of the two who shares a lot of unpleasant past, one of them becomes conscious, it can lead also to the transformation of the other. Not necessarily. If it doesn't, it's fine too. At least you are free. And so you. And you don't need the other to be free too. To be. To be feeling that you are free. And so it can also happen with your parents that suddenly the way in which your parents relate to you changes. When you meet your parents without reference to the past and in absolute presence. That's an amazing, amazing experience.
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