How to Find Calm in Nature and Sleep Better | Eckhart Tolle

And the strangest thoughts that always went through my mind when I was on my bicycle cycling in nature. And then I sometimes would get off my bike and just sit there, look around. And always I had this thought in my head which said, this will always be here. I already mentioned perceiving without labeling as a practice, a large sense perception. Nature, especially natural things, they are everywhere here. Nature is extremely helpful, especially in this world that we live in for sanity. Even not just here where you go back into your everyday life. Sanity can easily be found in nature if you go. Because you can divide the world into the human made world and the natural world. And some people live almost exclusively in the human made world, especially if you live in a big city. But there is always this vision that when I was a child, I was not happy a lot of the time when I was a child because of dysfunctional family background ground. They couldn't help it, they were just in the grip of their ego. But when I was given a bicycle, I was able to leave the city and drive and cycle to the outskirts where there was some nature and not magnificent nature, just ordinary trees and some fields and trees. And there I experienced my moments of happiness, relief in nature. And already there I knew the difference between the human made world, that was the world of unhappiness for me, and the natural world, which was the world where I experienced a sense of freedom. And the strangest thoughts that always went through my mind when I was on my bicycle cycling in nature. And then I sometimes would get off my bike and just sit there, look around. And always I had this thought in my head which said, this will always be here, this will always be here. I was only 10, 11, 12 years old, said this will always be here, this will always be here. Somehow. And I didn't even fully understand what this meant. I could feel. But I realized later, this is nature and this is the man and the man made. The human made world is not actually going to last. The natural world is relative to the human made world is almost eternal. And the planet has unbelievable ability for regeneration, which we may talk about some other time. So the humans will not destroy. They should do all they can to refrain from causing harm to the planet, obviously. But even if they go totally insane and they don't manage, they will not be able to destroy the. I will talk about at some other time. You don't need to believe me now. So the practice then is another. Tomorrow I will talk about relating to other humans here, which is another kind of practice, a bit more difficult than Relating to nature because humans are difficult and especially don't. As you go to sleep, make sure that the last thing that you are aware of before entering sleep, make sure that the last thing is not your device or the TV is still running. A good practice is you lie in bed on your back and place attention into the body, the inner energy field of your body. So you feel the body. Many times written, spoken about it as an important practice, inner body awareness. What you're aware of is not the physical body, it's that which animates the physical body. And so it takes your attention away from thinking. It's a very easy, quick way of stopping your mind without exerting some willpower and saying, stop, stop, stop. That won't work anyway. But there's attention into your body, abdomen, hands, feet. Feel them from within. We'll do some practice tomorrow perhaps. Or you might do it with Kim. Also feel the liveness that pervades the physical body. And from there you gradually go to sleep. And it's a beautiful, completely different way of entering sleep. And if you wake at night with certain thoughts, fearful thoughts for many people as they wake at night, what's going to happen? Nothing. This is the present moment and there's nothing happening but what's going when I get back home. But my life is just in shambles. Where. Oh my God, where am I going to? There's nothing. There is no crisis now. This is the present moment. The present moment. And as you're in bed, it's warm and comfortable. So go into the. Into the body. Take attention away from that. And you can feel, if you feel the inner body, there's no attention left for thinking. And it's usual. So whenever you have a sleepless night, you begin to be plagued by thoughts. Direct your energy. First, you start with the abdomen. Breathe into it, for example. It rises and you feel that as you breathe in. Follow the attention with your breath. The abdomen rises and falls, rises and falls. And then you feel the energy spreading out from there. Or you can start with your hands until you get a sense of global aliveness pervading the body. Beautiful. And when you wake up, just one last thing. When you wake up and these thoughts begin to tell you how critical your life is and fear. And then you say, okay, I'm going to go into the body. And then the thought that will arise most likely is, no, I can't do it now. No, this is not the time. I can't. This, I cannot know. I can't do it. I can't. I can't. Are you going to believe that thought or not? Because not every. Don't believe every thought that comes into your head. So. And if the thought is, I can't, yes, I can. Look, I'm doing it, so don't be. Don't get persuaded by a thought that tells you no, you can't do it now.