In this monologue Eckhart Tolle explains how to access the state of presence, describing it as a choice that requires sufficient awareness. He outlines a stepwise approach: first noticing heightened, relaxed alertness and sensory perception, then using the breath as a direct entry point that automatically quiets thinking. He expands the practice to sensing the subtle energy field of the "inner body" and moving attention to seeing and hearing without labeling or conceptual interpretation. Tolle frames ordinary thinking as an incarnation of consciousness into thought forms that creates problems, whereas presence allows consciousness to remain unincarnated, offering a deeper, non‑conceptual knowing. The talk emphasizes that awareness and thinking cannot coexist, that presence is a relaxed alertness free of tension, and that perceiving without interpretation reveals a more fundamental way of knowing.
Chapters
Now, what that does is, quite simply, it removes effortlessly— it removes thinking. You can't do both. You can't be aware of your breathing and think at the same time. Occasional fragments of thoughts may come in, but they immediately dissolve again. How do we get into the state of presence? First of all, step 1, let's so to speak, almost inevitably when you choose to be present, and it is a choice, but not everybody is capable of that choice. If there's a sufficient degree of awareness in you, you are capable of Taking your attention into the present moment. And the first thing then that you notice is you become more aware of sense perceptions of the world around you that you absorb through your sensory perceptions. You will also notice a heightened degree of alertness. Because that's why it's called awakening. It's another part of the awakening, a heightened degree of alertness. Shh. But not an alertness where there's any tension. There's no tension. It's not an alertness that goes like— no, there's no tension in it. It is a relaxed alertness. That's part of presence. So you decide to come into the present moment. You decide to step out of the problem-making mind because you have recognized that a lot of your mind activity is completely unnecessary and even harmful. Not all. For some things, the mind is a great tool. But a lot of the time it creates— it does not solve the problems of life, it creates the problems of life. So you take your attention out of the stream of thinking and bring it into the present moment. So it could begin with sensory perceptions. Suddenly you are— there's an alertness that wasn't there before. Why wasn't it there before? Because your consciousness was being absorbed by thoughts. Your consciousness continuously incarnated, which means took form as thought. Your consciousness incarnated into thought forms continuously. There was— you were not aware of consciousness because consciousness always, always assumed a thought form. Incarnation. You see why Buddhists want to become free of the wheel of continuous incarnations. But many of them don't realize this is the moment when you can become free of incarnation, because the most foundational, the most basic incarnation It's the incarnation into thoughts, the primordial forms, thought forms, and the emotions that go with thoughts. And here goes another incarnation and another. So you come to the end of— through consciousness, you're able to take consciousness out of that and then become aware— well, let's— before we go there, you become aware of sense perceptions. Alertness arises. This alertness is consciousness itself without having incarnated. And then you observe. If you find it difficult to immediately become aware of sense perceptions, Because the mind is still trying to get in there. Another helpful entry point into presence, present moment, that has been used for thousands of years is quite simply your breath, your breathing. Simply become aware that you're breathing right now, even without wanting to do any particular type of breathing. Become aware that your body is breathing. Becoming aware means you can sense that the breathing is happening. That is perhaps the most immediate entry point into the present moment. Awareness of your breath, already recommended by the Buddha, might even be older than the Buddha, as a meditation method, but not just as a formal meditation method, as a simple entry point. Into presence. Become aware that you are breathing. Now, being aware is not— could be misunderstood. A person might think become aware of your breathing looks like, oh yes, I'm breathing. What's next? That's not awareness. Awareness of your breathing is to be able to, with your attention, follow the breath as it enters the body. And as it leaves the body. So your attention moves with the breath. Now what that does is, quite simply, it removes effortlessly— it removes thinking. You can't do both. You can't be aware of your breathing and think at the same time. Occasional fragments of thoughts may come in, but they immediately dissolve again. You can verify for yourself. Are you breathing? Just checking. Are you breathing? Are you aware that you're breathing right now? Sometimes the awareness can sometimes have the effect of Lengthening your breath almost without wanting to. So when you become aware of your breathing, that's a wonderful entry point into presence. You are aware of your breathing and thinking subsides. Okay. Next thing that could happen is you're not only aware of your breathing, you're also aware of the energy field in your body, not the physical body, but that which— and the animating presence, that which animates the body, the life within the body, not the physical body. And you can sense that your breath can put you in touch with that. As your breath moves into the body, you feel it going into the abdomen and then spreading out the rest. You can feel the body is alive. You can sense— I call it the inner body. You can sense the energy behind the physical manifestation of body. And thinking subsides. And then it's easy to take the next step. Well, let's— okay, let's start breathing, beginning to feel to some extent there's an energy field behind the physical body, within the physical body. Sense perceptions. Now you're able to look around and to listen and to hear. Let's just talk about the 2 predominant sense perceptions, seeing and hearing. And you're able to— and this is an important part of it— you're able to perceive without labeling, without interpretation. This room, flower, man sitting on a chair, and you just see it, but you don't— you don't interpret it. You don't label it in any way. You just allow it. Again, allowing it just to be as it is. What is there to interpret? You can perceive it without thought. Just through awareness instead of through the veil of thinking. Perceiving through awareness rather than always perceiving through the veil of thinking. Sometimes thinking is helpful and you need it, but a lot of the time it's a prison. It imprisons you. So you become free by discovering, discovering your ability to, to, to to perceive without needing to interpret what you're perceiving. And you know what you're perceiving, but this knowing is not conceptual anymore. When you look at another human being in that state of perception, of non-conceptual perception, in a way you know that you're looking, that there's another human being, but not conceptually. So you discover a deeper way of knowing that humans have kind of— they have in the past, perhaps they had it a bit more than they have now. You can know something. There's a knowing through concepts, but there's a deeper knowing where concepts are not needed.
