Transcending Neediness with Eckhart Tolle

I wonder if you can have any advice about ego longing for something. For example, an experience that was so wonderful that I want to. I want it to be repeated.

It could even be a spiritual experience. It's not uncommon for people who have had. And then 10 years ago I had this great meditative experience. Ever since, I've been trying to get back there.

Yeah, something like that.

For example, is it in your case, is it one particular thing especially, or is it something that happens frequently thinking back on monitor experience, or is it something that you want to mention? Tell us what it is, or would you prefer not to say what it is?

Yeah, of course I can be open. It's spending time together with a particular person and it's wonderful. And I do realize that ego wants more and it's never enough. And I do. See, it's kind of insane.

That person is no longer in your life.

Yeah, he is in my life.

Oh, but why don't you spend time now with him?

Because I do realize that he's another human being and he might want something else. And it feels not healthy to have this desire to be with that person all the time. I would like to have my freedom too.

So you are in a relationship with that person, but you're not living together.

Yes.

Right. And you want to spend more time, but he wants to have his freedom.

I guess, yeah.

It's good sometimes to know a few details of the question because that can be helpful. Details are very important. Sometimes I've had. Before I answer your question, I don't know if there is an answer. We'll see. Sometimes people send me manuscripts of things they have written. Often it's called my life. And often I read and I read things like when I was between the age of 6 and 10, I went through the most horrific experiences with my dad, who had issues with this and that. And I was totally. And it's all abstract. The reader cannot even imagine what exactly did happen, except we are told it's horrific. And they say, and I don't want to go into it here, but if you don't go into it, nobody's going to read it. People want to know concretely what. What actually happened. And anyway, that's. It's helpful to know because then we can truly relate to the question. It's. The important thing is to become more comfortable with yourself and spending time with yourself. Now, in order to become more comfortable with that, you have to go more deeply into yourself. What I sometimes call. I haven't used this term here so far, but recently have been using it occasionally, what I call the deep I, not this I, the first person singular I, the deep I as opposed to the surface I. The surface I is of course the egoic identity, the things that normally people refer to when they use the word I. They refer to me and my story and my needs and my desires and my anxieties and my ambitions. That's I. I call that the surface I that is identified with forms and it feels certain needs, continuous needs. And the surface I lives in a state of frequent and in some cases or many cases, permanent impermanent state of unease at best. Unease not quite, not completely satisfied, except briefly, just after a great meal with two glasses of wine. Ah, but of course you're moving towards unconsciousness or after having sex, perhaps for a little while, no more desires, of course. The desire moon is just starting up again at the back and an hour later the unease comes back. This is the Freud wrote this book. I read it 30 years ago. So I don't remember exactly what's in it, but I remember the title, the Unease in Culture. It's the English translation. He's saying there's an unease that underlies civilization. Now, I assume if I don't remember the details, he says a civilization needs this unease. But I think he's wrong. The original word for unease as used by Freud, for those of you who speak German, is das Unberhagen translated into English as unease. So there is an almost continuous sense of unease. And it says what I need, I need, I need, I need. Sometimes you don't even know what it is you need, but there's just a neediness, a free floating neediness. And these are all symptoms of the surface eye. And as long as you live on the surface eye, then you can't get rid of these symptoms. They will remain. So the practice is exactly why you are here. This is the reason why you've come here. You've come here in order to go beyond, in order to transcend the surface eye. It will still be there, but it's no longer the foundation for your sense of identity. So you become still and the mind subsides. And then you begin to at first just as little glimpses, little glimpses of presence of yourself as experiencing yourself as an underlying presence, consciousness. You become aware that you are conscious or consciousness. And at first it seems to be insignificant. Okay, and the mind says, and now what? And you just, you just. Oh, it does, yes, I knew that. And now what do I do with that? Where does that take me? So you have to give yourself a little bit more space. Because space, exactly what you want and allow yourself to go more deeply. And then the thoughts will keep coming in and say, think about something else. Think about what you need. This is what you need on a truer level. But it's not so much that you need it because you already have it, but you need to be conscious that you have it. You need to be conscious of the deep. I it's already there. You don't need to bring it to you or to go do penance or work hard for the next 25 years and then no, it's already there. So you have to give yourself that space where you go within what we're doing here. I mean, by coming here, you're hard doing it because you realize that the solution to your so called problem lies here. Which means it's all about you. Lies in you. Become still. Find that dimension of stillness in you where you're fully alert but not thinking. Five seconds and then a little longer. Go into nature. Allow nature to help you. Look at a tree. Allow the tree to teach you stillness. Look at a tree for two minutes and you will notice the tree exists surrounded by stillness and it's very still. And so then you tune into that. So you look at the sky, the spaciousness. I take photos of the sky all the time. I think they showed some here before it had to be cropped a bit unfortunately. But in the original photo there's even more spaciousness. Because I love the spaciousness of the sky. Because the moment you take that in, you become aware of spaciousness in you. The moment you look at the spaciousness of the sky, you're not thinking, you're just taking it all in. And then become aware of the presence that's taking it all in. You are that and this presence. Then you feel that more and more strongly in you, the still presence. And that is not a place that needs anything. And there you become, you're at home then at home with yourself rather than always trying to get home because it's the ego state, so to speak. It's I'm trying to get home. But where is home? You never feel, this is where I belong. This is where you might think sometimes the physical place is it, but it's not it. Aum Home. Home. It's wonderful that the English word and the om are so closely related. So the answer is in yourself. The more you live from the deep I the less you need the other. But that also means the more deeply you can relate to the other. Because Then you can relate to the other no longer through your neediness, but through your aliveness, through your inner peace. And you can share that with the other. And then the other wants to spend more time with you because it's so lovely to be around somebody who doesn't need anything. And the other then feels so much, feels so good to be with you. But that's not why you do it. That's not why you go there. But so the. The thing with this, it's written somewhere, I don't remember where. Well, I do. The things that you need, all the things that you need. Or more accurately, the things that you think you need, many of those things. When you connect with the deep, I will be added unto you. They will be added. Now, what does it mean, added? Added means you no longer need them. And then you get them. You didn't get them when you needed them. This is the irony of the universe. The universe is smiling or God. And when you don't need, it comes or he comes. When you need it stays away or he stays away. That's a. Well, the ego says, well, that sucks. And another way, another story, what happened to me is the. In my 20s, when the ego was growing and growing and growing, and I was becoming more and more unhappy, if I had gone to a psychic and the psychic had said to me, you will become a great spiritual teacher, the ego would have said, wow, this is so great, Wonderful. I'll be great spiritual teacher. It would have been very elated. But if it had been a good psychic, he or she would have added, but you have to die first. You have to die to the illusory self. And then, yes, it may be satisfying when you're a great spiritual teacher, but you don't even think of yourself as a great spiritual teacher. And you. You do not regard it as a personal satisfaction. There is something satisfying there, but not a personal. Like, I did something. And if the psyche had predicted that, the ego would have said, hmm, I'm not sure if I want it anymore. So that's. So the paradox is the adding on. Seek first that, find that, and then the things that you thought you needed will be added on. And that's. It's miraculous how that works. And so that's good. So the whole situation has brought you here. It's all perfectly designed to bring about your awakening.

Thank you.