Eckhart Tolle describes death as the departure of consciousness from the body, while atoms disperse and an underlying presence remains beyond space and time. He argues that God as a controlling father figure limits understanding, and proposes instead an unnameable source of life that manifests as consciousness. Cultivating stillness reveals a sacred presence within and around us.
Every cell of the body partakes of that intelligence. And it's all organized, coordinated continuously, until one day, this vast intelligence that is the invisible you decides to depart. And then it goes. It's still you for a while. This. This is another. We may go on to that some other time. Don't have to. Or when you're dead, you'll find out anyway. So when. When it's. The time has come, this. This beautiful consciousness that's in the inhabiting presence that made this body possible and held all the atoms and molecules together as an intelligent, highly intelligent organism. At some point, something happens and this thing departs. And then the body is still there, but not for long. All the atoms and molecules say, what are we doing here? We don't need to be here anymore. Let's go somewhere else. And they go. And then a few bones are left, and that's it. And the bones survive a thousand years, but nothing much. And so it's. The body then quickly dissolves into nothingness. So the. The presence is gone. And we call it death to. God. Then. I don't use that word very much because the moment you say God, it creates an image in your mind of an entity, a finite entity. Because the world is kind of encapsulated God. And traditionally we have. I see. Not anymore. Perhaps we've gone beyond that, but a long time with everybody in the Christian tradition, everybody thought of God as an old man with a beard. You can still see him in the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican. It's the guy with a beard that goes. And traditionally been regarded as a kind of controlling father figure, the ultimate father figure. And that is very limiting. And that's why many people these days find it hard to believe in God. Because they say, this can't be right. They say, because if it's God, God must be omnipotent and omniscient, which means he can do anything and he knows everything. And they say, because if he doesn't, if he cannot do anything and doesn't know everything, then he's not God. And then the next step is. They say, look at all the suffering in this world, all the dreadful things that happen in this world. If there is a God, God must be omnipotent. And if God. If there is an omnipotent God who does not, who allows all this suffering to happen, then it's not God. Because then they say, my morals are higher than this guy's. Because then. Because I wouldn't allow all this suffering to happen if I were so. Therefore, I would be superior. And then the next step is, therefore there is no God, okay? And as far as this childlike image is concerned, they may be right. Not as God, not as a controlling father figure somewhere and who doesn't do his job. There is a more open way of looking at, not just thinking about looking at and sensing and perceiving this all pervasive intelligence that, as I see it, is an emanation of this one unnameable source of all life that we call God. Like the sun emanates light, God. And God does not exist as such, because exist means to ex, means out, to stand out. God is not an entity in space and time. God is, cannot be known or understood. It would be absurd to try to know or understand, but I'm trying anyway. But. This unnameable source of all life emanates into the light of God is consciousness. It emanates into this world of space and time where gradually the world is. God is awakening into this world and continuously incarnating into this world. And this is the world of space and time. And here, gradually, the universe is undergoing a gradual awakening process. God itself is beyond. Space and time doesn't undergo any process, but it sends, God sends out. Or, by the way, I find it very hard to call God he, because you're limited already. It is also difficult. And she is also limited. So we maybe one day I'm going to ask God what are your pronouns? And then God will come up, perhaps with a good, very good pronoun, but so far we don't have one. So there's an. And this. If you can sense, if your mind becomes still, there's a stillness in you, then you can. There's a presence that you become aware of that is within and without. Especially if you're out in nature or in a quiet room, you can sense that there's not just a stillness within you and a presence, the presence is also within and without. In this room we could sense, if you're still enough for a moment, you can sense that the space of this room is also a presence, an invisible presence. So when you are really present, then you notice, I reluctantly use that word, that presence is sacred. There is a sacred presence that pervades this world.
Why alcohol feels like relief, and what it is really giving you | Eckhart Tolle
