Eckhart Tolle argues that awakening to your true self isn't something to achieve but something already within you, dormant like a seed. He asks: who would you be without your past? The answer lies beyond words, in pure presence and the simple sense of "I am."
Who or what would you be without your past? The true purpose, as I said, of your life is awakening to that dimension in you, so that you're no longer looking at to your human for sense of ultimate identity. The human that is subject to all the fluctuations of time, of continuously the fact of impermanence that is continuously there. Anything you identify with is going to disappear and leave you. So finding the being of you. And that's why we are here, many of you have already gone in that direction, so to speak, of the being. And here we are to realize this more deeply, that dimension, the being. So how do you. Let's just ask a simple question. How do you access that dimension? Where is it? How do you get there? That's the wrong question. How do you achieve that realization? That's the wrong question. Why is it the wrong question? Because if you think you need to get there, if you think you need to achieve it, that implies that you don't have it yet. It also implies that you need time to find yourself. So you do not achieve that realization. Because that dimension is already in you. And in many humans. One could say it is dormant in many humans, but the potential is there in every human being. It's a little bit like a seed that has not sprouted yet. In many humans it's dormant. And in other humans it is beginning to awaken. So in many of you, it has begun to awaken. Or you may already have gone deeply into that awakening. But for those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about, let's go into it here. So the experiential, I will offer you, to you, various approaches to that dimension. Various, one could say portals into that dimension. And this is the most, I would even say the only thing in your life that is of absolute importance is to find that within you everything else may be of. Yes, there are many things that are relatively important in your life. It makes a difference whether your health is good or not, whether you have enough money to live in, whether you have a nice place to live, your relationships. All these things are relatively important. Yes. We don't need to completely dismiss all that. These things are relatively important. Yes. But there's only one thing that is of absolute importance and that is the realization of who or what you are beyond your form, beyond you as a person. That is the essence. And all spiritual traditions, ultimately, although they use different words, they ultimately all point to that realization, which in some traditions is called awakening. You awaken to the essence of your being. We could also call it the Awakening of consciousness in you. So I will offer to you, probably, I don't know beforehand what words come out of my mouth, but I offer you various approaches to that. Portals into that dimension. Let's start with one. There are so many I could ask you. To some of you, it may sound a silly question, but it's not silly. I could ask you, who or what would you be without your past? Let's imagine, or imagine for a moment that you don't have a past. You've just arrived here. Oh, no past and no future. There's just this moment here. You don't have a name. You don't need a name or an email address. You don't need it. There's just you here without a past. And you look around, what does it feel like to be you without a past? Or perhaps a better question, what does it feel like to be I? Because everybody says I. What does it feel like to be I? To be me, to be I without. Am I still there if I don't remember my past at all, as if it didn't exist? What is left without my past? What is left of me? That's a very interesting question. You cannot answer it conceptually. You have to go there with your attention and see if you can sense what is left to you. Without your past, what are you? Who are you? But the answer is not a word, it's not a concept. So ask, who or what are you without your past? What is left of you? If you let go of the past completely. And of course you come. If you go to your mind for reference, your mind will say, I don't know who I am. Very good. You don't know who you are. That's a fantastic place to arrive at. Which means your conceptual identity subsides your conceptual identity, which is derived from thoughts plus emotions, your conceptual identity is not there. When you say, I don't know who I am. Okay, that's great. So you're letting go of trying to find yourself in concepts, mental concepts, inhabiting an exclusively conceptual reality that falls away. In other words, you become free of yourself. What's okay now? What's left? But the answer is not in words or thoughts or concepts. You can only sense what's left of you. Are you still there? Well, yeah, there's something there, but I can't. What is okay? What I would suggest what is left is, you know that you are. You know that you exist, that you are. A sense of I am. Is there still a beingness to be? This is the being dimension to be I am. Many people may not realize, if you're not familiar with rudimentary grammar, that I am is a first person singular of the verb to be. So it's the same thing, really. Probably you should say I be. I am. The realization that by letting go of the concepts that you have relied on for your sense of identity, you let go of the concepts and what left is a sense of at first very, very subtle only a sense of beingness or presence. All you know is that you are I.
Why alcohol feels like relief, and what it is really giving you | Eckhart Tolle
