Eckhart Tolle explains why people turn to alcohol: a built-in longing to escape the self. Substances lower consciousness briefly, relieving the feeling of not being enough, but can awaken what he calls the pain-body. The real path to transcendence is inner awareness, not external shortcuts.
So there you have glimpses of self-transcendence, and that's why people feel drawn to it, because without knowing it, people are longing to become free of themselves. They don't know it, but there is a longing, and this is built into the evolution of the human being. We all have this virus called time, and it's already consuming our bodies. And you don't have to wait long, and finally it kills you. They haven't found a remedy yet against time. So the ripple lives an uneasy existence on the surface of the ocean, looking for some kind of completion and fearing other ripples or wanting to use other ripples Come, let's join. The two together, we can kind of bigger ripple, but it probably won't work. And then let's say the ripple in a moment of complete dissatisfaction with life, when it says nothing makes sense anymore, it finally comes to a stop in its incessant search for fulfillment, and it comes to a stop in its incessant doing. In looking to the next moment for some kind of fulfillment, and the ripple for a moment stops, and— but it doesn't stop because it has taken— I don't know if this analogy still works if I continue with the ripple, but— No. I talked about transcending a sense of self through taking in a substance. It frees you for a moment from this The sense of insufficiency. The rebel feels a little bit better and has taken something and, you know, doesn't think about his problems anymore. Ah, it doesn't always work because sometimes it can awaken the pain body. Certain substances like alcohol can awaken your pain body, in which case, because it lowers your level of consciousness to an even lower level than your normal level, I'm not talking to you personally. It lowers your level when you drink, lowers your level of consciousness to an even lower than the normal level, and then this gives the pain body an opportunity to completely take you over. But with other people, they become temporarily quite happy when they drink or take other substances. You can smoke. Ah. It slows down your mind, it goes, ah, and it feels so good. Your problem, the whole superstructure of problems begins to subside because you're not thinking about the problems, therefore they disappear. Ah. So there you have glimpses of self-transcendence, and that's why people feel drawn to it, because without knowing it, People are longing to become free of themselves. They are— they don't know it, but there is a longing, and this is built into the evolution of the human being. This longing for self-transcendence is built into the evolution of human consciousness. Every human experiences it, but they look for it For a solution to this longing on— in the wrong ways, in the completely wrong places.
