Eckhart TolleNYT Bestselling author of the Power of Now

You Exist Before Your Own Name

12 Jun 2026 · 1 min

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1:11

In this brief excerpt from Eckhart Tolle’s talk, he invites listeners to explore the possibility of sensing their true self without any reference to personal history, name, or thought. He asks whether one can feel a sense of beingness or presence that is independent of past memories. Tolle explains that this direct experience of presence is not describable, but can be accessed when the continuous stream of thinking temporarily subsides, allowing the underlying awareness to be felt directly.

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Can you feel or sense who you are without reference to the past in you? You don't even need to remember your name right now. What for? Can you still get a sense without reference to your personal history? Can you get a sense of beingness or presence? Ah, there's no past in that at all. But what is that? You can't really describe it. All you know is that you are. I am. You can sense the underlying beingness or presence of you. And but to really sense it, what needs to happen is that for a moment the stream of thinking needs to subside. And when I asked you whether you can sense yourself without reference to your personal history, what I was really asking was, can you get a sense of your presence without thought?