Via mijn zoon, hij is academicus (advocaat) die in tegenstelling tot mij zeer gestructureerd kan denken, en een scherp denkvermogen heeft, heeft mij afgelopen weken verbaasd doen staan. Hij leest boeken van Eckhart Tolle en gaf mij er ook één kado.
Het heet "de kracht van het nu". Is iemand hier bekend met deze spiritueel leraar, en wat vind je ervan?
Eckhart Tolle
Moderator: Moderators
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MOODY BLUE
- Diehard
- Berichten: 1080
- Lid geworden op: 22 apr 2006 19:10
Eckhart Tolle
I'm more than that, I know I am, at least, I think I must be.
There you go man, keep as cool as you can.
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Samante
Ik ben bekend met Eckart Tolle. De Kracht van het Nu heb ik gelezen en ook lees ik Een nieuwe Aarde, maar dat lijkt naar mijn smaak zeer veel op die eerste.
In de Kracht van het Nu wordt het ego, het verstand en het pijnlichaam besproken. Zeer interessant. Je leert eigenlijk op een andere manier naar jezelf te kijken en ook naar de manier waarop je in het leven staat.
In de Kracht van het Nu wordt het ego, het verstand en het pijnlichaam besproken. Zeer interessant. Je leert eigenlijk op een andere manier naar jezelf te kijken en ook naar de manier waarop je in het leven staat.
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MOODY BLUE
- Diehard
- Berichten: 1080
- Lid geworden op: 22 apr 2006 19:10
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Theoloog
Een collega heeft me het boek ooit aanbevolen en me een paar dingen vertelt. De kern kwam er op neer dat het geen zin had om te blijven vasthouden aan het verleden (en vervelende episodes keer op keer overnieuw af te spelen in je hoofd) en evenmin om je zorgen te maken over de toekomst. Beide zijn ficties omdat ze er niet zijn. Met name de toekomst is fictie. Het enige reeele is dat je er bent en dat het heden is. Vandaar: de kracht van het nu!
De volgende passage uit zijn boek maakt duidelijk hoe hij tot dat inzicht kwam:
An Extract from The Power of Now
By Eckhart Tolle
I have little use for the past and rarely think about it; however, I would briefly like to tell you how I came to be a spiritual teacher and how ‘The Power of Now’ came into existence.
Until my thirtieth year, I lived in a state of almost continuous anxiety interspersed with periods of suicidal depression. It feels now as if I am talking about some past lifetime or somebody else's life.
Awakening
One night not long after my twenty-ninth birthday, I woke up in the early hours with a feeling of absolute dread. I had woken up with such a feeling many times before, but this time it was more intense than it had ever been. The silence of the night, the vague outlines of the furniture in the dark room, the distant noise of a passing train – everything felt so alien, so hostile, and so utterly meaningless that it created in me a deep loathing of the world. The most loathsome thing of all, however, was my own existence. What was the point in continuing to live with this burden of misery? Why carry on with this continuous struggle? I could feel that a deep longing for annihilation, for nonexistence, was now becoming much stronger than the instinctive desire to continue to live.
‘I cannot live with myself any longer.’ This was the thought that kept repeating itself in my mind. Then suddenly I became aware of what a peculiar thought it was. ‘Am I one or two? If I cannot live with myself, there must be two of me: the ‘I’ and the ‘self’ that ‘I’ cannot live with.’ ‘Maybe,’ I thought, ‘only one of them is real.’
I was so stunned by this strange realization that my mind stopped. I was fully conscious, but there were no more thoughts. Then I felt drawn into what seemed like a vortex of energy. It was a slow movement at first and then accelerated. I was gripped by an intense fear, and my body started to shake. I heard the words ‘resist nothing,’ as if spoken inside my chest. I could feel myself being sucked into a void. It felt as if the void was inside myself rather than outside. Suddenly, there was no more fear, and I let myself fall into that void. I have no recollection of what happened after that.
I was awakened by the chirping of a bird outside the window. I had never heard such a sound before. My eyes were still closed, and I saw the image of a precious diamond. Yes, if a diamond could make a sound, this is what it would be like. I opened my eyes. The first light of dawn was filtering through the curtains. Without any thought, I felt, I knew, that there is infinitely more to light than we realize. That soft luminosity filtering through the curtains was love itself. Tears came into my eyes. I got up and walked around the room. I recognized the room, and yet I knew that I had never truly seen it before. Everything was fresh and pristine, as if it had just come into existence. I picked up things, a pencil, an empty bottle, marvelling at the beauty and aliveness of it all. That day I walked around the city in utter amazement at the miracle of life on earth, as if I had just been born into this world.
Bliss
For the next five months, I lived in a state of uninterrupted deep peace and bliss. After that, it diminished somewhat in intensity, or perhaps it just seemed to because it became my natural state. I could still function in the world, although I realized that nothing I ever did could possibly add anything to what I already had.
Understanding
I knew, of course, that something profoundly significant had happened to me, but I didn't understand it at all. It wasn't until several years later, after I had read spiritual texts and spent time with spiritual teachers, that I realized that what everybody was looking for had already happened to me. I understood that the intense pressure of suffering that night must have forced my consciousness to withdraw from its identification with the unhappy and deeply fearful self, which is ultimately a fiction of the mind. This withdrawal must have been so complete that this false, suffering self immediately collapsed, just as if a plug had been pulled out of an inflatable toy. What was left then was my true nature as the ever-present I am: consciousness in its pure state prior to identification with form. Later I also learned to go into that inner timeless and deathless realm that I had originally perceived as a void and remain fully conscious. I dwelt in states of such indescribable bliss and sacredness that even the original experience I just described pales in comparison. A time came when, for a while, I was left with nothing on the physical plane. I had no relationships, no job, no home, no socially defined identity. I spent almost two years sitting on park benches in a state of the most intense joy.
But even the most beautiful experiences come and go. More fundamental, perhaps, than any experience is the undercurrent of peace that has never left me since then. Sometimes it is very strong, almost palpable, and others can feel it too. At other times, it is somewhere in the background, like a distant melody.
Sharing
Later, people would occasionally come up to me and say: ‘I want what you have. Can you give it to me, or show me how to get it?’ And I would say: ‘You have it already. You just can’t feel it because your mind is making too much noise.’ That answer later grew into my book, ‘The Power of Now’.
From The Power of Now, copyright 1999 by Eckhart Tolle.
Citaten: http://users.ncrvnet.nl/gjhardeman/cittolle.htm. Een beetje teveel gepraat over dingen waar hij geen verstand van heeft als je het mij vraagt. De zelfkwellig heeft zichzelf hervonden als mysticus en deze is gemuteerd tot filosoof, nee, ontvouwer van goddelijke kennis. Ik kan niet in Tolle's hoofd kijken, maar de vraag die bij mij opkomt is: zijn dit ook geen zelfconstructies?
Tolle's website is behoorlijk gelikt. http://www.eckharttolle.com/home.php
En 'Eckart Teachings Inc'? Commercieel dus. Hoeveel verdient Eckart aan zijn onderwijzingen, hmmmm?
Sorry; op zich vind ik verschillende kernideeen niet eens zo gek: dat ons idee van persoonlijkheid vaak een bedachte constructie is om ons gevoel van eigenwaarde te geven; dat verleden en toekomst ficties zijn en alleen het heden werkelijkheidswaarde heeft. Ik denk dat dat waardevolle inzichten zijn. Dus dan baal ik wel een beetje als ik al die bullshit erom heen zie; de 'packaging' van Tolle en quasi-diepfilosofisch gewauwel.
De volgende passage uit zijn boek maakt duidelijk hoe hij tot dat inzicht kwam:
An Extract from The Power of Now
By Eckhart Tolle
I have little use for the past and rarely think about it; however, I would briefly like to tell you how I came to be a spiritual teacher and how ‘The Power of Now’ came into existence.
Until my thirtieth year, I lived in a state of almost continuous anxiety interspersed with periods of suicidal depression. It feels now as if I am talking about some past lifetime or somebody else's life.
Awakening
One night not long after my twenty-ninth birthday, I woke up in the early hours with a feeling of absolute dread. I had woken up with such a feeling many times before, but this time it was more intense than it had ever been. The silence of the night, the vague outlines of the furniture in the dark room, the distant noise of a passing train – everything felt so alien, so hostile, and so utterly meaningless that it created in me a deep loathing of the world. The most loathsome thing of all, however, was my own existence. What was the point in continuing to live with this burden of misery? Why carry on with this continuous struggle? I could feel that a deep longing for annihilation, for nonexistence, was now becoming much stronger than the instinctive desire to continue to live.
‘I cannot live with myself any longer.’ This was the thought that kept repeating itself in my mind. Then suddenly I became aware of what a peculiar thought it was. ‘Am I one or two? If I cannot live with myself, there must be two of me: the ‘I’ and the ‘self’ that ‘I’ cannot live with.’ ‘Maybe,’ I thought, ‘only one of them is real.’
I was so stunned by this strange realization that my mind stopped. I was fully conscious, but there were no more thoughts. Then I felt drawn into what seemed like a vortex of energy. It was a slow movement at first and then accelerated. I was gripped by an intense fear, and my body started to shake. I heard the words ‘resist nothing,’ as if spoken inside my chest. I could feel myself being sucked into a void. It felt as if the void was inside myself rather than outside. Suddenly, there was no more fear, and I let myself fall into that void. I have no recollection of what happened after that.
I was awakened by the chirping of a bird outside the window. I had never heard such a sound before. My eyes were still closed, and I saw the image of a precious diamond. Yes, if a diamond could make a sound, this is what it would be like. I opened my eyes. The first light of dawn was filtering through the curtains. Without any thought, I felt, I knew, that there is infinitely more to light than we realize. That soft luminosity filtering through the curtains was love itself. Tears came into my eyes. I got up and walked around the room. I recognized the room, and yet I knew that I had never truly seen it before. Everything was fresh and pristine, as if it had just come into existence. I picked up things, a pencil, an empty bottle, marvelling at the beauty and aliveness of it all. That day I walked around the city in utter amazement at the miracle of life on earth, as if I had just been born into this world.
Bliss
For the next five months, I lived in a state of uninterrupted deep peace and bliss. After that, it diminished somewhat in intensity, or perhaps it just seemed to because it became my natural state. I could still function in the world, although I realized that nothing I ever did could possibly add anything to what I already had.
Understanding
I knew, of course, that something profoundly significant had happened to me, but I didn't understand it at all. It wasn't until several years later, after I had read spiritual texts and spent time with spiritual teachers, that I realized that what everybody was looking for had already happened to me. I understood that the intense pressure of suffering that night must have forced my consciousness to withdraw from its identification with the unhappy and deeply fearful self, which is ultimately a fiction of the mind. This withdrawal must have been so complete that this false, suffering self immediately collapsed, just as if a plug had been pulled out of an inflatable toy. What was left then was my true nature as the ever-present I am: consciousness in its pure state prior to identification with form. Later I also learned to go into that inner timeless and deathless realm that I had originally perceived as a void and remain fully conscious. I dwelt in states of such indescribable bliss and sacredness that even the original experience I just described pales in comparison. A time came when, for a while, I was left with nothing on the physical plane. I had no relationships, no job, no home, no socially defined identity. I spent almost two years sitting on park benches in a state of the most intense joy.
But even the most beautiful experiences come and go. More fundamental, perhaps, than any experience is the undercurrent of peace that has never left me since then. Sometimes it is very strong, almost palpable, and others can feel it too. At other times, it is somewhere in the background, like a distant melody.
Sharing
Later, people would occasionally come up to me and say: ‘I want what you have. Can you give it to me, or show me how to get it?’ And I would say: ‘You have it already. You just can’t feel it because your mind is making too much noise.’ That answer later grew into my book, ‘The Power of Now’.
From The Power of Now, copyright 1999 by Eckhart Tolle.
Citaten: http://users.ncrvnet.nl/gjhardeman/cittolle.htm. Een beetje teveel gepraat over dingen waar hij geen verstand van heeft als je het mij vraagt. De zelfkwellig heeft zichzelf hervonden als mysticus en deze is gemuteerd tot filosoof, nee, ontvouwer van goddelijke kennis. Ik kan niet in Tolle's hoofd kijken, maar de vraag die bij mij opkomt is: zijn dit ook geen zelfconstructies?
Tolle's website is behoorlijk gelikt. http://www.eckharttolle.com/home.php
En 'Eckart Teachings Inc'? Commercieel dus. Hoeveel verdient Eckart aan zijn onderwijzingen, hmmmm?
Sorry; op zich vind ik verschillende kernideeen niet eens zo gek: dat ons idee van persoonlijkheid vaak een bedachte constructie is om ons gevoel van eigenwaarde te geven; dat verleden en toekomst ficties zijn en alleen het heden werkelijkheidswaarde heeft. Ik denk dat dat waardevolle inzichten zijn. Dus dan baal ik wel een beetje als ik al die bullshit erom heen zie; de 'packaging' van Tolle en quasi-diepfilosofisch gewauwel.