Eckhart Tolle Quotes

Everybody who is not awake spiritually is totally identified with and run by their thinking mind - the incessant voice in the head.

For some people, it's the beginning of an awakening when they hear or read, "You have a voice in your head that never stops talking. Have you noticed that?" And suddenly they become aware that the thoughts go through their heads, whereas before they were so identified with them that they were those thoughts.

I'm pretty much done with mindfulness. I'm just going to start paying attention.

Mindfulness is a quality that's always there. It's an illusion that there's a meditation and post-meditation period, which I always find amusing, because you're either mindful or you're not.

When you are present, you can allow the mind to be as it is without getting entangled in it. The mind itself is a wonderful tool. Dysfunction sets in when you seek your self in it and mistake it for who you are.

When you listen to the voice in your head, listen to it impartially. That is to say, do not judge. You'll soon realize: there is the voice, and here I am listening to it, watching it. This I am realization, this sense of your own presence, is not a thought. It arises from beyond the mind.

We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake.

And perhaps our awareness is the first step to our liberation.

The more you expand your awareness, the more naturally you will be present without effort.

Mindfulness means being awake. It means knowing what you are doing.

Instead of 'watching the thinker,' you can also create a gap in the mind stream simply by directing the focus of your attention into the Now. Just become intensely conscious of the present moment. This is a deeply satisfying thing to do. In this way, you draw consciousness away from mind activity and create a gap of no-mind in which you are highly alert and aware but not thinking. This is the essence of meditation.

You can indeed be aware of your body, but you can also be aware of your mind - you can right now notice all the thoughts and ideas and images floating in front of the mind's inward eye. You can, in other words, experience your mind, be aware of your mind. And it's very important to experience your mind directly, cleanly, intensely, because only by bringing awareness to the mind can you begin to transcend the mind and be free of its limitations.

If you shift from compulsiveness to consciousness, being joyful will not be an effort.

Being aware in the moment of right now is just the most important thing. All of our issues come from us not being aware enough or not seeing through our problems to the depths of the issues.

Knowing yourself as the awareness behind the voice is freedom.

We have been so blinded by thinking and feeling that we have never seen the World.

Mind only thinks, meditation lives.

Simply put, mindfulness is moment-to-moment non-judgmental awareness.

The thinking mind is a useful and powerful tool, but it is also very limiting when it takes over your life completely, when you don't realize that it is only a small aspect of the consciousness that you are.

It is only through meditation that slowly slowly more consciousness is created within you, more light is created; more watchfulness, witnessing, happens. And that is the miracle of awareness: if you become aware of anger you become a master of anger. Then it is up to you whether to be angry or not. You are absolutely free to be this way or that way.

First Sight means you can see what really is there, and Second Thoughts mean thinking about what you are thinking. And in Tiffany's case, there were sometimes Third Thoughts and Fourth Thoughts although these...sometimes led her to walk into doors.

Meditation is the art of awareness. And once you are aware, out of your awareness your actions will arise - not out of conscience. Conscience is cultivated by others, by the vested interests, by the establishment. Consciousness is yours. It is individual, it is not collective. Conscience is part of the mob psychology. Consciousness gives you dignity because it gives you individuality. It gives you rebellion, it makes you capable of saying yes or no of your own accord. There is no foreign agency manipulating you in the name of religion, morality, etcetera.

Instead of being lost in your thinking, when you awaken you recognize yourself as the awareness behind it. Thinking then ceases to be a self-serving autonomous activity that takes possession of you and runs your life.

I think it's so important to have a practice, because the consciousness isn't perfection or enlightenment or any of that bullshit. The consciousness is, "Oh, I'm walking down the street and I'm doing nothing."