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Wednesday, February 28, 2007

Eckhart Tolle - The Power Of Now

Quick vid of Eckhart Tolle --> for some reason this clip cracks me up.

Eckhart is a much better writer than speaker, IMO, btw...

One of the major themes of The Blueprint and in Real Social Dynamics is "being in the moment".

I talk about this endlessly.

Seriously -- I'd even go as far as to say that if your'e "in the moment" that your whole "attract phase" in terms of meeting women is usually pretty much taken care of.

So as I've written and spoken more and more about the idea of "being in the moment", I've had certain book recommendations that kept popping up over and over, like "Tyler you've GOT to read this"........

And viola!!

Enter Eckhart Tolle and his book "The Power Of Now".

This is a book that literally spends two hundred pages inducing you to "be in the NOW", as Tolle calls it.

Now whether you agree with the eastern philosophy underpinnings or not is pretty much irrelevant.

As you guys know, for me to rate a book a "10 out of 10" (which this book clearly is) in my mind, it only needs to offer me insights that I couldn't have gotten otherwise.

I may disagree with a lot of what I read in this book, similarly to how I disagree with Ayn Rand.

That doesn't matter.

What's important is that "The Power Of Now" is LACED with phenomenal portrayals of what "being in the now" is all about, and that through constantly repetition this book hammers the away at the point until it hits home.

I personally found this book to be more or less a "magic pill" in the sense that it delivered instant results.

The whole thing is funny to me, because like I always say, the average guy on the street is so brainwashed by social conditioning that if you talk about a book you're reading he'll usually ask you "DID IT WORK?" -- as if there exists some sort of magic pill.

Like, most people think that if you read an Anthony Robbins book that you'll somehow be transformed by THE BOOK as opposed to by YOURSELF.

Of course, books are just a resource.

If you keep reading quality materials over the course of your life you tune yourself into a presence of mind that you couldn't tune yourself into otherwise.

It's gradual.

The thing with this book that kind of cracked me up though is that actually IS somewhat of a magic pill.

Eckhart Tolle is basically using very sharp hypnotic inductions (whether he realizes it or not I don't know) to smash the whole "be in the now" point home until it's lodged so deeply into your brain that you can't get it out.

That's a very good thing.

Tolle paints being in any headspace other than "the now" to be outright insanity.

As in, the word "insanity" is used over and over until you've re-associated your previous thinking patterns.

If you read his arguments, while any argument can be dismantled, they're pretty darned good.

Eckhart Tolle also shares a fundamental view of mine, which is that the solutions to your dilemmas in life will present themselves to you WHEN and ONLY WHEN you need them.

Worrying about them beforehand or afterwards is only a waste of time, and spreading your capacities too thin.

Anyway, in the same sense that Ayn Rand's stuff is really fundamental in terms of conveying to "carry your own values and standards", I feel that this book could someday become instrumental in the community in terms of it being a 200+ page masterpiece on "being in the moment."

I can't recommend the book highly enough, so do yourself a huge favour and read it ASAP.


Tyler

18 comments:

Anonymous said...

Seriously Tyler, I can't stress to you enough the importance of reading "I Am That" by Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj. If you think Eckhart Tolle will offer you new insights, try this book. Your entire reality will shift if you understand what is said in this book.

Check it out on Amazon, you'll see that I'm not the only one who discovered this book.

TheMan

Anonymous said...

Yeah I've also read The Power of Now; it's a good book overall, and I was just as excited when I first encountered it.

You really should look into Ken Wilber's books. (Maybe read Sex, Ecology, and Spirituality, if you want a specific title.) Anyway, the value I got out of his work is his map of 'everything'; it's a model which (hate to sound fanatical, but I'm deadly serious) anything can be fit into (he even has the masculine and feminine types included).

I meditate, and I've also read many of the eastern philosophy/spirituality materials out there; and while many are good, it's not always easy to see how they can be practically employed in one's life nor how to fit that 'understanding' into the here-and-now framework of day to day life.

Yeah I guess now I'm just another anonymous Joe on the internet spewing recommendations on top of the mountain load which you already have. If anything, check out the link and click the "IOS Basic and the AQAL Map" to get a sense of what I'm blabbering about here. And who knows, maybe this can be of great use to you and in return you can somehow use it to better help others in the future. www.kenwilber.com/professional/writings/index.html

Anonymous said...

Incredible. My campus library has this entire book in electronic format, so I read it RIGHT FRICKING NOW. Awesome. Definitely reading this...

Anonymous said...

I love this book.

It's awesome, and accessible to everyone.

Anonymous said...

Fabulous book indeed, read it 3 times, however a lot of it I am not able to grasp yet. His latest book "A new earth" is even more powerful in my opinion, because it is less vague and he seems to more rooted into the ground there. Another incredible 'enlightenment' book is Awareness by Anthony De Mello, read that one almost 10 times. Gives major new insights every time you read it.

Anonymous said...

I read the Power of Now a while ago when my bootcamp instructor repeated to me how important it was to be in the now. I found the book extremely interesting (you start questioning yourself a lot of things, e.g. when Tolle tells you that usually we think 'I am my conscious mind') and I thought that Tolle proposes some good steps on how to live in the now.

For me, his viewpoint was a little too spiritual (I think that you can live in the now without feeling that connection to God) and he keeps repeating his ideas over and over again. But nevertheless, there are many good pointers in the book.

I know that Tolle also has a book called 'practice the power of now', maybe it has more exercises in there (I haven't yet read it).

On the same subject I can also recomment 'the present' by Spencer Johnson. It's a tale similar to the 'who moved my cheese', very short, you can read it in about an hour and it also points you to living in the present (while still learning from your past and planning for the future).
Enjoy!
Wannabe

Frank Denbow said...

On my resolutions list for this year. Only read the first 20 pages and had my uncle explain the rest to me.

Anonymous said...

Hi Tyler,

could you please give us some recommendations on 'how to read' these books?

I have read a lot of inspirational books recently, and there definitely is a lot of material you can get out of them. But I feel that from just reading it once you probably will miss out/forget/not apply most of it.

What's your take on this?
Thanx!

Wannabe

Anonymous said...

Christophe!!

Wannabe-The short answer is to keep reading. Don't necessarily get bogged down in the details. Chunk things. Take action.

It won't be long before you start seeing common threads of truth in books and life that will parallel and become apparent. Follow those threads until you find (realize) your own internal path.

-Nathan

Anonymous said...

Tyler, when I was reading your previous posts on this blog, I knew you'd sooner or later come across "The Power of Now". The book was a big one for me as well - a total epiphany.

It is just that with these kinds of books I've noticed a funny phenomenon: first you read one book with chills down your spine. Then you read another which has an even greater impact and it sort of invalidates the previous book for you. For me this has happened three times during the last six months.

First, I read "The Power of Your Subconscious Mind" by Joseph Murphy. Awesome book. I thought that this is exactly what I've been missing - just learn to appreciate the amazing power of your subconscious mind and repeat affirmations. A few months later, I discovered "Awakening" by Anthony DeMello. It seemed to be so much more - a bigger picture compared to Murphy's book. I was on a high for a few days.

Then I read "The Power of Now" a few weeks ago. Both "Awakening" and "Subconscious" seemed to pale in comparison. And now I'm working on "Mastering Your Hidden Self" by Serge Kahili King. Suddenly I'm not so sure about the greatness of Tolle's work anymore - these Huna guys have had it all figured out for hundreds of years :) And they say: don't kill the ego, but expand it.

The point is, that when you read a lot of this stuff you begin to connect the dots. There are lots of similarities between different teachings. Also, when you see things in real life that resonate with what you've read, that is when the real epiphany kicks in. And after all, it is not about the books you've read - it's about...

-S

Unknown said...

Ive read The Power of Now in 2005,and this book completely changed my way of thinking and has improved my quality of life and still does because each time i listen or read things by Eckhart i make new distinctions and realizations.

I live more and more in the present moment instead of having glimpses of the present moment not so often.

I Hope being in the present will be my predominately state of mine. Highly recommend this.

Anonymous said...

This book enabled me to solve my problems.

I had massive attraction tonight from every woman I interacted with for more than 30 seconds.

But here's the kicker - I wasn't attached to it. Even if the girl in front of me was a 10, I wouldn't have been attached, because I realize that I am not my ego and that the NOW is the only thing that exists, and the more I come into alignment with existence the more whole I am.

I feel incongruent using the word 'I'. There is no 'I'. There just is.

Thanks for posting this.

Peace

Humjob

Anonymous said...

I read this only last month.

It's a great book - full of amazing insights alright.

I will have to read it again to "digest" it.

Some of the communits stuff, like the Secret is hokey bs.

Eckhart Tolle is the real deal. He is more of a philosopher than a spirtualist too.

Anonymous said...

Just read it cause of this recommendation - AWESOME book (minus a lot I don't agree with, but awesome none the less)!

Anonymous said...

just read it - awesome

Anonymous said...

Oh shit! You are SO on point about this damned question! I've been asked "So did it work?" when talking about books countless times and it always seemed utterly stupid to me. Finally somebody touched on this phenomenon :).

Anonymous said...

Holy Cat, I'm reading this book and I can feel everything slowing down. Before, I was always in a rush, trying to get somewhere, as fast as possible, and when that moment came, it didn't feel that good as I expected. I'm becoming aware of myself, my inner state, my thought patterns, my own (big) ego. I even got a plant because of the book :)
It really unscrambled my mind.

Anonymous said...

I disagree with Tolle.

It's not about being in the now all the time. That's plain stupid, humanity wouldn't have made any progress with this attitude.

It is all about being in the RIGHT "timezone" that is appropriate to the situation you're in and the problem you have to solve. Sometimes it pays a lot thinking in detail about the future and sometimes it pays reviewing the past (although that's certainly rather rare) and often it pays to be in the moment - which is often the best mode to be in if you're actually doing something physical.

But bottom line is: It's all about knowing when to switch gears. I'd agree however that many people often tend to think about the future when in fact they should shut up their mind and enjoy the moment. (Sex)

Yet the whole frontal lobe of our brain is there to process and imagine the future, to plan - and it's the part of the brain that ultimately distinguishes us the most from other mammals and apes.

If you only want to live in the here and now then you should have been born as a fruit-fly.