The Power Of Now - Eckhart Tolle
Many of us are constantly plagued by negative feelings, remorse or fears.
We wonder what would have been if we had done this or that differently in our lives, or what could still become.
Eckhart Tolle explains in his book “The Power Of Now” why the mind sometimes prevents us from being happy and how it is possible for us to use the power of the present constructively.
The biggest obstacle to live your life carefree and to find inner peace is our tendency to either get stuck on the past, for example by constantly racking our brains about how something could have gone better, or to already be rushing into the future.
In this case, we are mostly preoccupied with things that we still want to achieve at some point. In doing so, however, we completely ignore what is really important: The Now.
Only the present moment counts, since nothing ever happens in the past or future: Our life consists of a continuous series of now-moments.
Most suffering comes from remembering painful or failed things in the past or imagining things in the future that we don’t feel up to. And what part of you is responsible for this thinking outside of the now? The mind.
It burns up much of your energy on wallowing in memories and visions of the future, constantly keeping you from living in the present.
Since thinking promotes an unhealthy ignorance of the present, we must begin to separate ourselves from it and get closer to our bodies again.
The first step in detaching yourself from your mind is to become fully aware of its power over you. It can influence you in the most subtle ways – you must first realize this.
To do this, you should begin to observe yourself thinking.
To do this you can try the following technique: “What will be my next thought?”
If you focus hard enough on this question, it will take a while for the next clear thought to actually appear. By observing and paying attention to your mind, you have managed to create a gap in your steady flow of thoughts.
If you do this more often, you will notice how busy you usually are with the rushing flow of your thoughts and how that can distract you from more important things.
With this little exercise you can train yourself to stop your mind and thus distance yourself from your mind.
Living in the now is the only way to inner peace and long-term happiness.
To achieve this state of being absorbed in the present, we must ignore the past and the future and distance ourselves from our hyperactive minds.
In this way, we can save ourselves a lot of suffering and find the path to the life we were meant to live.
What you can do concretely:
Try to turn off your mind.
Observe how much time you spend thinking.
If you know how negatively your mind affects you and how much worry it causes you, you can practice turning it off from time to time and instead incorporate periods of non-thinking.
Be in a state of constant alertness.
The more attentive you are to the present situation, the more your focus will be in the now and the less your mind will wander into the past or future.
Try to consciously focus all your senses on what is happening around you right now, and most of your problems will resolve themselves.