I already respected and had personally benefited from Eckart Tolle’s teachings when my friend Jess and I sat down with Eckhart at his publisher’s home in Vancouver, British Columbia. I have interviewed a pretty fair number of impressive spiritual teachers over many years. Nonetheless, I remember being truly affected by Eckhart’s very presence. Because that’s…
Ray Hemachandra: Eckhart, the practice of being in the moment by definition is not goal-oriented, correct? Eckhart Tolle: Correct. You are not seeking to attain some future state. That is the fallacy of many spiritual seekers. They have an image of some state — enlightenment, or whatever they call it — they want to achieve.…
Ray: What can help people better understand the now — what the present moment really is, and what they really are? Eckhart: Most people equate the now, the present moment, with what happens in the now. They think there are many different moments, thousands of moments every day, because different things are happening every…
Ray Hemachandra: How practical is the practice of alignment with the present moment? For example, is making money at odds with an enlightened mode of being? Eckhart Tolle: If the main purpose of what you do is making money, then of course, yes. You are using what you do as a means to an end,…
Ray: Learning to deal with the small things in the now trains you to deal with the larger ones, doesn’t it, Eckhart? Eckhart: Exactly right. When you observe yourself reacting to what are minor things in your life, you will find that the mechanism is the same as when major things seem to go wrong…
Ray: Why is stress so common, and what are the consequences of people living stress-based lives? Eckhart: The whole world accepts that being stressed is the normal way to live. In fact, people think you have to be stressed to be successful. They think if you are not stressed, something is wrong with you. But…
Ray: In modern times, people often are given medications to calm and quiet their racing minds. The medications almost force people into the present moment, albeit a dulled present moment. I wonder what the impact of such medicine is on the spiritual dimension of people’s lives. Is it positive or negative, do you think? Eckhart:…
Ray: You’ve written that human beings had to develop a state of madness as a collective to then be able to transform and awaken evolutionarily. That parallels what seems to happen on the individual level, doesn’t it? As a child, a person builds up an egoic sense — the child has a name, has an…
Ray: What changes for people in their day-to-day lives when they begin to live in the now? Eckhart: I have spoken to many people who have begun to live in presence, and they find many changes come into their lives. Sometimes these changes happen as inner realizations — “This is what I have to do”…
Ray: If awareness means recognizing being conscious as our inner purpose and living accordingly, does awareness encourage passivity by making specific life goals irrelevant at the most important level? Eckhart: Some people say they can be conscious only when they sit quietly. One woman said to me, “I can be spiritual when I sit alone…
