What am I in the Now?

Elizabeth and I have been discussing Eckhart Tolles "The Power or Now", and have run into an interesting question that we would like peoples input on.

In the book he talks about removing the influence of the "pain body". Residual emotional pain we identify with, that negatively affects us as well as the impact of our past on how we define ourselves as people. So the question is...


If I am no longer my pain, my past, what am I?

To use one of his terms...

The observer..

You are simply being.....

Hrm...never really good at explaining this so please bare with me...


Your personal point or place will never be explained in a satisfactory manner because it doesn't exist. You, apart from everything else, do not exist. Everything ELSE apart from everything else does not exist. All is.

When you wonder what you are after what you thought you were was taken away, your reflecting on something that wasn't in the first place.

Any definition, any opinion we descry from our experiences will always fall short of what was, is or will be.

The greatest state one could hope for is to not need definitions to live.

Sensory modalities could be more equally valid as distinct 'bodies' perhaps.

We are all very aware of pain, and instinctively it probably serves the emotions and reinforces context for stronger memories. Perhaps instead of viewing the world in terms of the duality across pleasure and pain, we instead viewed in it terms of things like orientation, influence, and action - we might tread a pathway of directed wisdom instead one of whirling around emotions. Im not sure if that links into the doctrinal focus, knowledge and wisdom, but it might
:woohoo:

Neurologically speaking the proprioception (body position), and nociception (pain) systems take different paths once in the Central Nervous system. If there was to be a 'pain body', then I'd wonder if not a similar posture body, or touch body, or temperature body LOL. Perhaps we could perceive our existence in representations of each of the physical senses to create a more accurate representation of the now, for more a real present and perhaps more useful memory of it.

For me, when I look back at my pain, I have noticed the memories use pain as a context, but when I find out new information about those memories, I have experienced an amazing insight and gradual release of pain around them - they seem to become recontextualized in some way. It is almost as if pain in memory represents confusion or uncertainty. Perhaps pain is the signal used by memory for those things, and therefore constitutes its own infrastructure of confusion.

So maybe Tolle's advice is to unseat the primacy given to pain because it is the most common thing people focus on, but also because it might be used by the brain as an easy mechanism in learning. It makes sense that the brain would prioritize remembering things which cause pain as a survival mechanism.

Jestor wrote: To use one of his terms...

The observer..

You are simply being.....

I think the issue is that I would imagine most people (and I include myself for the most part!) have spent all their life not being the observer and need some kind of "identification". To go from "this is who I am" to "I cant feel anything.... am I doing this right?!" The compulsion I guess is to be "doing" in order to be.

Tolle also speaks of "peace in all its fullness" as an indicator that you are being, but how do you recognise that if you have never felt it?

Brenna wrote:

Jestor wrote: To use one of his terms...

The observer..

You are simply being.....

I think the issue is that I would imagine most people (and I include myself for the most part!) have spent all their life not being the observer and need some kind of "identification". To go from "this is who I am" to "I cant feel anything.... am I doing this right?!" The compulsion I guess is to be "doing" in order to be.

Tolle also speaks of "peace in all its fullness" as an indicator that you are being, but how do you recognise that if you have never felt it?

Stop, close your eyes for one second...

Listen to the universe...

The quiet power, that surges through you, and everything...

Don't think, don't do anything but be aware...

I just got goosebumps, lol....

Well, it's always now. Now is all you have. Really, there is no such thing as past, or residual pain. Any pain felt, would be now, wouldn't it?

Separation sounds slot like denial in this sense. Peace in all its fullness being a denial of the pain you feel now.

In denying it, aren't you denying now as much as your identity?

Its so hard to forget pain, but it's even harder to remember sweetness. We have no scar to show for happiness. We learn so little from peace

What a collection of scars you have. Never forget who gave you the best of them, and be grateful, our scars have the power to remind us that the past was real.

The power of now is it always is, now matter how you feel, or how much you don't.

Observe your pain, learn from it, fight for it. You only have it for such a short time, it's a precious thing.

What does he say about residual love? What if that love has pain attached to it?

E

Brenna wrote:

Jestor wrote:

Tolle also speaks of "peace in all its fullness" as an indicator that you are being, but how do you recognise that if you have never felt it?

I imagine its like when you're singing an operatic solo, and you get all caught up in the moment, and time and space cease to exist, and its only you and the vibrations of the music, and everything flows from you and flows to you; I imagine that this is peace in all its fullness. I can only imagine, because I can't sing, but I have felt it listening in the balcony.

It's been a long time since I have read it, but this discussion almost makes me want to "pick it up" and read it again... almost. :whistle:

Good stuff.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvQPLcnbGP4