Eckhart Tolle writes in The Power of Now, “The greater part of human pain is unnecessary. It is self-created as long as the unobserved mind runs your life.

The pain that you create now is always some form of nonacceptance, some form of unconscious resistance to what is. On the level of thought, the resistance is some form of judgment... the more you are able to honor and accept the Now, the more you are free of pain, of suffering.” (p. 27)

 

There are several ways our thoughts create pain.

1. We create stories. Something happens and we build a story around it. If it is something we project into the future, we create worry; something in the past, we create guilt. I have been going to the same auto mechanic for over 20 years. I have always been satisfied with his work and how he has treated me. The bills for the last couple of car repairs were higher than expected. He has a different service manager. I create a story: this guy is out to cheat me. For the future I create worry by wondering what happens if my car gets into trouble; and I create guilt about the past for not getting a second opinion about the needed repairs. I can flip-flop between the pain of worry and guilt as I choose.

 

2. Life is not the way it should be. Have you ever experienced anger when you get caught in a red light? How do you feel when you are on the telephone wanting to ask a human a simple, quick question and you keep hearing automated menus telling you to chose a number that puts you into another menu, when finally you pick a number that does not have the answer to your question and you have to start all over? Barking dogs? Children or spouse’s behavior? When children are on stage and the person in front of you is in synch with your movements trying to see? I can create all kinds of pain for myself – seething, upset, anxiety about being late, etc

 

3. .The present we have created for ourselves is fertile ground for all kinds of pain. We take our past, project it into the future and thus create our present. For example, so-and-so told one of my secrets and I was offended (past); I am not going to get hurt like that again (future); so now in the present, I keep my secrets to myself – and develop high blood pressure, ulcers, heart trouble. We have one foot in the past and one foot in the future and these are the shoes we are wearing in the present.

 

4. We take our identity from our thoughts. We use labels: victim, middle child – can’t make a decision, first born – the responsible one, mother, father, minister, sick one, cluts, stupid, etc.

 

5. We see (taste, hear, smell, touch) and almost automatically our thought projects our feeling – I never ate a rat. We don’t go through the thought process – rat – that sounds gross – eating one sounds even more gross – the feeling comes almost automatically – bang!! Uugghh!

 

Where do these thoughts come from?

-         parents, siblings, society, culture, religion, past experience, etc.

At some point we chose our thoughts. 50 people say you are smart and one person calls you dumb – which thought is usually chosen?

 

When we become aware of our thoughts, we can change them, we can change the story/interpretation of the event and thus change how we feel – 2^nd base as little kid, brother-in-law didn’t like me, he was also a salesman, so for a number of years I never met a salesman I liked. Looking as an adult at that scene, I was smaller than the bat and how my brother-in-law felt about me had nothing to do with my lack of baseball ability. We can become aware and reinterpret our stories and thus change how we feel: our experience, book, friend, movie, therapy, journaling, etc.

 

Thoughts can control how you feel. Thoughts can cause pain and suffering.

 

Tolle writes,

            “Does the past take up a great deal of your attention? Do you frequently talk and think about it, either positively or negatively? The great things that you have achieved, your adventures or experiences, or your victim story and the dreadful things that were done to you, or maybe what you did to someone else? Are your thought processes creating guilt, pride, resentment, anger, regret, or self-pity? Then you are not only reinforcing a false sense of self but also helping to accelerate your body’s aging process by creating an accumulation of past in your psyche. (he goes on a little further)

          “...Are you worried? Do you have many “what if” thoughts? You are identified with your mind, which is projecting itself into an imaginary future situation and creating fear.  There is no way that you can cope with such a situation, because it doesn’t exist. It’s a mental phantom. You can stop this health- and life-corroding insanity simply by acknowledging the present moment. ... All that you ever have to deal with, cope with, in real life – as opposed to imaginary mind projections – is this moment.

          “.... It is not uncommon for people to spend their whole life waiting to start living. Waiting is a state of mind. Basically, it means that you want the future, you don’t want the present. You don’t want what you’ve got, and you want what you haven’t got. With every kind of waiting, you unconsciously create inner conflict between your here and now, where you don’t want to be, and the projected future, where you want to be. This greatly reduces the quality of your life by making you lose the present.”

 

            If our thinking creates pain and suffering. Tolle suggests, “Stop thinking”. (That’s something to think about.) There are three concepts that I want to mention and then I will try to show how this has affected me. (This is where the “easier done than said” comes in.)

 

The Present Moment

            When you stop thinking, you are in the present moment. Or when you are in the present moment, you stop thinking. For example, when there is an emergency, we stop thinking and are focused on the present moment. Driving in the rain or icy roads at night, we are very much aware of the present moment. We stop thinking and just do or be in the present moment. Golf story.

 

 

Life and Life Situation

            Tolle makes a distinction between Life and Life Situation. Life situation involves our every day surroundings. My life situation right now is talking in front of this group. On Tuesday my life situation will be having a cook-out with my wife, son and his wife. My life situation is everything in between now and Tuesday. Driving the school bus taking a group of kids to the swimming pool. Every day situations we are in all the time.

 

When he talks about life, he speaks about who you are, just being and not what you are doing, or thinking.  For example, take this room. Right now the room’s life situation is a gathering hall, another time it is a dining room, or a meeting room, or a social gathering spot. If we were to take everything out of the room, so the room is completely empty and there is just space, the room would not lose its identity. In fact it may even be more of a “room”.

            The same with us. Our life situation may entail a job, another time a parent and spouse, friend, doctor, lawyer, cook ... whatever. If we were to remove all that, remove all thoughts and just left space, you would not lose your identity. You would still be you. Our life does not change. We live our life in our life situation.

           

Space Consciousness

            Space is every where. Our bodies are made up of 98% space. Rocks – one of the hardest elements – are 98% space. Space is a universally shared element. Space consciousness is becoming aware of this space. For example, we look at the tree and being aware of the space between you and the tree is space consciousness. When we see a tree, there is space between the eye seeing the tree and we saying “tree”, regardless of how small that space may be, even if it is unnoticed. When I mentioned eating the rat, there was a space between “rat” and your reaction regardless of how automatic and spontaneous your reaction. Space consciousness is extending the awareness of space between what is seen, thought, tasted, etc. and our labeling and reacting to it.

 

            So we have the present moment – the right here right now; life which is who we are and life situation which I think we can say is where we are; and being aware of space. We get in touch with our Life – which is who we are, our being, - by becoming aware of our internal space – the empty room, the space filled room, the empty mind, no thoughts, no stories, no judgments – and that can only be done in the present moment of right here right now.

 

            I would like to share the process I experienced in my journey and how that has affected my life.

            Six or seven years ago I started driving a school bus. At the time I would describe myself as a “waiter” – waiting to start living again. During the down time between routes, I was reading Wayne Dyer’s Manifesting your Destiny trying to figure out how to end the waiting. Dyer mentioned in his book our most basic element is energy and how we are all one with the environment because all things are made up of energy. This one day I sat on the bus and was looking out the windshield at a tree and I started a conversation with the tree. “Well, we are both one, say something to me.” And then I would look around and hope that none of the other drivers would ask me what I was doing. Nothing happened. In the days that followed, I did it a couple of more times, usually feeling skeptical and a little silly. I don’t know what I was expecting. Finally one day I looked at the tree with a completely empty mind, and it was as if the tree moved toward me. It was like a 3-D movie. I rubbed my eyes and started driving.

 

            One morning several months later I was driving along 35^th street in West Des Moines heading up toward Valley Southwoods. There was just a hint of day light so you could see somewhat. Ice had formed on the branches of the trees and all during my route I had been admiring the beauty of the trees. As I turned up 35^th Street, there is a field of trees you face as you turn into a curve. All of a sudden this panorama of ice covered trees seemed to pick up and reach out to me – similar to what the tree had done several months before. A tremendous wave of peace flowed through my body and I was mesmerized and it was like “Wow, I want to stay here all day.” But then I heard a little voice in my head say, “Hey Bob, you are driving a bus load of kids here.”

 

            Looking back at those incidents after reading Tolle, I think what happened was I was into my Life, the empty space within me, and I connected with the Life, empty space, of the trees in the present moment. I experienced a peace unlike any other peace that I can recall.

 

            A couple of years later along comes Rachel. Rachel is a child with special needs. I have always felt uncomfortable being with children with special needs because I always plug into my stories: How difficult it must be for the parents? What is it like to go through life with these special needs? This one day I was assisting on the bus for children with special needs. Rachel is a girl, I would guess about the age of second or third graders, who always sat in the wheel chair somewhat slumped over to the left. She did not speak. I was bent over securing her wheel chair with straps on the floor, when I looked up and we caught eyes. The world stopped. Only the connection between the two of us was real. It was as if her space, her life, had reached out and drawn in my life, my space to her. I was in the present moment. There were no stories, no thoughts in my head. I experienced again a tremendous wave of peace.

 

            With the trees and Rachel, I experienced a connection, a oneness, in space – there was nothing else there – no thoughts, no stories – just space – internal and external. And a peace that was just wow! I think babies can reach out with their space – I know I can watch a baby for quite a long time and be at peace, until I start thinking – oh, the baby has his mother’s eyes and uncle Joe’s chin and I can’t stand uncle Joe and thus the baby is labeled and packaged.

 

            Tolle mentions that it is not how long we are in those moments, but how often we go to those moments, those moments of space, not thinking, that is important. We get in touch with our Life by being in the present moment which is done by not thinking, being aware of space.

 

            There are many doors we can walk through to get into the present moment. Be in touch with your breathing – following the flow of air in and out; focusing your awareness on any one part of your body; feeling the energy flow through your body; drawing a circle on one leg and lightly tapping on the other, focusing your attention on what you are feeling – the brain can only handle one or two things at a time. A million and one meditation techniques can get you into the present moment and to point of not thinking.

 

            Tolle says that this being in the present moment, this stop thinking, is not a means to an end, but an end in itself. I have done several things to slow down and calm myself with the idea of being able to better deal with a situation. This is not what Tolle is talking about because when I do this quieting I am using it as a means to get something else done and therefore I am projecting into the future and I am not in the present moment. This being in the present moment gives you an experience of your life, your space, which connects with everyone else’s space and all the space in the environment. In this space one experiences a peace like no other. So many through the ages have spoken about a peace that surpasses all understanding. It is there for you.

            Any kinds of fear, worry, uneasiness, discomfort, annoyance, etc. comes because you are not in the present moment. All the meditation techniques can bring you into the present moment. Also being aware that you are not in the present moment puts you in the present moment.

 

            Tolle mentions that there are three ways that make any sense to handle situations. You can change it, you can leave it, or you can allow it (accept it as it is). The last day of school was a trip. The day was quite hot and humid, the heat in the bus tends to get quite warm, and with a metal inside the noise is amplified. At 3:40 pm 50 elementary children who were quite fired up about school being over got on the hot humid bus. The noise got more intense as I drove down the street. Three options: I decided or chose not to try to change it figuring no matter what I do would only last a couple of seconds plus it was the last day, I decided I could not leave; and so I focused on the allow. I recognized that my rising annoyance with the noise meant I was not in the present moment. I started repeating to myself “stay in the present moment, stay in the present moment” and within a few seconds I noticed a peace come over me.

 

            For me getting into the present moment has been a gradual process. When I see a tree, I behold it rather than try to name it; a flower; stopped at a red light – 70^th and Hickman, light going east/west recently changed to a 90 second interval. North/south has become a rather short time. If two cars facing each other want to take a left turn and no one moves, the light can change before too many cars get across and if I get caught and have to wait for the next green light, I can get annoyed, especially if I am in a hurry. “Be in the present moment.” Little things – change a life time of habits – creating stories.

 

            Worrying about the future, feeling guilty about the past, living a waiting life of “if onlys”, are all thoughts that take you out of the present moment and cause suffering. And all you have to do to change this is “stop thinking” and be in the present moment and find a peace that will permeate your life.

 

            Does this mean we walk around like space cadets? Does it mean we do not make plans for the future or learn from our past experiences? No. We plan for our future, set goals, and use our past in whatever way is helpful. We use our thinking as a tool to help us and not control us. We get in touch with our life, who we are, and then step into our life situation. We allow, accept whatever our life situation presents to us so we are in the present moment and then we act whatever way we see fit. It is not how long we can stay in this present moment but how often we go there. For me it can be a second or two. Believe me, it is easier done than said.

 

            Often I ask myself why am I not better at this? If the peace is so wonderful, why don’t I really get serious about it and speed up the gradual process I am experiencing? Tolle says that people resist or are hesitant about it because they do not want to give up the drama that is present in their life. It is like “the devil you know is better than the devil you don’t know”.

            We experience our drama through our stories that we create. For years there was drama walking around as the scorned second baseman from South Boston. One of my more potent drama stories being played out now is called “Being out of shape”. Some of the lines in this drama goes like this: “I am so out of shape I can’t do anything to get in shape” and “I better rest up in front of the television before I cut the lawn” and “I am so out of shape it doesn’t matter if I eat another dish of ice cream” and on and on. What would my life be like if I were in shape? My story and drama just carry me along. The only way I know how to make a change is being in the present moment. I be in the present moment and then I act. We all have our drama born from our stories.

 

            Why did I pick this topic for a Sunday service? I see the Unitarian Church being very community oriented. Each one of us brings us something to the table. We all have our contribution to make to the community. Living a story, a drama couched in suffering can be an offering brought to the community, or, the gift can be a person aware of life, carrying space in the present moment free of judgments, criticisms, resentments, aware of their connection with everyone and everything. We honor and respect the dignity of each other. We relate to each other in the present moment and the hurts of the past are no longer needed. We are a welcoming community – a group of Rachels welcoming the new comer into our midst.

 

            For me the most significant thing about this whole process is when I am in this space, in the present moment, not thinking, I am connected to what Tolle calls “The Unmanifested” and I am defining the Unmanifested by my presence. In my own words, I am connected to the divine within me and make present the Divine (with capital D) in the world. Which says how important I am. And I know this is so because of the tremendous peace I experience.

 

            Tolle, in the beginning of his retreat, says that you will not hear anything new, what is being said has been said before for centuries. I am sure what I have said you have heard before in some form or other. I would like to end with a line from the book The Power of Now. The line is “Try it and see what happens.”