Friday, November 13, 2015

Eckhart Tolle Waffles about the Refugee Crisis in Europe

If you watch this video, you can see Tolle waffling about side issues:


It seems that he borrowed his methods from J Krishnamurti - exploring the leaves and branches from various angles but never getting to the root.

The question about what to do about the refugee crisis in Europe is just the presenting issue. We need to dig below the surface. Indeed, such questions can be rephrased as: “Here in the swamp, what should we do about X?” Obviously, the right response is to say, “First, get out of the swamp!”

If we follow a living enquiry approach the next logical question arises: “What is the swamp?”

Answer: The swamp is the idea that security and/or reliable happiness is found in such things as materialism or spirituality, when in reality, security is in good relationships and reliable happiness is innate to being. Europe, like the rest of the world, is shouting 24/7, “Happiness is in this or that,” so when refuges arrive and settle, they will do so for wrong reasons anyway. Europe is creating the problem by creating attractive illusions, and not working on the real issues.

The next natural question is: How do we get Europe to realise the innate happiness of being?

Answer: First, we need to show them that reliable happiness cannot be found in things that change. Then they will naturally look for that which doesn’t change.

The typical next response is to say, “Isn’t it unrealistic to get a whole continent to change?”

Answer: The reason things seem hard and unrealistic is that people keep saying it is. In reality, all we need is for each person to say yes to the obvious truth, then to pass it on and point out to the next person that objections are nothing but self-fulfilling prophecies.

Lastly, people will say, “Isn’t this a roundabout response to an immediate problem of refugees?”

Answer: No, it’s the direct response that ends the problem once and for all. If each person in turn takes a stand in the truth and in their innate goodwill, then all our problems would be solved. The current approach of falling into so-called commonsense stops you from digging below the surface to the real immediate issues.

2 comments:

  1. Martin,

    History is full of examples where one or a few more individuals see a solution in their own experience and then put lots of energy in attempting to sell it to the masses. Sometimes that creates a religion, sometimes it creates small or large groups that share an ideology and attempt to sell it to the masses together.

    While this does succeed in inspiring some others to follow or better still to investigate deeply themselves and arrive at the same solution, more often than not though, it creates further wars with other groups that are attempting to solve the problem with another solution, another ideology, belief, religion, philosophy, etc.

    People can only take on a new idea when they are ready, interested or capable, otherwise they will fight because their own ideas are threatened, AND they are attached to these ideas, they identify with them. Ready means being interested in truth to the point of seeing their own attachment and being happy and excited for seeing them because now they have a opportunity to be free from them, otherwise a stupid defence is initiated subconsciously.

    While a human is acting like a robot, there is nothing we can do other than attempt to reprogram him. But if he wants to be free from his programming, then anything he does can free him.

    In my personal experience (obviously limited to my capacity), I have come to the conclusion that we can try yo influence others by trying to trick them to see that they are robots, but any attempt to change them results in violence that often makes them dig deeper in their hold on their beliefs. We need to encourage them to relax and let go and enjoy their present state whatever it is (you call it being), and see that there is no need to defend or fight because we are not attacking them, we actually love them (assuming we do). Then they relax and may even give us a hug, to which we may enjoy responding with a hug.

    Most of us can only do this with one individual at a time (if we can at all). Doing it to large groups, countries, continents, etc requires so much more inner strength, love, joy and compassion than an average human is endowed with.

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  2. ^^^ Unknown, that was all assumptions, read herrings, reactions, etc. Such objections are precisely the obstacles that stop us exiting the swamp. When a group of people are in a swamp, the priority is to exit the swamp and to help others exit the swamp. Lamenting that it's supposedly been tried before, that swamp inhabitants are robots, and that we can only do it one person at a time, just closes the door.

    But let's look at each point you made:

    History and war: Battles of ideology are cases of swamp vs swamp. They are not cases of sharing understanding and pursuing liberation from the swamp.

    Robots: Human beings, unlike robots, want security and happiness. So there is a window to the soul. We only have to get them to see the futility of seeking security and happiness in the wrong place.

    One person at a time: Eckhart Tolle has a large audience of people ready and willing to hear the truth. That's a good start. He even has Oprah onside. So it can happen in a widespread way as well as one at a time.

    Now let's look at your case. Instead of debating, what if you just saw that we've been seeking security and happiness in the wrong place, stopped doing it, and passed the message on? Then when the next person raises objections, what if you showed them how those objections are actually the obstacle in the way of the fire spreading?

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