Painting by Belynda Wilson Thomas

Life is available only in the present moment. If you abandon the present moment you cannot live the moments of your daily life deeply. Thich Nhat Hanh

In Eckhart Tolle’s book The Power of Now he talks about “mind energy and “spiritual energy”. He says there is a gap between the demands or rigid expectations of our mind and “what is”.

Things go wrong quite often in our lives, the world, and life in general. It is our expectation that things should be different than what is, that causes our problems. We don’t want to accept that the situation is, what it is. We waste energy wishing, hoping, lamenting. He says if we can surrender to, which means yield to rather than, opposing the flow of life.

This does not mean we cannot change things. Surrender is not resignation.  Surrender means there is no judgment of the now, it just is. Therefore there is no resistance, no emotional negativity. After we accept what is, without negativity we can take positive action to do everything we can to get on with our life.

The example he gives is if we are stuck in the mud, it just is. If we get angry and rant and rave we expend more energy getting less done than if we surrender to the situation and accept that “it is” without putting a negative spin on it. Then we do what we can to get out of the mud.

When you are here and now, sitting totally, not jumping ahead, the miracle has happened. To be in the moment is the miracle. Osho

Resistance is futile. Resistance hardens us. We begin to look at the world and people in general as threatening. The unconscious compulsion to destroy others through judgment arises; our interpretations and perceptions are governed by fear.  Our attitudes and our body become rigid. The free flow of energy through our body becomes restricted. He believes we access our spirit through surrender.

We think surrender is defeat. In the surrendered state we have access to a new state of energy. Through non-resistance, the quality of our consciousness and therefore the quality of everything we are doing is enhanced. According to Mr. Tolle, this is why Jesus said, “Look at the lilies, how they grow, they neither toil nor spin.”

According to Mr. Tolle we are to look at each situation we are in and if it is unsatisfactory or unpleasant ask our self, “Is there anything we can do to change the situation, improve it, or remove our self from it?” If so, we are to take appropriate action. Focusing not on the hundred things that could be done, but on the one thing we can do now. We are to be careful we don’t put our energy into running mental movies of what can be, and lose “the now”. He believes it is through surrender that spiritual energy comes into our world.

When we surrender either our conditions change or they don’t. If they change when we surrender they often change faster than when we resist the reality of life. If circumstances don’t change, our acceptance of “the Now” allows us to rise above them. Either way, we are free.

This is not new, nor is it easy. This is according to Mr. Tolle exactly what Jesus was preaching. This is also what Byron Katie is talking about in her books.

Eckhart Tolle’s ideas are not new. Some people believe that Eckhart Tolle is not compatible with Christian thinking.  He is not asking us to believe anything; he is asking us to try something. As Mark 9:38 says, “Whoever is not against us is for us.”

It may not be easy to surrender to “what is”, learning to live in “the Now” may be the best thing we can do. Can this be one of the changes we need to make in our life?

The meeting of two eternities, the past and future…is precisely the present moment. Henry David Thoreau

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