fourthy, fifthly, sixthly....???
and blah blah blah...honestly, who has time to read all this drivel?

Quote
The Shadow
fourthy, fifthly, sixthly....???
and blah blah blah...honestly, who has time to read all this drivel?

sorry, i should have prefaced this comment with an address to CSP...i just scrolled through all this stuff, really don't have time to ponder all his/her regurgetations...

Interesting thread.
Just wanted to check in to say that I agree that Tolle is perpetrating a huge con.
Here, below, is an article on Hinduism Today, which laments the fact that although Tolle has obviously gleaned most of his ideas from Advaita, he refuses to name his sources. I believe this is part of the con; while most Westerners are familiar with Buddhism and vaguely know that it has something to do with mindfulness and meditation, Advaita is still largely unknown, and so his "teachings" come across as new and original. In fact, whatever is true in his teachings is simply ancient stuff known by all Hindus, and the rest is his imagination and often does not even make sense. It's the Emperor's New Clothes all over again.

Most of all, Tolle would have us believe that one experience of "Enlightenmnet" was enough for a lifetime, and that he is there.
What I see is ego gone amuck.

The Hinduism Today article finally takes a basically kind view of Tolle's failure to name his true sources, believing that at least he is opening minds to the Advaitic way of thinking. I'm not so kind; I feel it is the blind leading the blind.
Here's the article

Hello,

First of all I apologize if my redaction looks weird or has grammar or syntax errors. English is not my birth language, and I don't consider myself english-speaking. At least not at the level that this kind of forums could require.

I've been reading through almost a hundred of posts in a dozen of topics during last two weeks. Particularly about Tolle (and mostly about BK).

As I didn't have any idea about this woman before getting into this forum (I live in Colombia, the country), you are preventing me from wasting my time with her.

I want to refer to Tolle, from who I would say, I have enough "awareness". I read A New Earth and parts of The Power of Now.

As Anticult or Corbey (I don't quite remember which one), mentioned in one post, maybe if Tolle were restricted to only writing the PON he wouldn't have attracted that much attentions from those with expertise in cult detection.

From all the things that I have read, I don't consider the following the "key ones" to seriously doubt about Tolle (and I expose my reasons why):

- The suposed enlightenment experience. This could actually be truth. There is no way to probe it or not. It's quite possible that there many more enlightened people who just keep living their lifes and teach, to those close to them, by simple example and without premeditation.

- His association with the concept that mind is evil or our enemy. According to his most recent statements, mind is not ego. Indeed, he mentions mind as an extraordinary tool that needs and has to be used. His latest claiming is that ego is identification with thoughts that lead to emotional reactions that are totally useless. That's in my understanding, what the basis of being-in-the-now points to: accept the situation as is, don't judge it; don't take it personal; don't keep emotions related to that moment that add no value at all to the situation. As a matter of example, after taking the measures at my reach to reduce the risk of a personal financial crash or its impact, having thoughts about how would be that situation and feeling feared when having those thoughts is useless.

- The lack of reference to whom he studied and got his ideas from. I'm wondering, who were the source of knowledge for Buddha? As I don't know, I am going to figure out that Buddha did have a set of previous ones who were a source of knowledge to him. Now I'm wondering, who were the source for those sources? My point is that there could be an original enlightenment not depending in the knowledge of previous ones. If something like that could be possible, couldn't also be possible to happen again?

For me the serious issue, the one that really makes very, very difficult to be confident about Tolle is all the marketing stuff.
If he was truly interested in spreading this knowledge he would be using all of the resources to put it a everybody's hands as cheaper and easy as possible.
All his videos should been posted on youtube by himself or his followers and maybe small donations (i.e US$ 5 a year), could be accepted (the guy still has to eat, sleep, laundry, pay the bills). The whole amount of those donations should be made public and proof that the their exceeding is delivered to charity, should also be provided. The king's wife has not only to be virtuous, she has to seem so.
He could explain that his teaching can't be applied to all emotional thoughts. That people who has experienced any kind of abuse for a long time and specially in childhood requires professional attention.
And he could also teach to his students that after a while, they have to continue without him as any good and loving teacher always does.

After receiving such kind of proofs during several years, I think I could be confident about Tolle.

In the meantime I am going to explore clues like the one that Anticult mentioned about trustworthy uses of mindfulness. The information about the topic in wikipedia allowed me to know that there another western psychology aproaches to mindfulness in addition to MBCT.

Finally I want to state that I firmly believe that as human beings we grow up under an almost total emotional ignorance and that a lot of unnecessary suffering, could be prevented just by having the proper tools and knowledge.

Being taught to read and write as long as about maths, geography, history, etc. is considered an universal right, and expected to start when we are kids.
Being taught about how to recognize our emotions and how to properly handle them to be more humans, should also be consider the same way.

This surely will make almost impossible for gurus to have a fertile ground for their business (and to marketing in general :-))

Thank you very much for your contribution to my life.

Regards,

V

Hi everyone I posted here sometime ago (last year) and I have just come to accept my new state of being. I am not saying Eckhart Tolle is good or bad and in fact I only heard of him since I went through a similar (ego death) like he claims he did. I do believe Enlightenment is very real and one can be without thought at all and function normally and I am proof of this. I never followed any teachers though or cults I took up meditation without any guidance. For nearly 2 years now I have been completely free of "mental noise" or whatever you want to call it only silence of the mind remains and If I think it's really only to work something out or to resolve a problem, otherwise I don't really think about anything. I can choose to think or not to It's the way my mind is and I think meditation caused this permanent change. All I want to say is for those who managed to shut down their mind and remain with no thought I do think It can be permanent as I think it is for me you may have to accept it which I am. It seems when one reaches Enlightenment it's the point of no return. I don't know If I had a Kundalini awakening or not but I have heard the energy permanently changes the whole nervous system. I wouldn't necessarily say I'm less intelligent as the result of this "awakening" or whatever you want to call it I just don't think very much it's ironic because I used to analyze everything and I was stuck in my head.

Honestly it hasn't been easy getting used to having this new state of mind (If you look at my older posts) because with the inner voice gone so has a lot of my feelings as they were part of my mind. Living "in the now" has very much become my reality I rarely even daydream anymore and it was something I often did and came naturally. I believe this happens because my consciousness has taken over. My state hardly ever changes unless something outside of me triggers an emotional response (eg hearing a joke, watching a comedy hearing sad music) etc. Like say If I go out with my family or friends and I have a great time, in that moment I will feel great and happy etc but when the event finishes I am back into the state of "nothingness" or "no mind" whatever term you want to call it. So basically I am constantly content and peaceful inside until an event or person triggers some emotional response in me if you know what I mean.

I just wanted to share my experiences.

Cheers



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/07/2011 02:10AM by Calm.

Calm:

You are certainly free to "believe" whatever you wish.

But this is a subjective experience based upon your feelings.

It cannot be proven objectively, like Tolle's claims.