Personal avowals

• 'I cannot live with myself any longer.' This was the thought that kept repeating itself in my mind. Then suddenly I be-
  came aware what a peculiar thought it was. 'Am I one or two? If I cannot live with myself, there must be two of me: the
  'I' and the 'self' that 'I' cannot live with.' 'Maybe,' I thought, 'only one of them is real.' I was so stunned by this strange realization that my mind stopped. I was fully conscious, but there were no more thoughts. Then I felt drawn into what seemed like a vortex of energy. It was a slow movement at first and then accelerated. I was gripped by an intense fear, and my body started to shake. I heard the words 'resist nothing,' as if spoke inside my chest. I could feel myself being sucked into a void. It felt as if the void was inside myself rather than outside. Suddenly there was no more fear, and
  I let myself fall into that void. Eckhart Tolle (*1948) German-born Canadian teacher on spirituality, bestselling author, The
  Power of Now. A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment, Namaste Publishing, 1997, New World Library, 1999

• That's an important point for many people to reach. That sense of deep crisis – when the world as they have known it, and the sense of self that they have known that is identified with the world, become meaningless. That happened to me. I was just that close to suicide and then something else happened – a death of the sense of self that lived through identifi-
  cations, identifications with my story, things around me, the world. Interview with Eckhart Tolle (*1948) German-born Cana-
  dian teacher on spirituality, bestselling author, Ripples on the Surface of Being, presented by the dissolved US American magazine What is Enlightenment? / Enlightennext, ⚡ Andrew Cohen (*1955) resigned US American enlightenment guru (1986-2013), musician, founder of the dissolved magazine What is Enlightenment? / EnlightenNext, author, issue 34, 2006

Future prospects

• SOM: Do you believe that humanity is ready for this transformation?
  E. Tolle: Yes, I see signs that it is already happening. For the first time there is a large scale awakening on our planet. Why now? Because if there is no change in human consciousness now, we will destroy ourselves and perhaps the planet. The insanity of the collective egoic mind, amplified by science and technology, is rapidly taking our species to the brink of disaster. Evolve or die: that is our only choice now. Without considering the Eastern world, my estimate is that at this time about ten percent of people in North America are already awakening. That makes thirty million Americans alone, and in addition to those people in other North American countries, about ten percent of the popu-
  lation of Western European countries are also awakening. This is probably enough of a critical mass to bring about
  a new earth. So the transformation of consciousness is truly happening even though they won’t be reporting it on to-
  night’s news. Is it happening fast enough? I am hopeful about humanity’s future, much more so now than when I wrote
  The Power of Now. In fact, that is why I wrote that book. I really wasn't sure that humanity was going to survive. Now
  I feel differently. I see many reasons to be hopeful.
  Interview with Eckhart Tolle (*1948) German-born Canadian teacher on spirituality, bestselling author, Creating a New Earth Together, presented by the US American magazine Science of Mind, Kathy Juline, reissued by eckhart teachings, 2018

Insights

• The opposite of life is not death. The opposite of death is birth. Life has no opposite. Life is eternal.
  Eckhart Tolle (*1948) German-born Canadian teacher on spirituality, bestselling author, Stillness Speaks, New World Library,
  new edition 1. August 2003