Eckhart Tolle distinguishes the foreground of perception — sensations, thoughts, situations that come and go — from the still background of awareness that contains them. He argues most of what one is does not actually exist in this dimension.
Transcript
While you're aware of all this, can you sense the consciousness that you are? The presence, the silent presence, one could say, the silent presence in the background of your perceptions. And then you can sit here and instead of being a person perceiving this through the veil of the person's conditioning you sit here perceiving this room not through your personal sense of self but through the simple uncluttered pure awareness. And so that and that awareness is the still background to your sense perception so to speak. So you're aware of the foreground and in the foreground things appear and disappear appear and disappear. Impermanence fleetiness of everything. A house is built, then the house collapses or burns down, bodies are born, grow, and then they get old and then they die and and situations they come, they go very quickly. Uh all these things happen in the foreground. Everything happens in the foreground and even your thinking is one could say is still the foreground of what happens in your mind. It's the foreground ultimately everything happens in your mind and but the background is the the stillness behind it that which is the awareness. So and this is what this is what I the Indian term sahaja samadi would be in both worlds. So samadei itself you could totally withdraw and forget all about the the so-called external world. Sahi you can be in both worlds. So you sit here aware of everything. and present. There's the presence in the background and that is also stillness and that is your essence identity not the narrative of your person that is the narrative that calls itself my life. That's a short-lived phenomenon. So you are essentially the presence. That's a wonderful realization. And then especially when things in the foreground become difficult because you lose something in the foreground. There's gain and there's loss. You gain something then you lose something. There's success and there's failure. until you have the opposites. There's even happiness and unhappiness. Happiness and unhappiness. Oh, and but they can't even when as happiness arises and there's still the stillness in the background. His happiness is still there, but even the happiness doesn't take you over because you have something more vital and deeper. So the happiness doesn't make you go, "Wow, yeah, I got it. Wow." And two days later, oh, I'm devastated. I thought I could trust this person. It was such a wonderful person. I've been deceived. That was horrible to all coll or whatever it is or you went to some place that was prom promised some kind of fulfillment and then you get there. Oh n oh oh no. So this the fluctuation happiness unhappiness there's something deeper than happiness and unhappiness and that's the the stillness behind it all and from there you can observe. So and then something that makes you unhappy it doesn't devastate you which is let's say unfort if you have a witnessing something that is usually would usually be called tragic or let's say your house is burned down unfortunately it's can happen then you are there you're not of course you're not happy but and of course you you could say you're unhappy but not in the it touch it does not touch the deepest levels of your being anymore. It it it remains a surface ron. Um Now the presence consciousness, awareness. How do we use these words? One could say that when we say awareness, that means consciousness has become conscious of itself because you are consciousness. Then you become conscious of yourself as consciousness. Consciousness is the the greatest mystery in the universe. Even greater much greater than even the mystery of outer space. Infinite number of galaxies. The mystery of atomic and subatomic particles al mysterious realm. But the most mysterious is consciousness. Nobody can tell you what it is because if you're looking for it, trying to examine it, it's it's like a um let's say you have a flashlight and you're you're shining the light the you're using the flashlight to look for the flashlight. You're losing in the flight of you're looking for it. So consciousness scientists have a problem with consciousness because you cannot put it under a microscope. You cannot dissect it. It is never it is not an object that you can see. Everything else is an object. But consciousness is the eternal subject. Where does it come from? The prevalent belief is in mainstream science that or Edov mainstein doesn't know what it is but it kind implies that consciousness is a byproduct of matter. Matter being in the case of humans the human brain. And so the belief is that consciousness somehow the chem the che the the chemical soup of the brain which is a jellyike substance in your head. This jellyike substance which nobody it's incredibly comp complex and somehow they say this produces something that is nonmaterial. So there's matter of the matter of the constant and then it produces something that is not matter. How is that possible? How can the the chemical brain produce uh the all this uh beautiful works of art, music, technology, all and this experience of this moment nobody knows but some of the great scientists they recognized That consciousness ultimately is not a product of the brain but transcends all that. That it is that the foundation of the universe is not matter physical ma but consciousness itself. And here we come to my phone. Now, is this phone conscious? I don't know. It may be on its way to consciousness. Would it produce consciousness or would it be a receiver of consciousness? Your brain does it produce consciousness or is it like a radio that receives consciousness from and and then transforms it into mind stuff and into thoughts and into words? Does it does your brain receive consciousness or produce consciousness? For example, there was a one of the most famous physicists, um, Max Blan, German physicist, the founder of quantum mechanics. If you want to know what that is, go to Google. And so but he was one of the great scientists uh more or less a contemporary of Einstein. There were there was a group of great physicists at that time that dis had made enormous discoveries in the realm of the subatomic realm. So Max Blanc said, "I regard consciousness as fundamental. I regard matter as derivative derivative from consciousness." This of course goes against the traditional scientific view of material reality as the basis for it all. And he also said all matter originates and exists only by virtue of a force which brings the particle of an atom to vibration and holds this most minute solar system which is the atom together. We must assume behind this force the existence of a conscious and intelligent mind. The consciousness is the intelligence behi behind all the phenomena that we see in the so-called physical world. There's an organizing principle and int vast intelligence behind it all. And this vast intelligence of course it's invisible in the same way that most of you is invisible. It's perhaps comes at a surprise maybe you hadn't thought about it when I say that most of you are is invisible. What? When I see you, I see your body and I can perhaps draw some conclusions as to your mind by observing your behavior or your words. Then I can learn a little bit about your mind. But mostly and even that is still comes through the body. But if somebody was looking for you in the physical realm, let's say a surgeon, looking for you by cutting open your skull and examining your brain, which is supposedly that's where it all lives. The scientist or the surgeon cutting open your bra your brain would not find a single thing that he could call you. Your countless memories, all the things that go on your mind. He wouldn't know what language you speak. He wouldn't know where the memory of your parents or grandparents is. He can't say, "Oh, there's the grandmother." They say I found a molecule that represents the grandmother and then she and there's a there molecule of the language of spe person was speaking. No wouldn't he couldn't see he can he if if the brain is damaged he could find he could say yes there are damages in the brain and this is perhaps why the person suffered from dementia because the brain had become defective. This is similar to the examining a radio and when the music is no longer coming through very well. You examine the radio and it's and you see that rust particles have accumulated and and so it's not functioning very well anymore. But what you consider to be you are an invisible phenomenon. Every because every thought is already exists in the realm of invisibility. Yes. it. The brain is necessary in the way the same way that the radio is necessary to play the music. But you are essentially an an invisible entity and which means most of you does not even exist in this dimension.