Stillness Speaks by Eckhart Tolle.

The book, Stillness Speaks by Eckhart Tolle points clearly, ways to freedom: awareness, acceptance, just being.

I learnt that simply becoming aware is a liberating experience. Becoming aware of the thoughts. Becoming aware of the space in which the moment happens. And becoming aware of the now. Right now is all there is. The past happens in the now. The future happens in the now. So this moment is simply to be experienced. And bringing acceptance adn awareness to that experience is what deepens the space in which all this happens.

Written with crystal clarity, this book brings deep insight, helping us to free our minds from the habitual ego-mind and to bring compassion towards ourselves and towards others for being in the graps of the ego. It also sheds light on the beauty of surrender: surrendering to the present moment.

The messages in this book are presented in short nuggets of wisdom, written in short paragraphs. I loved this style as it allowed me to reflect on the points presented here after each paragraph. The questions that Eckhart asks throughout the text is a wonderful launching pad of my own introspection. For instance, on page 28, he asks:

Can you see that this "I" is fleeting, a temporary function, like a wave pattern on the surface of the water?

The "I" he is referring to is the identity of the self derived from the ego: name, occupation, gender, our life stories. All of the external ways of identifying ourselves refer to the form, the body, not the formless that is within each of us. And this formless I Am is eternal, Echkart states. This is the I AM that you are. Beyond all the classifications, titles, labels and names of all sorts, you are limitless, unbounded, and infinite.

This kind of reflective question reveals something within me that is beyond words and concepts. It seems paradoxical that in thinking about these insights brings me to a space within that is beyond thoughts. In this way, the thoughts serve beautifully in enabling the experience of peace and stillness that rises from beyond the thinking and the thoughts.

This book was introduced to me by Oprah in one of her conversations with Eckhart. It is a book that he wrote before, A New Earth which for me laid a wonderful foundation for reading Stillness Speaks and made the material easily graspable for me in my mind as well as in my heart.

I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to feel at peace and find ways to connect with oneself and with the space within us in a deep, full way. It is a truly life-enhancing book.

Love,

Sophia