Wow, Master Puppetji is truly wise…

Linus

Heather & Barry,

Thanks very much for your thoughts related to this specific theme. I like the Master Puppetji’s wisdom….

I loved to listen to the last weeks Tele-Cast with Paul Check. A real hammer of wisdom, insight and thoughts.

I am looking forward to learn about your inside regarding Eckhart’s teaching.

At the end of the day we all have to live our own life. We do have a choice how we love doing it.

How do we transition all the knowledge, which is served from so many sources out there, in our life, into feel good?
Or should we rather do it the other way around and let most of the things, which are served from all the different sources, out of our lives, to feel good?

What is the truth? How do we produce real results? Why do we desire to produce results? Do we really have to think a lot, analyse everything, know all the different laws and own a kind of a truth for ourselves? How much does it really help us to live a fulfilled life?

We all are in different stages of life. We all have a choice. Do we have the courage to choose and live the way, we desire to live?
Or are we still prepared to be bothered by the society values like: possessions, looking pretty and young, fitting in, being smart, being successful and you name it?
Playing roles?

I am very happy to have a choice and to choose.

Love to all of you!

I just viewed your video presentation on the Eckhart Tolle effect, and I appreciate your insights. I have read both of his books, listened to all the Oprah webcasts, as well as Bill Harris’ series (centerpointe), and I have to say that I found Eckhart’s teachings to be extremely wise and beneficial. I do not believe he was setting himself up as a guru, nor claiming that those who did not agree or understand his work were unenlightened, or that his approach was “the only way.” The fact that most of us spend almost all of our time in the past and in the future, and are so identified with “our story” and labels is what keeps us from experiencing the beauty of our present NOW experience. I would not call that infantile regression by any means! I try to apply wisdom from a variety of sources, and do not deify any ONE of them, but I have to say that Eckhart Tolle is near the top of my list of those I have gained tremendous value from.

Keep exploring and investigating the field . . and bringing us your insights, as that does expand our horizons. It is not about agreement, but rather about experientially verifying that which works in our own lives, so there is much to apply. Thanks, and continued best regards!

Jim

Those who do not understand Eckhart Tolle and the books he has written are not ready to AWAKEN. If these people were ready they would understand Eckhart’s writings because he is NOT suggesting a theory - he is stating Absolute TRUTH. Only those who wish to remain in Illusion through their Ego/Painbody do not understand. Ego is afraid to lose It’s identity!

I’d just like to say that I endorse what Jim Hallett had to say. I actually didn’t listen to all of the video presentation because, although I enjoy listening to a variety of viewpoints, I found the presenting style quite aggressive, and the constant giggling rather annoying. I think they would have served their cause better by a calm analysis of what they saw as lacking in Eckhart Tolle’s thesis. I have read his book, and found much of it to be useful, reminding me as it did of where I began in my seeking many years ago with zen masters. I certainly agree with Jim when he talks about ‘experientially verifying that which works in our own lives’ - debate is interesting, but eventually, sitting silently with ourselves is where we find our own truth.
Thanks
Jan

I so agree with the above comments. I feel that Eckhart Tolle is greatly misunderstood by those who aren’t ready to receive the information, however, the seed is planted by the exposure. And that is enough. It was interesting and fascinating to see how millions of people were reached at the same time and millions more in the downloads. I liked that he did not put down other philosophies and beliefs. He did, however, point out the downside of organized religion.

And I must say that I am disappointed in the aggressive negative attitude of Manifest Life. I hope that isn’t some sort of jealousy or unnecessary competetive nature coming out. We all seek our Truth through many channels. Thank you for your contribution to my Truth.

Can’t wait to see this “new Goo Roo” on Oprah.

Just want to say that you will be hosed by ETs followers if you think you can get away with your (non) hosing of him…

Plus you will also lose some of your followers (and subscribers) at the same time.

Please be careful. I’m not that attached to ML. I still remember that Zeitgeist video…

You already have 8 comments defending ET!! Watch out!

Very interesting. Veeeerrrrryyyyy interesting indeed!

With the exception of Jim Hallett, every response defending Eckhart (like he needs to be defended when we are only giving you a critical thinker’s view of the “other side” of the story, like all good journalists and investigators do) just reeks of emotional reaction.

Yes, reaction rather than response. And we all know that reaction is irrational and response is rational… so what happened to rationality as soon as Eckhart’s name is mentioned?

We’re labelled “negative”, “aggressive”, we’re put down for expressing human emotions like laughter and perplexity — and yet the same people putting us down for that are reacting in ways that could certainly be labeled “negative”, “aggressive”, “angry”, “ridiculing”… any and all of the names they’re calling us, here and behind the scenes (there’s that fascinating mirror effect… something in what we said pushed their buttons, so they’re reacting with the same emotions that they’re claiming not to like in us, and some of them while claiming that they’re “more enlightened” and “more evolved” than the rest of us. Things that make you go “Hmmm”…)

Nobody (except one person on another post here) is stepping forward to say what specifically Eckhart helped them achieve… instead they just spout off the same rhetoric, that anyone who doesn’t understand it is not enlightened, not awakened, blah, blah, blah (and, by the way, we never said whether we understood his teachings or not; we’re doing this as a service for our community, some of whom no doubt, like us, find Eckhart’s teachings to be rather dry, cryptic, overly-authoritarian, and designed with a certain aim in mind… to shut down those who don’t agree or want to challenge any part of it by labeling them “unenlightened”, “not ready”, too engaged in the mind, and dealing with a “pain-body”.)

So… does all this emotional reaction from Eckhart’s “followers” not smell suspiciously like a “pain-body” in action? Or perhaps a hurt “ego”?

It’s like lemmings… they don’t think rationally, they just blindly follow, and end up dead at the bottom of a cliff as a result. There’s no moment of, “Hmmm…. maybe this ISN’T such a good idea, after all.”

They just leap before they look.

Just like some commenters here seem to be reacting before they think.

Ah, yes… but thinking is looked down upon by Eckhart, isn’t it? So instead of actually thinking through what is being said, what is not being said, and deciding how it affects your life, we’re getting profanity sent to our customer support desk and threats on the blog.

Interestingly, one person who wrote us an email to our customer support desk accused us of being threatened by Eckhart, when clearly she was the only one feeling a threat of any sort.

Apparently the same thing is going on over at Oprah’s forum. This is from the blog of a critical thinker named Monica Pignotti:

“I just checked in on Oprah’s messageboard discussion of her online class with Eckhart Tolle and noticed that critics are being trashed and shouted down by true believers who cannot stand to hear any criticism.”

And yes, this is exactly what is happening here, too.

To those that are thinking it through, and making your own decisions, congratulations. To those who just feel hurt and angry and feel a need to defend and/or threaten… well, we’re going to defend Eckhart here, and say that is NOT what he teaches or endorses. We’re not going to ask you to critically think anymore about whether it is, we’re going to supply this one… it’s not.

So we find it incredibly interesting that so many people react in ways that Eckhart does NOT endorse in order to defend him.

And if you have any deep thoughts around that, then, once again… we welcome people who can voice their thoughts and experiences, and show us all what Eckhart’s teachings have done for you, specifically.

That’s the kind of discussion we want to see here at Manifest Life (and not to take Eckhart’s buzz phrase, but if you’re “not ready” for that, then please don’t sign up to access any of the interviews in our portal, because some of them contain powerfully mind-bending, truthful, no-holds-barred stuff that just might rock your world).

And, to Thomas Marguccio (who can’t count; where d’ya see 8 “defending ET”?): while we find your thoughts of “protectionism” quite amusing, we’ll still sum it up for you: the last thing we care about is a subscriber removing themselves from our list due to their inability to hear about an upcoming “tough but fair” report (something that was pointed out in descriptive fashion on the blog post) about a highly-questionable self-proclaimed “enlightened being” — one that is condescending, somewhat redundant, potentially dangerously influential, and seems to relish engaging in confusing word-play.

A true leader or spiritual guru should NEVER claim to be “fully enlightened” or “in a state of higher consciousness all the time”. This is up to his followers to judge. And we, as a two-person team who has been purposely investigating and researching Metaphysical thought processes, usable strategies, and real-world spiritual methods for years, will release this REPORT knowing that, undoubtedly, his followers (some already showing signs of serious anti-intellectual programming) will actually end up enjoying the taste of “bad medicine” when it’s all said and done.

Barry & Heather

Never read a Tolle book before so I’m more han eager to do so. I am looking forward to you report and constrasting it with Tolle’s writing.

Loved Puppetji. The non attachment is a buddhist concept I think
Claudia

Just finished listening to mythbuster #5. I don’t watch Oprah (or the news in general for that matter). So, this is the first I have heard about Ekhart Tolle. Therefore, I really cannot comment either way on his philosophy. It is interesting though how your comment about him raised so many hackles!

I wanted to comment on your “final thoughts” on MB#5, and the Stuart Wilde quote. I thought you did very well in your “Barry” paraphrasing. When trying to explain the same thing to someone, I liken the Law of Attraction to the Law of Gravity. They are both laws of the universe, and the law of gravity states basically that what goes up must come down … period. It (the law of gravity) does not care what you threw up in the air, whether it will break or bounce upon coming down, whether it was expensive or cheap. It went up, its coming down and thats it. No emotion, no discrimination! So, in my humble opinion, “ya done good!” Keep up the interesting and enlightening work you two, I enjoy your straight forward, no holds barred bits of wisdom! Thanks! Leesa~*

I first heard ET audio version of “now” and remember thinking that he seemed to labour the point and it didn’t seem to go anywhere. But I’m the kind of person who has to completely read a book or listen to an audio version of the book from beginning to end. I found his style very ho-hum… but something obviously stuck with me because a few weeks later I experienced a major trauma in my life and all I could think of was “stay in the moment”, stay in the “now”. And it really helped pull me through that.

I’m not a total supporter of ET but something about what he’s saying and the way he obviously says it resonates within me. I’ve watched some of his interviews with Oprah and left feeling energised. ET is like everyone else… take from them what resonates with you at that time and run with it!

No one has a total answer for you… but we can all learn from everyone else so we can find the answer within our self

Jeanne

Jeanee, Eckhart Tolle isn’t the only person on the planet espousing the virtues of the power of NOW.

However, he is one of the very, very few who want you to distance yourself from your senses, mind, emotions, fantasies, intuitions, etc.

And, instead of showing people how to use this very basic Buddhist precept in a modern, practical way (as in “being in an awake state” to appreciate the occasional amazing moment in our life), he has made the pursuit of being “awakened or enlightened” into a western style competitive race.

It’s not a race and not what a conscious mind will allow to even remotely pass for spiritual evolution nowadays. Instead, enlightenment is an experience (it comes and goes), NOT a permanent way of life!

Instead of teaching people it’s “okay” to spout off completely useless spiritual soundbites and bubble-gum buzzwords — junk food “spirituality” proliferated by New Age fad-jumpers and the middle-aged blue collar Oprah crowd — we need to be responsible by explaining to people that life is way too complex to pretend to be a flower or a bird and forget about everything else.

As one of our readers put it: “savor the drama of human life and learn from it. If you suffer, be stronger. If you are comfortable, share your wealth. If you are in love, then love, love, love! We are not robots! We are passionate ‘human’ beings..”

Eckart Tolle, as you will soon find in detail via our REPORT, takes a very obtuse and indirect approach to say many of the same things that others like Viktor Frankl, Guy Finley, Stephen Covey, Rick Warren, and Stoic philosophers like Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius have said very clearly and directly.

WOW! I don’t think ET is implying that you are unenlightened for not finding “A New Earth” helpful. In fact, it seems to me that he would believe that you have begun to journey on that path in the work that you do.

I agree that the information ET puts out has been said and written by many –in many ways–and there is certainly nothing wrong with that. I read the Bible and studied it for years. I had major problems with some of the scriptures due to my upbringing in a narrow minded dogmatic religion. Reading ET brought together many of these wonderful philosophies.

I’m extremely grateful to just have all this information at hand, so that I can find what works best for me. Thanks for being a part of that.

For me, ET thinking is about awakening to your senses and your aliveness. It’s about being. I like the concept of your reporting on things but it would be better if you would not get so emotional and defensive over something that millions believe to be good information. I do appreciate your contributions as well. More effective though, if you didn’t come across as so emotional. Put out the information without the spin and let us glean what is helpful to us.

To Sandy:

[ YOU SAID ] - “it would be better if you would not get so emotional and defensive over something that millions believe to be good information.”

Yes, that sounds like something Eckhart would endorse, doesn’t it? No emotion, no thoughts.

And, therein lies the very REASON for being “passionate” (emotional) and “critical” (thoughtful) of a teacher who has potentially duped “millions” into believing that they’re flawed, broken, or unenlightened if they confront change, question his spiritual vague drivel, rant about something they dislike, or engage in any subject that is less than “feel-good” or “uplifting.”

Yep, dangerous, very dangerous !

We are advocating, with INTENSE PASSION and FLAIR (notice, how we’re now not using your perceived tainted word called “emotion”), the virtues of putting the examining spotlight on any body of knowledge or metaphysical advice that can not be understood UNLESS it is also believed (i.e., “if you don’t understand what I’m saying, then you’re not enlightened or ready to ‘get it’” — that kind of response by a teacher of Eckhart’s marketing stature is a cop-out of HUGE proportions).

And, just a tad more “insider insight” for you to ponder BEFORE our report becomes available:

—————————-

FROM Eckhart’s Website:

“More importantly than any words, however, these sessions represent an invaluable opportunity to allow yourself to be drawn into the awakened state by the intense conscious presence of the teacher and thus experience it first hand.”

—————————–

A LWL community member response, via our ticketing system ( hey, here’s some EMOTION for you ):

“Another spiritual teacher whoring their ‘presence’ for money. Does he care that this is like shitting directly into their students’ brains?

I’m a HUGE skeptic of anyone claiming you can catch something in their presence. I did many cliched spiritual things when younger, but always focused on things I could do myself (meditation, self-inquiry, etc.) because I assumed every guru out there was a flake.

But then, wouldn’t you know, I happened across a few spiritual people in whose presences I did get a spritz of peace or an uncontrollable-laughter-inducing momentary connection to a truer, effortless nature.

The difference between them and Tolle is that none of them ever claimed they were the cause of whatever I felt. So even if I returned to them a few more times, I was able to celebrate what happened to me and not celebrate the teacher.

I lost a bit of respect for Tolle.”

—————————————

Sandy, when we learn to not blindly accept somebody else’s truths, and to question how a concept, story, or idea may or may not work in our own lives, we learn to live life through personal inquiry instead of peer-pressure say-so.

And no, there’s nothing wrong with saying the same things many others have said; we never said there was. But Eckhart says it in a more cryptic way, and goes one step further by saying that if you don’t understand, you’re not ready to be enlightened.

Many people who have been enlightened time and time again would take exception to that; however, again, the simple act of disagreeing gets an “unenlightened” stamp from Eckhart.

Hello Arena,

I agree with what you say about the pain body - Once upon a time I would never have believed that what he is saying is truth, but having had a direct experience of it and saw how how it was my false self which needed to cling to this pain body as it gave me some kind of identity. To grow and expand we need to transcend this complete identification with the false self, and when we do we can know how this false self which contains so much of our `shadow` has been trying to protect us from seeing ourselves as we truly are. It has therefore kept us in stagnation and in thrall to society and consensual reality.
I do not think Eckart is courting Guruship and the worship of adoring fans and the money they bring with them - for me he is stating truths about human nature and giving us his insights which have come about through his innner journey, and it is up to us to accept whether we want to learn something from him or not.

I have found that when something gets up my nose where other people are concerned then I am disowning something in myself and projecting outside that part of me which I don`t want to own. When we can spot these projections there is a very valuable lesson contained in them if we can have the courage to look inside ourself.

Just wanted to say, you guys think way too much and make things complicated. Please take with you - by applying it into your life - of what resonates and makes sense to you. Whatever makes you feel good and makes your heart sing. Wherever the source may be. Take comfort everyone here is doing the same — going about on their journey on their path to their inner truth/awareness.
The learning/insight ultimately comes effortless when we are open to receive it, and you know it always comes at the right moment
Lets attempt to be gentle with each other wherever we may be. Remember we are ultimately here for the evolution of the collective consciousness.
Peace to all.

WOW

“And, therein lies the very REASON for being “passionate” (emotional) and “critical” (thoughtful) of a teacher who has potentially duped “millions” into believing that they’re flawed, broken, or unenlightened if they confront change, question his spiritual vague drivel, rant about something they dislike, or engage in any subject that is less than “feel-good” or “uplifting.”

Yep, dangerous, very dangerous ! ”

It is really amazing to hear this from someone who claims to be able to report on something. I could say this about some other stuff out there that seems to be more acceptable. Did you get the last emails from Bob “the car salesman” proctor. I’d love to get a dollar for every time he snapped his fingers saying that wealth was that easy if I bought his product… Those LOA gurus are much more dangerous in my opinion.

How can anyone take your “report” seriously if you use this type of language. This dicussion reminds me of a debate between a born again christian, a rabbi and an iman.. All saying that their god was better than the others, when in fact they have the same god!!

Tolle doesn’t have all the answers, Bob Proctor doesn’t either, Bob Doyle with is EFT doesn’t either, but maybe an intelligent discussion about the three can bring about an understanding. for example, the secret talks about asking then letting go of resistance. believe you have the item you want to manifest. Take some of ET’s methods, and you can achieve this letting go, if not then start tapping your head and saying some self asserting satements…

I read a little bit of the Oprah posts but quickly stopper because of the useless posts people were posting (mostly in capitals). And that is the point. I want to hear intelligent counter points of views on these topics. I read his books and have obtained something worthwhile. I don’t agree with everything he says but I don’t feel threatened by the “not ready” clause. Who cares about that? Weak minded people who write in capitals i would guess..