A New Earth – Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose
If you’re like everyone else and his brother (or you’re a 2008 Stanford grad), you know all about Oprah’s book club selection earlier this year of Eckhart Tolle’s best-seller, A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose
A New Earth is Tolle’s follow-up to The Power of Now
What on earth does this have to do with parenting and dating? A lot.
If you’re pissed off about your circumstance – being a single parent, being divorced, lacking a relationship, enduring online dating, lacking booty, lacking intimacy, having a sexy moment interrupted by kids, feeling your opinions attacked, whatever it is – and you’re wanting, craving, lashing out, demanding change, then you’re stuck in thought and missing out on the simple joy of Being.
As Tolle writes, The joy of Being, which is the only true happiness, cannot come to you through any form, possession, achievement, person, or event - through anything that happens. That joy cannot come to you - ever. It emanates from the formless dimension within you, from consciousness itself and thus is one with who you are.
This doesn’t mean your situation won’t or can’t get better. It just means for right now, life is what it is. You exist. Why not enjoy it? Stop minding so much.
There are tons of books on learning to live a heartfelt life. What I like about A New Earth is Tolle’s mix of philosophy and straight-forward advice. For instance, he suggests when a parent is with a child, if the parent can be alert, still, completely present, not wanting anything other than that moment as it is – then you make room for Being. You stop being a father or mother, and you become Presence, beyond form, the timeless I Am. When the basis for your actions is inner alignment with the present moment, your actions become empowered by the intelligence of Life itself. Applied here, it sounds like a prescription for getting along with and loving your kids.
These concepts may be heady stuff for anyone who hasn’t delved into spirituality, especially Eastern modes of thought. But Tolle breaks it down further, suggesting there are three modes to help you enter life through the present moment, and align your life with the creative power of the universe.
- Acceptance – accept life as it is. Don’t assign blame. This doesn’t mean things can’t or won’t change for the better. It simply encourages a stillness to emerge. That peace is consciousness. Consciousness is your own responsibility, and it’s the first step toward self awareness.
- Enjoyment – enjoy what you’re doing. Don’t wait for something joyful to happen. You don’t need an event to occur. Joy is an aspect of Being. Infuse your activities with joy. It comes from within you. Allow yourself to feel that deep sense of aliveness.
- Enthusiasm – this is joy directed toward a goal. You’ll feel intensity and energy behind what you do. That’s the universal spirit. If the goal becomes more important than enjoying what you are doing, you’ll feel stress.
Things, emotions, thoughts, struggles – these come into our lives, seem all-important for a time, then disappear, dissolving back into the nothing-ness from which they arose. Resistance is futile and leads to intense unhappiness. Non-resistence brings freedom.
So - got a pile of dishes to do and no spouse to do it for you? Don’t bemoan your lack of a partner, or the present mess. Accept that you’re on your own right now. Enjoy the act of creating a clean and healthy environment for you and your kids.
Friday night and no date? Embrace it. Pay attention to sites, smells, sounds around you. Maybe you’ll read a good book, hit a coffee house, have fun at a bar, meet someone new at the supermarket. You won’t do any of those if you’re sulking, angry at the past, wanting a different future.
Cranky kids got you down? Acknowledge they are young, immature, childish. Be happy and grateful they are exploring their lives and surroundings, discovering their feelings, dealing with emotions, whatever it is. They are living. You are present.
I can’t possibly boil down Tolle’s book into a single blog post, but hopefully I’ve given a fair overview. It’s definitely a good read. And on that note, it’s time to get off my new-age soap box. Dad’s House will now return to non-Oprah programming.
(Is texting an ex for booty okay if it’s done with joy and enthusiasm?)
- Single Parent, Empty House, Full Life
- How to Date Four Women at Once
- Tantric Sex (Dad’s House post on Silicon Valley Moms Blog)
- Play the Game of Life
- Great Books for Relationship and Divorce Advice
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