Now, What?

The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle is one of the five books I brought to Bohol to read. It was the shortest of the five; up to now I’m still not finished reading it. I find it difficult to read because it repeats the same basic idea over and over—being in the Now. But there is reason behind that: most people are not used to being in the Now, which is why he takes time to repeat it again and again. It’s not as easy as it sounds: silencing your noisy mind and just surrendering to the Now.

However, there is this section in chapter eight on “Enlightened Relationships” that I feel expresses better what I was trying to grasp at regarding “love” in the earlier episodes of The McVie Show. When I read it I had to stop. It gave me a glimpse—just a glimpse, but what a sight!—of what I felt was the bigger, broader meaning of “love,” and how this affects our different relationships. But the more I read it again and again, the more I got a headache. Jeez.

The heading where the following paragraphs are lifted is quite telling: “From addictive to enlightened relationships”:

Love is a state of Being. Your love is not outside; it is deep within you. You can never lose it, and it cannot leave you. It is not dependent on some other body, some external form.

Love is not selective, just as the light of the sun is not selective. It does not make one person special. It is not exclusive. Exclusivity is not the love of God but the “love” of ego. However, the intensity with which true love is felt can vary. There may be one person who reflects your love back to you more clearly and more intensely than others, and if that person feels the same toward you, it can be said that you are in a love relationship with him or her. That bond that connects you with that person is the same bond that connects you with the person sitting next to you on the bus, or with a bird, a tree, a flower. Only the degree of intensity with which it is felt differs.

See why it’s so hard to finish the book?