Transcending the Self.

In this episode, Eckhart reflects on his signature teaching, awareness of the present moment.

He says, when we focus on the here and now, our senses become heightened.

We smell a familiar flower as if it were the very first time, or we reread a favorite book and understand it in a whole new way.

Eckhart says when we give any experience our full attention,

that is the first step towards what he calls self-transcendence.

He explains, we release our limited perceptions and connect with the aliveness of the universe.

Welcome, everybody, in the present moment. Welcome to the present moment, in case you've been

missing it, easy to miss, by too much thinking.

So we begin by, I'm not going to call it a meditation.

Let's put that word aside.

There's nothing wrong with meditation,

but I'm just not going to call this meditation.

Let's begin by becoming aware of the present moment, more aware than you would normally be,

or for some people the first time. Today you're actually acknowledging the present moment.

Where is it? Of course you can't see it, but what you see, you can only see it in the present moment. So you can't see the present moment, but whatever you see happens in the present moment, seeing is inseparable from the present moment. Now, I can't hear the present moment either,

but you can only hear whatever you're hearing in the present moment. It's a prerequisite for hearing

and other sense perceptions too. They all happen in the present moment. They're inseparable from the present moment.

So you cannot perceive the present moment, of course, but the entry point, a good entry point,

or portal into the present moment are sensory perceptions

to become more acutely aware, or for some people, aware of something that they had been

habitually missing most of their life, which is the aliveness of whatever it is that's around them that is being perceived now.

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