A New Earth: Awakening To Your Life's Purpose
Many people feel trapped by their lives. They have responsibilities they don’t want, or lack the opportunities that they think they deserve. When life feels this way, it may seem limited and small. However, this is just an illusion of the mind. In his book A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose, Eckhart Tolle informs readers that in reality, life is unlimited if we discover who we really are and identify our true purpose. Tolle explains that we are really one with the universe, and since the universe is infinite, so are we. Therefore, in order to find peace and contentment, we need to see that the self and the universe are unified.
In his book, Tolle explains that the thing that we identify as the self is actually just the ego, and …show more content…
In his poem “My Life,” Billy Collins shows this kind of attitude in action. First, Collins describes how he used to wonder what his life was, but does not do that anymore. He writes, “I will cease to wonder if it is one thing, a large ball of air and memory, or many things, a string of small farming towns, a dark road winding through them.” As this quote shows, Collins knows that life can seem to be many different things, just like the self can be confused by the ego as Tolle explains in his book. But then Collins goes on to compare his life to a field that he works on, a nest, a hallway, and finally a lake. In my opinion, the meaning of this poem is that our life has many different aspects, and we cannot pin it down to just one thing. He uses many metaphors for his life, but the one he likes the most is the one he mentions at the end when he writes, “I am a lake, my poem is an empty boat, and my life is the breeze that blows through the whole scene.” This seems to suggest that life is an activity that we can create content for as we go along. This is exactly the way that Tolle encourages us to think. Our daily life is an activity, not who we are. We can do many things, but our identity does not change because in fact we are actually just part of the universe. When we remember that, we stop worrying about other problems because they will seem so
In his book, Tolle explains that the thing that we identify as the self is actually just the ego, and …show more content…
In his poem “My Life,” Billy Collins shows this kind of attitude in action. First, Collins describes how he used to wonder what his life was, but does not do that anymore. He writes, “I will cease to wonder if it is one thing, a large ball of air and memory, or many things, a string of small farming towns, a dark road winding through them.” As this quote shows, Collins knows that life can seem to be many different things, just like the self can be confused by the ego as Tolle explains in his book. But then Collins goes on to compare his life to a field that he works on, a nest, a hallway, and finally a lake. In my opinion, the meaning of this poem is that our life has many different aspects, and we cannot pin it down to just one thing. He uses many metaphors for his life, but the one he likes the most is the one he mentions at the end when he writes, “I am a lake, my poem is an empty boat, and my life is the breeze that blows through the whole scene.” This seems to suggest that life is an activity that we can create content for as we go along. This is exactly the way that Tolle encourages us to think. Our daily life is an activity, not who we are. We can do many things, but our identity does not change because in fact we are actually just part of the universe. When we remember that, we stop worrying about other problems because they will seem so