First, I started looking at abstractions that pop up in my life:
Generalizations, like "science", "politics"
Large collections, like "the Chinese", the solar system
Then, I started thinking about time. I knew that Tolle's books focus on the present moment and the fact that the past, a minute or a millennium ago, is gone. I have read that William James, American psychology/philosophy thinker, thought that we could consider the present moment to be as long as 17 seconds. I haven't tracked down that idea, where he got that figure or just what he was thinking about. Right now, I don't think the present moment is that long. It only takes a shorter time to spill my milk.
Once I really started thinking about the duration of the present, I felt that it is something I feel I can sense and experience but I have a difficult time thinking about it. Each key I strike writing this is an old action by the time I reach the period. I knew the joke that when I ask a dog what time it is, the answer is always "Now!" I knew that The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle is related to the subject of now so I started re-reading his book. I found his "Stillness Speaks" quite helpful before but this time, The Power of Now seems clear and useful. I suspect that a big piece that has fallen in place in my understanding is Eagleman's "Incognito" and his illustration of a conscious human mind as a proud traveler on the top deck of a giant passenger ship with hundreds of crew members, an experienced captain, a skilled navigator and a giant powerful engine. The traveler has the illusion that he is conducting the voyage and is ignoring the 95% of the reason he moves. The traveler, Eagleman says is my mind, while my brain is the greater part of the cause and governance of me.
With this distinction between full brain and conscious but smaller and more limited mind, I read Tolle's remarks quite differently.
Then suddenly I became aware of what a peculiar thought it was. "Am I one or two? If I cannot live with myself, there must be two of me: the 'I' and the 'self' that 'I' cannot live with." "Maybe," I thought, "only one of them is real."
Tolle, Eckhart. The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment (p. 4). New World Library. Kindle Edition.
