"Oprah & Eckhart Tolle: A New Earth" Chapter 4 guest Dionne Gray

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Dionne from Port of Spain, Trinidad
When Dionne called from Trinidad, she was having a problem using her new awareness to prevent herself from slipping into a role.

"Although I'm now aware of some of the roles that I play, it's really easy to flip back into them sometimes," she said. "I'm at the stage where I recognize that I'm playing a role after the moment has passed, but, I'd like to know, how do I recognize it in the moment before it happens, especially in those unexpected moments?"

As it turned out, her question was a common one.

"This applies to many, many people," Eckhart said. "I've heard this so many times. The awareness begins to grow, this dimension that we call presence or awareness. At first, the awareness does not necessarily flow into all parts of their lives."

In the heat of the moment, people play their conditioned role, but later on they realize they had fallen into their old pattern again. This is often how awareness first comes about, according to Eckhart. He told Dionne that she would begin to see the time gap between the event and the awareness eventually getting shorter.

"The next thing that happens is, in the middle of playing a role, you suddenly realize, 'Oh, I'm playing that role again,'" he said. "So the awareness has come in. You’re still doing it, but then you know that you’re doing it."

According to Eckhart, the next step after that for Dionne is noticing just before she is about to enter into a conditioned pattern and realizing she doesn't need to play that role.

Find out how Dionne is doing today...