What do you think?
Rate this book
Freedom from the World: Bridging the Dimensions of Form and Formlessness
Teachings on Bridging the Dimensions of Form and Formlessness
Once there was a student who asked the master, "How can I become free of the world?" The reply: "Love the world and everything in it." How do we handle this paradox? By allowing and accepting what is. This is the simple yet life-changing teaching Eckhart Tolle shares on Freedom from the World, a retreat with the bestselling author of The Power of Now.
Deepening Our Perception of Who We Really Are
Many people with worldly success report they’re actually miserable, begins Eckhart. This is because worldly possessions and accomplishments will only bring short-term fulfillment when our lives are not rooted in the unified, unmanifested source of life itself—or what Eckhart often calls "the formless dimension." By discovering who we are in our most essential nature, he explains, we naturally begin to transform the world even as we transcend it. Freedom from the World brings you nine sessions with Eckhart, exploring how to be and act simultaneously in the material realm and in the formless dimension.
"You are a blessing on the planet when you are in touch with the spacious, formless dimension within yourself," teaches Eckhart. Freedom from the World brings you empowering teachings for bridging the dimensions of form and formlessness and living with renewed joy, peace, and a sense of a meaningful purpose.
Highlights
• Breaking the cycle of reincarnating thoughts
• Sense perceptions, the inner body, and on-the-spot inquiries that serve as "portals to presence"
• Simple practices to deepen daily interactions with others
• Embracing the inherent goodness of life
• Knowing the deeper truth that pervades the ever-changing content of your life
• More than twelve hours of teachings on living in the world while rooted in Being
Once there was a student who asked the master, "How can I become free of the world?" The reply: "Love the world and everything in it." How do we handle this paradox? By allowing and accepting what is. This is the simple yet life-changing teaching Eckhart Tolle shares on Freedom from the World, a retreat with the bestselling author of The Power of Now.
Deepening Our Perception of Who We Really Are
Many people with worldly success report they’re actually miserable, begins Eckhart. This is because worldly possessions and accomplishments will only bring short-term fulfillment when our lives are not rooted in the unified, unmanifested source of life itself—or what Eckhart often calls "the formless dimension." By discovering who we are in our most essential nature, he explains, we naturally begin to transform the world even as we transcend it. Freedom from the World brings you nine sessions with Eckhart, exploring how to be and act simultaneously in the material realm and in the formless dimension.
"You are a blessing on the planet when you are in touch with the spacious, formless dimension within yourself," teaches Eckhart. Freedom from the World brings you empowering teachings for bridging the dimensions of form and formlessness and living with renewed joy, peace, and a sense of a meaningful purpose.
Highlights
• Breaking the cycle of reincarnating thoughts
• Sense perceptions, the inner body, and on-the-spot inquiries that serve as "portals to presence"
• Simple practices to deepen daily interactions with others
• Embracing the inherent goodness of life
• Knowing the deeper truth that pervades the ever-changing content of your life
• More than twelve hours of teachings on living in the world while rooted in Being
Audio CD
Published April 1, 2016
7 people are currently reading
144 people want to read
About the author
Eckhart Tolle
273 books10.8k followersEckhart Tolle is a German-born spiritual teacher and internationally bestselling author whose work has profoundly influenced the contemporary spiritual landscape. Born Ulrich Leonard Tölle in 1948 in Lünen, Germany, he experienced a transformative spiritual awakening at the age of 29 after years of depression and anxiety. This profound shift in consciousness marked the beginning of his journey as a spiritual guide and thinker. Tolle abandoned his doctoral studies at the University of Cambridge to explore and embody the stillness and presence he had discovered, eventually becoming a spiritual teacher based in London and later in Vancouver, Canada.
Tolle rose to prominence with the publication of The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment in 1997. The book, which emphasizes mindfulness and present-moment awareness, resonated with a global audience and was later championed by Oprah Winfrey, catapulting it to international bestseller status. In 2005, Tolle released A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose, which expanded on his earlier teachings and explored the role of ego in personal and societal dysfunction. The book also achieved massive commercial success, further solidifying Tolle’s reputation as one of the most influential spiritual authors of his time.
His teachings draw from a variety of traditions, including Zen Buddhism, Christian mysticism, Sufism, and Hindu philosophy, though he remains unaffiliated with any formal religion. Tolle emphasizes a non-dualistic approach to spirituality, focusing on the importance of presence, inner stillness, and the disidentification from ego-based thinking. His accessible language and calm demeanor have helped millions integrate spiritual practice into daily life.
In addition to writing, Tolle has delivered talks, retreats, and webinars to audiences around the world. In 2008, he partnered with Oprah Winfrey to produce a groundbreaking webinar series based on A New Earth, attracting millions of viewers. He also co-authored the illustrated book Guardians of Being in 2009, further exploring his core themes through the lens of animals and nature.
Tolle currently lives in Vancouver with his partner, spiritual teacher Kim Eng. Together, they continue to teach and support global audiences through online content, publications, and events. Widely regarded as one of the most spiritually influential figures of the 21st century, Tolle’s message of inner peace and awakening remains as timely as ever.
Tolle rose to prominence with the publication of The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment in 1997. The book, which emphasizes mindfulness and present-moment awareness, resonated with a global audience and was later championed by Oprah Winfrey, catapulting it to international bestseller status. In 2005, Tolle released A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose, which expanded on his earlier teachings and explored the role of ego in personal and societal dysfunction. The book also achieved massive commercial success, further solidifying Tolle’s reputation as one of the most influential spiritual authors of his time.
His teachings draw from a variety of traditions, including Zen Buddhism, Christian mysticism, Sufism, and Hindu philosophy, though he remains unaffiliated with any formal religion. Tolle emphasizes a non-dualistic approach to spirituality, focusing on the importance of presence, inner stillness, and the disidentification from ego-based thinking. His accessible language and calm demeanor have helped millions integrate spiritual practice into daily life.
In addition to writing, Tolle has delivered talks, retreats, and webinars to audiences around the world. In 2008, he partnered with Oprah Winfrey to produce a groundbreaking webinar series based on A New Earth, attracting millions of viewers. He also co-authored the illustrated book Guardians of Being in 2009, further exploring his core themes through the lens of animals and nature.
Tolle currently lives in Vancouver with his partner, spiritual teacher Kim Eng. Together, they continue to teach and support global audiences through online content, publications, and events. Widely regarded as one of the most spiritually influential figures of the 21st century, Tolle’s message of inner peace and awakening remains as timely as ever.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
May 28, 2018
Transcendentalism, for me, nudges up to the Truth as close as anything I've investigated, lived, tried--at least to this point. The fact that Tolle hasn't made himself into a prophet or demi-god, that he constantly points back to personal, interior experience, and preaches a gospel of extant wholeness beneath a facade of disconnection, feels true to me. He is repetitive but gets at the same things from different angles in his various talks. The practices have also proved quite, life-changing in a relatively short amount of time, the moment to moment noticing my thoughts and emotions, noticing when old hurts take over, being in the body, being present through breath and allowing stillness to spread into whatever activities with which I'm engaged. When I allow these things to be the background of action, life is more peaceful and meaningful regardless of what I'm doing or what is coming at me.
We're listening to 10 minutes of this one before bed each night with our kids.
We're listening to 10 minutes of this one before bed each night with our kids.
December 10, 2019
Never take thoughts too seriously. Language always creates a duality. What you do is more important than who you are (personal identity) or what you are (social role). To speak from presence (not preparing the next thing to say), is to speak from space. To speak from space is to let God speak through the body.
Conscious breathing throughout a single day is worth more than one hundred books on spirituality. Nothing real can be threatened, that’s the peace of God. Thinking plus emotions creates ego. Dissolving into space is the opposite of ego. It’s the opposite side of the consciousness attention sphere. The form of each moment changes continuously. Understanding the bright white light of death is like understanding the difference between grouping and symmetry order. God is the formless. All form is limit, because form can only exist through limitations. The opposite of life isn’t death, it’s birth. Life has no opposite. There is a web (of space-time) where everything is connected.
There’s a clear relationship between one’s inner state and external reality. Thought informs behavior, and feelings culminate inaction. Life cannot flow through you if you’re dependent on form and outcome.
Your life’s purpose is to transcend ego. Spiritual practice is all about bringing into consciousness what was unconscious. Whatever you bring your presence to us your spiritual teacher at this moment. The dilemma of all spiritual thinkers is to dissolve enlightenment as a goal. Goals are outside of the present moment, and therefore irrelevant to enlightenment being in a future state. Enlightenment is always available to everyone through and in the present moment. By giving up the search, we can realize it’s always already here. The greatest obstacle to God is time.
The ego is a necessary stage for enlightenment. By not losing yourself in the conditions, you find freedom. Healing only comes after acceptance. The mental concept of an illness has the power to create that illness itself. The funny thing is, when I look back on my life, it’s simply one mistake after another.
Fear is only a conception because it references some uncertain future event. All other negative emotions stem from fear. A life lived in only the realm of concepts becomes boring quickly, because the differences that make life interesting are reduced to generalized conceptualizations. To enjoy the interesting details of life, liberate them from concepts. Nothing new ever arises out of the same state of mind/consciousness.
Thought only becomes problematic when it is believed to be or identified with you, then it becomes ego. Thoughts trend toward problems because problems generate more thoughts. This is thoughtless thinking about thoughts, the whole ordeal is nonsense. Sense perceptions are the form of present experience. Never take any thought too seriously. The ego is nothing more than a knot of thoughts. The wisdom necessary to resolve every situation is always there and without any need of effort, because it always exists in the present moment. Saying yes to your life situation now is how you surrender, because that’s all there ever is.
Conscious breathing throughout a single day is worth more than one hundred books on spirituality. Nothing real can be threatened, that’s the peace of God. Thinking plus emotions creates ego. Dissolving into space is the opposite of ego. It’s the opposite side of the consciousness attention sphere. The form of each moment changes continuously. Understanding the bright white light of death is like understanding the difference between grouping and symmetry order. God is the formless. All form is limit, because form can only exist through limitations. The opposite of life isn’t death, it’s birth. Life has no opposite. There is a web (of space-time) where everything is connected.
There’s a clear relationship between one’s inner state and external reality. Thought informs behavior, and feelings culminate inaction. Life cannot flow through you if you’re dependent on form and outcome.
Your life’s purpose is to transcend ego. Spiritual practice is all about bringing into consciousness what was unconscious. Whatever you bring your presence to us your spiritual teacher at this moment. The dilemma of all spiritual thinkers is to dissolve enlightenment as a goal. Goals are outside of the present moment, and therefore irrelevant to enlightenment being in a future state. Enlightenment is always available to everyone through and in the present moment. By giving up the search, we can realize it’s always already here. The greatest obstacle to God is time.
The ego is a necessary stage for enlightenment. By not losing yourself in the conditions, you find freedom. Healing only comes after acceptance. The mental concept of an illness has the power to create that illness itself. The funny thing is, when I look back on my life, it’s simply one mistake after another.
Fear is only a conception because it references some uncertain future event. All other negative emotions stem from fear. A life lived in only the realm of concepts becomes boring quickly, because the differences that make life interesting are reduced to generalized conceptualizations. To enjoy the interesting details of life, liberate them from concepts. Nothing new ever arises out of the same state of mind/consciousness.
Thought only becomes problematic when it is believed to be or identified with you, then it becomes ego. Thoughts trend toward problems because problems generate more thoughts. This is thoughtless thinking about thoughts, the whole ordeal is nonsense. Sense perceptions are the form of present experience. Never take any thought too seriously. The ego is nothing more than a knot of thoughts. The wisdom necessary to resolve every situation is always there and without any need of effort, because it always exists in the present moment. Saying yes to your life situation now is how you surrender, because that’s all there ever is.
June 13, 2017
Amazing audio book from Eckhart’s retreat.
October 17, 2021
Another great set of lectures, this time from a week long retreat making the audiobook approx. 12.5 hours long. Second half "better" than first half, in my opinion. My favourite excerpts:
22 min: "If action is possible or necessary, it happens. If no action is possible, there's a simple beautiful acceptance of this moment as it is."
1:12:00: "If your relationship with the present moment is not right, nothing can ever be right in the future because when the future moment comes, it is the present moment. And your mental, emotional habit is to have a dysfunctional relationship with it when it comes. And when it comes, it's never quite right and it's never enough. There's always something missing. For a little while, there's an elation when some new form arrives that satisfies you for a moment and takes away the needing and wanting and you get a little bit of glimpse of the fullness of being."
6:21:00: "When you become you still or the moment you allow the content of this moment to be as it is, not what I regard my life situation.... Your life situation is an abstraction, it's a story.... Acceptance is only to do with the form that the present moment takes."
8:23:00 "...the power comes through the acceptance, the non-rejection."
8:29:00 "...impatience means you've lost the present moment. ... At this moment, you are where you are meant to be. And then life unfolds.... At each moment, you are where you're meant to be. It doesn't mean you're stuck in it..... If change is destined to you, it will happen much more quickly. "
8:33:00 re. the story of the disciple who asked his master to write down notes: "the desire of the disciple to have something tangible in form to take away with him."
8:42:00 "Going beyond form and identification with form is beyond ego.... Your life purpose is the transcendence of that... and it can only be transcended at this moment."
8:57:00 "The fun, the aliveness of life is here in this moment...get in here to find it and then you realize the very aliveness of yourself is the fun you were looking for. .... The dependency on experiences goes, the almost compulsive or addictive search for more experiences also goes. In that sense, you're no longer a fun seeker. "
9:14:00 "The mind is saying you've had a hard day, you deserve a break, you deserve something. If you're not present than you cannot see that thought as a thought, then you are that thought and then you of course you will reach out and the whole thing will be unconscious. But if you recognize that thought (you've had a hard day you deserve something because nobody else has given you anything, I'm going to treat myself now...) you're not in touch with yourself. ... If you were in touch with the being that you are, you would see that the neediness is already fulfilled. .... the vicarious enjoyment of entertainment... the need of stimulus... gradually you become dulled to stimulus and you need stronger and stronger doses."
10:05:00 "If there's ever a question that you truly need an answer to, if you becomes still, the answer will come. Or the question disappears in the stillness."
10:18:00 "The realization of what is right for you to do doesn't come with thinking.... The true realization, and usually when it comes out of presence, it comes as a ready made realization of this is what I have to do."
10:20:00 "Decision making is limited. It always involves thinking. ... If it comes from presence, it's almost like a ready made answer. Something comes and you almost have no choice anymore."
10:24:00 "The meaningless jumble of events of your life becomes meaningful. ... All the mistakes and all the chaos has taken you here."
10:51:00 "The more present you are, the more you realize there's nothing to fear in this moment. There's only something to fear in the next moment, which is conceptual. The fear is created by the conceptual reality in the mind that creates future which is always uncertain."
12:57:00 "You've gone through the form, not by fighting it, but by surrendering to it. What looked like a wall in front of you suddenly opens up. What looked like the greatest obstacle to your awakening becomes the opening for your awakening. .... In ordinary life, what you practise is continuous little surrenders... Surrender is the shift from an inner no to an inner yes. You may have to do this many times throughout the day. "
13:00:00 "Live in natural alignment with life. ... That's the simple way."
22 min: "If action is possible or necessary, it happens. If no action is possible, there's a simple beautiful acceptance of this moment as it is."
1:12:00: "If your relationship with the present moment is not right, nothing can ever be right in the future because when the future moment comes, it is the present moment. And your mental, emotional habit is to have a dysfunctional relationship with it when it comes. And when it comes, it's never quite right and it's never enough. There's always something missing. For a little while, there's an elation when some new form arrives that satisfies you for a moment and takes away the needing and wanting and you get a little bit of glimpse of the fullness of being."
6:21:00: "When you become you still or the moment you allow the content of this moment to be as it is, not what I regard my life situation.... Your life situation is an abstraction, it's a story.... Acceptance is only to do with the form that the present moment takes."
8:23:00 "...the power comes through the acceptance, the non-rejection."
8:29:00 "...impatience means you've lost the present moment. ... At this moment, you are where you are meant to be. And then life unfolds.... At each moment, you are where you're meant to be. It doesn't mean you're stuck in it..... If change is destined to you, it will happen much more quickly. "
8:33:00 re. the story of the disciple who asked his master to write down notes: "the desire of the disciple to have something tangible in form to take away with him."
8:42:00 "Going beyond form and identification with form is beyond ego.... Your life purpose is the transcendence of that... and it can only be transcended at this moment."
8:57:00 "The fun, the aliveness of life is here in this moment...get in here to find it and then you realize the very aliveness of yourself is the fun you were looking for. .... The dependency on experiences goes, the almost compulsive or addictive search for more experiences also goes. In that sense, you're no longer a fun seeker. "
9:14:00 "The mind is saying you've had a hard day, you deserve a break, you deserve something. If you're not present than you cannot see that thought as a thought, then you are that thought and then you of course you will reach out and the whole thing will be unconscious. But if you recognize that thought (you've had a hard day you deserve something because nobody else has given you anything, I'm going to treat myself now...) you're not in touch with yourself. ... If you were in touch with the being that you are, you would see that the neediness is already fulfilled. .... the vicarious enjoyment of entertainment... the need of stimulus... gradually you become dulled to stimulus and you need stronger and stronger doses."
10:05:00 "If there's ever a question that you truly need an answer to, if you becomes still, the answer will come. Or the question disappears in the stillness."
10:18:00 "The realization of what is right for you to do doesn't come with thinking.... The true realization, and usually when it comes out of presence, it comes as a ready made realization of this is what I have to do."
10:20:00 "Decision making is limited. It always involves thinking. ... If it comes from presence, it's almost like a ready made answer. Something comes and you almost have no choice anymore."
10:24:00 "The meaningless jumble of events of your life becomes meaningful. ... All the mistakes and all the chaos has taken you here."
10:51:00 "The more present you are, the more you realize there's nothing to fear in this moment. There's only something to fear in the next moment, which is conceptual. The fear is created by the conceptual reality in the mind that creates future which is always uncertain."
12:57:00 "You've gone through the form, not by fighting it, but by surrendering to it. What looked like a wall in front of you suddenly opens up. What looked like the greatest obstacle to your awakening becomes the opening for your awakening. .... In ordinary life, what you practise is continuous little surrenders... Surrender is the shift from an inner no to an inner yes. You may have to do this many times throughout the day. "
13:00:00 "Live in natural alignment with life. ... That's the simple way."
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
October 7, 2021
I generally like Tolle though he pretty much says the same thing slightly differently each time I still enjoy listening to him. This one brought up some good insights about Our place in the universe.
January 31, 2020
Transcending the egoic mind (your childhood and societal conditioning) and resting in a place that is formless has been my goal for the last couple of decades. Eckart Tolle is such a good conveyor of these concepts. He talks about our human condition in such a humble and humorous way. I read his book "The Power of Now" many, many years ago and didn't get it. Now I am in a different place in my own evolution and he is speaking my language. Nevertheless, I need to hear it over and over again, because we all have built -in forgetters and get caught up in ego where we become imprisoned. Highly recommend this book for anyone who would like to experience more freedom!
December 28, 2021
He is a really good teacher. The present moment is all there is. Past mistakes bring you to now. The primary is to accept the now and what is, and the secondary might be to act. This is what is. Whatever condition has arisen at this moment, that I say yes to because you cannot do otherwise.
May 16, 2019
Breathe. Be here now.
June 4, 2019
The ability to be free in the world is to understand that the universe will always be there for you; as you are part of the universe.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews