47 Eckhart Tolle Quotes on Life, Happiness, and Mindfulness (The Power of Now)

Here are 47 inspirational Eckhart Tolle quotes on life, happiness, and mindfulness.

Eckhart Tolle is a German-born spiritual teacher and self-help author. He is best known for his book “The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment” which was published in 1997. The book has been translated into 33 languages and has sold over three million copies in North America alone.

Eckhart Tolle’s “The Power of Now” is a widely acclaimed book that has helped millions of people around the world to find inner peace and happiness. According to the book, only the present moment is real and only the present moment matters, and both an individual’s past and future are created by their thoughts. The book also describes methods of relaxation and meditation to help readers anchor themselves in the present.

His other books include “Stillness Speaks” (2003) and “A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose” (2005).

Eckhart Tolle Quotes (The Power of Now)

1. “The power for creating a better future is contained in the present moment: You create a good future by creating a good present.” – Eckhart Tolle

2. “Don’t wait to be successful at some future point. Have a successful relationship with the present moment and be fully present in whatever you are doing. That is success.” – Eckhart Tolle

3. “Time isn’t precious at all, because it is an illusion. What you perceive as precious is not time but the one point that is out of time: the Now. That is precious indeed. The more you are focused on time—past and future—the more you miss the Now, the most precious thing there is.” – Eckhart Tolle

4. “Thinking is a wonderful tool if it’s applied. Thinking, however, can not become the master. Thinking is a very bad master. If you’re dominated by thinking then your life becomes very restricted.” – Eckhart Tolle

5. “Wherever you are, be there totally. If you find your here and now intolerable and it makes you unhappy, you have three options: remove yourself from the situation, change it, or accept it totally. If you want to take responsibility for your life, you must choose one of those three options, and you must choose now. Then accept the consequences.” – Eckhart Tolle

6. “Acceptance looks like a passive state, but in reality it brings something entirely new into this world. That peace, a subtle energy vibration, is consciousness.” – Eckhart Tolle

7. “The past has no power over the present moment.” – Eckhart Tolle

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8. “To complain is always nonacceptance of what is. It invariably carries an unconscious negative charge. When you complain, you make yourself into a victim. When you speak out, you are in your power. So change the situation by taking action or by speaking out if necessary or possible; leave the situation or accept it. All else is madness.” – Eckhart Tolle

9. “To know yourself as the Being underneath the thinker, the stillness underneath the mental noise, the love and joy underneath the pain, is freedom, salvation, enlightenment.” – Eckhart Tolle

10. “Power over others is weakness disguised as strength.” – Eckhart Tolle

11. “The primary cause of unhappiness is never the situation but your thoughts about it.” – Eckhart Tolle

12. “Sometimes letting things go is an act of far greater power than defending or hanging on.” – Eckhart Tolle

13. “Life will give you whatever experience is most helpful for the evolution of your consciousness.” – Eckhart Tolle

14. “If you are not living this moment, you are not really living.” – Eckhart Tolle

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15. “Your entire life only happens in this moment. The present moment is life itself. Yet, people live as if the opposite were true and treat the present moment as a stepping stone to the next moment – a means to an end.” – Eckhart Tolle

16. “It is through gratitude for the present moment that the spiritual dimension of life opens up.” – Eckhart Tolle

17. “Realize deeply that the present moment is all you ever have. Make the Now the primary focus of your life.” – Eckhart Tolle

18. “In the egoic state, your sense of self, your identity, is derived from your thinking mind – in other words, what your mind tells you about yourself: the storyline of you, the memories, the expectations, all the thoughts that go through your head continuously and the emotions that reflect those thoughts. All those things make up your sense of self.” – Eckhart Tolle

19. “Forget about your life situation and pay attention to your life. Your life situation exists in time. Your life is now. Your life situation is mind-stuff. Your life is real.” – Eckhart Tolle

20. “Some changes look negative on the surface but you will soon realize that space is being created in your life for something new to emerge.” – Eckhart Tolle

21. “The only thing you ever have is now.” – Eckhart Tolle

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22. “Worry pretends to be necessary but serves no useful purpose.” – Eckhart Tolle

23. “Acknowledging the good that you already have in your life is the foundation for all abundance.” – Eckhart Tolle

24. “Most people treat the present moment as if it were an obstacle that they need to overcome. Since the present moment is life itself, it is an insane way to live.” – Eckhart Tolle

25. “People tend to dwell more on negative things than on good things. So the mind then becomes obsessed with negative things, with judgments, guilt and anxiety produced by thoughts about the future and so on.” – Eckhart Tolle

26. “If you live only in one culture for the first 20 years of your life, you become conditioned without knowing it.” – Eckhart Tolle

27. “Life isn’t as serious as the mind makes it out to be.” – Eckhart Tolle

28. “It is not uncommon for people to spend their whole life waiting to start living.” – Eckhart Tolle

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29. “Always say “yes” to the present moment. What could be more futile, more insane, than to create inner resistance to what already is? What could be more insane than to oppose life itself, which is now and always now? Surrender to what is. Say “yes” to life — and see how life suddenly starts working for you rather than against you.” – Eckhart Tolle

30. “Give up defining yourself – to yourself or to others. You won’t die. You will come to life. And don’t be concerned with how others define you. When they define you, they are limiting themselves, so it’s their problem. Whenever you interact with people, don’t be there primarily as a function or a role, but as the field of conscious Presence. You can only lose something that you have, but you cannot lose something that you are.” – Eckhart Tolle

31. “Is there a difference between happiness and inner peace? Yes. Happiness depends on conditions being perceived as positive; inner peace does not.” – Eckhart Tolle

32. “You do not become good by trying to be good, but by finding the goodness that is already within you, and allowing that goodness to emerge. But it can only emerge if something fundamental changes in your state of consciousness.” – Eckhart Tolle

33. “Nothing has happened in the past; it happened in the Now. Nothing will ever happen in the future; it will happen in the Now.” – Eckhart Tolle

34. “If small things have the power to disturb you, then who you think you are is exactly that: small.” – Eckhart Tolle

35. “Whatever you fight, you strengthen, and what you resist, persists.” – Eckhart Tolle

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36. “If there are people you haven’t forgiven, you’re not going to really awaken. You have to let go.” – Eckhart Tolle

37. “If you get the inside right, the outside will fall into place. Primary reality is within; secondary reality without.” – Eckhart Tolle

38. “Pleasure is always derived from something outside you, whereas joy arises from within.” – Eckhart Tolle

39. “Living up to an image that you have of yourself or that other people have of you is inauthentic living.” – Eckhart Tolle

40. “Most humans are never fully present in the now, because unconsciously they believe that the next moment must be more important than this one. But then you miss your whole life, which is never not now.” – Eckhart Tolle

41. “The greater part of human pain is unnecessary. It is self-created as long as the unobserved mind runs your life.” – Eckhart Tolle

42. “You can only lose something that you have, but you cannot lose something that you are.” – Eckhart Tolle

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43. “Knowing yourself is to be rooted in Being, instead of lost in your mind.” – Eckhart Tolle

44. “Awareness is the power that is concealed within the present moment. … The ultimate purpose of human existence, which is to say, your purpose, is to bring that power into this world.” – Eckhart Tolle

45. “Nothing ever happened in the past that can prevent you from being present now, and if the past can’t prevent you from being present now, what power does it have?” – Eckhart Tolle

46. “People don’t realize that now is all there ever is; there is no past or future except as memory or anticipation in your mind.” – Eckhart Tolle

47. “The more you live in the present moment, the more the fear of death disappears.” – Eckhart Tolle

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