Transcription
Now, as you might have guessed, I have a bit more yin than yang. (audience chuckling) (audience laughing) This does not mean I'm going to burst into your ladies' bathroom. (audience laughing) (bell chiming)
Another thing to be aware of that's all part of it is the yin and yang in every human being. The movement, the polarity manifests in every human being of the feminine and the masculine. And again, it's important to not to stray too much to one extreme or too much to the other extreme. Nothing in excess. But there's no human being who is totally in the middle. And if you are a man, it does not necessarily mean that you energetically have more yang than yin. There are men who have more yin than some women. There are some women who have more yang than a man.
Now, as you might have guessed, I have a bit more yin than yang. (audience chuckling) (audience laughing) That not does not mean I'm going to burst into your ladies' bathroom (audience laughing) and claim my right to use it. (audience laughing) And if you become aggressive with me and say, "Get out of my bathroom," I can say, "I have more yin than you. (audience laughing) And the fact that you are aggressive towards me proves it. (audience laughing) You should be in the yang bathroom." (audience laughing) (Eckhart chuckling softly)
Michael, our Swedish organizer, who spoke to you just now, yin or yang? (audience chuckling) (Eckhart chortling faintly) (audience laughing) (Eckhart laughing) He is even more yin than me. (audience laughing) That's why he's so lovable. (Eckhart chuckling) (audience chuckling)
But don't go too far with your yin. You have countries too that have predominant, are more yin or yang. In the United States, you have states that can be in their collective energy field either more yin or yang. A typical example or for example, on the whole, doesn't mean that every individual in that state corresponds to that, but on the whole, probably most people would agree that California is more yin, Texas is more yang. So if your car breaks down in the middle of the night and your cell phone doesn't work so you have to knock at a door. And if it's an extreme yang household, the door will open with a guy with a gun. "What do you want? Get off my property." (audience chuckling) If you come to an extreme yin household, "Oh, hi. Yeah, sure, come in and have some soup." (audience laughing)
Now, the danger is with the extreme yang you have just not helped a person who is truly in need of assistance and help, and you're totally closed. Your boundary is so rigid that nothing penetrates. You've desensitized yourself in your hardened attitude. It's an extreme form of yang. So you don't even know what you're doing to yourself, ultimately. Now, there's also danger involved in the extreme form of yin, obviously. Perhaps you're helping a person in need of help or you invite somebody in who's going to rob and kill you. (audience chuckling) And this is because you have loss of awareness. You are not more in the middle.
To stay in the middle, more or less, of course, you'll fluctuate, I'll always probably be more yin than yang, but in certain situations, I may suddenly be a bit more yang. But that requires wisdom. It requires openness to the present moment rather than living through mental concepts. And then your response to that situation will be correct. It'll be either more yin in it or more yang in it.
On the whole, and that is not a bad thing, Western civilization shifted from a very long time being predominantly and excessively yang began to shift in the '60s more towards yin, and that was a wonderful thing, it was absolutely necessary. And that enabled a lot of the spirituality to come in from the East, the human potential movement, the equality for women, the respect for people who are outsiders, empathy towards other human beings who are of a different race or who are a minority of human beings who are other, different. Gay people, finally the acceptance of gay people, all these wonderful things that happened through the shift to a more empathetic state of consciousness through shifting to yin. And that was a great thing. Otherwise we probably wouldn't even be here talking.
But you have to be careful with the movement because once it starts and there's not enough awareness, it can go on, and on, and on. And so the empathy towards others, which is a great thing, if you take it to an extreme, it becomes political correctness that can be very extreme. So you cannot say many things you can't say anymore. Don't disagree with me or with us, because anything you disagree with is hate speech. Don't talk. Of course there is such a thing as hate speech, and that is clearly recognizable.
So just as an example of an extreme form of permissiveness, well, actually, there was already a great thing. Education changed very much, it's much more respecting the child, the end of corporal punishment, all wonderful things. Then, of course, permissiveness gained so much that there was a total lack of guidance given to a child. So it went too much that way. Another interesting thing is in many schools these days they don't want to differentiate between children's achievement anymore. And I can see why, because it makes the child feel bad to be to be said, "You are better than, you are not as good as that one."
So, when I was a child, we had sports events and I wasn't very good, as you might have guessed, at sports. (audience laughing) And it was a little bit like the Olympics. You needed to have certain number of points, and then you got a bronze medal, and then you were even better, more points, you got a silver medal, and then you got a gold medal. And I got 39 points, which was just one point below the bronze medal. And all the bigger boys condescendingly came to me and said, "Oh, you did really well, I'm so surprised." (audience laughing) Now, nowadays perhaps I would've received a gold medal. (audience laughing) Don't even have to make an effort. Is that a good thing? We'll have to see. Nothing in excess. It didn't kill me that I didn't get a bronze medal. I realized that, I knew already, that the physical was not my strength, being a puny weakling. (audience chuckling) (Eckhart chuckling) Or as Arnold says, "Don't be a puny loser." (audience chuckling) (Eckhart chuckling)
So just to give a very extreme form of yin now is you have to allow the child to choose their own gender at the age of seven already. So if they feel they are tomboy, a girl is a tomboy, says, "Would you rather be a boy?" "Oh, might be a good idea, doctor." "Do you want to be a boy?" "Yeah, yeah, I want to be a boy." (audience chuckling) Okay, we'll dress you up as a boy and in there's a new, I couldn't believe it at first, in Ontario, Canada, there's a new law. If the child expresses his or her desire to be the opposite gender, this seems almost incredible, and I hope it's not true, but several people have told me it's true, I saw it on the internet, a reliable source. (audience laughing) Not fake news. If the child expressing desire to be the opposite, might be an 8-year-old or 10-year-old, and the parents refuse to take this child to a doctor for hormone treatment, the state authorities are entitled to take the child away from the parents. (audience murmuring) (Eckhart chuckling) Seems incredible, but that there will be an extreme form of where something has gone wrong. (Eckhart chuckling)
So we need to be very careful with balance. Balancing things between the two. People tend to identify with a particular movement, so even though yang lends itself more to ego, yin also can become ego. If you're unconscious and you identify, that means it then determines the way you think and the way you see things. If I've said anything that you feel angry about right now, it means you have identified with something and your ego identity, you derive from that particular collective position. And that's fine, at least now you know it. (audience chuckling) (water trickling)