Tolle begins his first chapter by raising the question, “Enlightenment—what is that?” (11). He relates a parable about a low-income man who is sitting on a box, asking for money. Another man passes and tells him to look inside the box he is sitting on; when he does so, he is shocked to find he was sitting on a box of treasure. Tolle compares the reader to the man and their “true wealth” or “radiant joy of Being” to the treasure box (11). He claims that the ego likes to perceive enlightenment as a “superhuman accomplishment,” but it is actually a feeling of “oneness with Being” and “connectedness” with oneself and others (12). Without it, people feel separate from others, which makes them more fearful.

The Buddha’s version of enlightenment was simply existing without suffering, which Tolle explains prevents striving toward a false accomplishment. Tolle uses the word “Being” to mean the “One Life,” which is the “essence” that all life forms share that can only be experienced, not mentally understood (12). While Tolle sometimes uses the word God, he generally feels that the word’s meaning was lost through millennia of “misuse,” making it prone to be used in exclusive and divisive ways (14).