This excerpt was taken from the transcripts of Oprah’s Webcast of A New Earth which can be downloaded and viewed from www.oprah.com

jmccarthyOPRAH WINFREY (HOST): Okay. I got it. Tonight actress Jenny McCarthy is joining us.

JENNY MCCARTHY: Hi.

OPRAH WINFREY (HOST): How are you? Do you know that when I was reading this book, Jenny, when I was reading my book. Here it is. My book’s all kind of torn up now but when I was reading this book on page 104, I wrote, when I read as you look at, listen to, touch or help your child with this or that you are alert, still, completely present, not wanting anything other than that moment as it is. In this way you make room for being. In that moment you’re present, you’re not a father or mother, you are the alertness, the stillness, you are the being behind the doing. I wrote Jenny McCarthy because that reminded me so much of what you had said about your function as a mother.

JENNY: Yes, absolutely. You know, I read this book when it first came out and that was one of my big wake up calls. Realizing that when I was with Evan, all I needed to do was just be with Evan. And our relationship bloomed like you wouldn’t believe, the love connection was there. He was getting fulfilled because he knew, even when Evan wasn’t able to speak. This is when Evan still wasn’t able to use words. Energetically he felt that I was with him, that I was being with him. And I’m so grateful, Eckhart, that you taught me that.

OPRAH WINFREY (HOST): So did you have a question? Or do you..

JENNY MCCARTHY: I do. I do have a question. Okay. It’s long so bear with me.

OPRAH WINFREY (HOST): Okay.

JENNY MCCARTHY: It’s not spelled on but bear with me. One very common emotion that I have personally experienced and that I have seen in many mothers is this emotion called guilt. Mothers today experience a few different forms of guilt and I’m going to explain three different versions where I’m sure moms listening right now, one of them will say that’s my guilt.

OPRAH WINFREY (HOST): Yeah.

JENNY MCCARTHY: The first one is the 9:00 to 5:00 working mom feels guilty for leaving the baby with the nanny all day. The second one is the stay at home mom feels guilty for getting bored playing with her, you know, her son or daughter all day long. And sometimes you can only play choo choo so long and you can’t do it anymore and you feel guilty for not wanting to do that. And the last one being, and this one I can really connect to, the thousands of mothers I’ve met who have children with autism carry a huge amount of guilt with them. That’s hard for me to get out, sorry.

OPRAH WINFREY (HOST): Take your time.

JENNY MCCARTHY: I haven’t cried yet in one interview so I’m sorry. But, a huge amount of guilt that it’s in some way their fault, our fault that our child became autistic. So my question is, can you offer some insights as to how we can look at things differently from a different perspective on how to alleviate this guilt that we carry as mothers?

OPRAH WINFREY (HOST): Nine to five guilt, choo choo guilt and feeling guilty because your child has autism or whatever your child has and that you are somehow responsible. Thanks Jenny, this was so well said.

JENNY MCCARTHY: Thank you.

ECKHART TOLLE (AUTHOR, “A NEW EARTH”): Before I say anything, I read your book while it was still in manuscript form. You gave it to me and I was very impressed by what you did with your child, the courage that you had where other people would have succumbed and fallen into negativity or self-pity. You were able to turn it all around and make it into something very positive, at the same type helping many other people, not helping your child but helping many other people

JENNY MCCARTHY: Thank you, Eckhart.

ECKHART TOLLE (AUTHOR, “A NEW EARTH”): Now, and you still feel guilty. Of course, that’s the structure. After all this wonderful work that you have done with your son, it’s amazing isn’t it, that there are certain structures in the human mind that operate no matter how much good you do, they carry, the structures carry on playing themselves out and they are part of the what I call not the content of the ego but the structure of the ego. So if you, nobody could have done a better job than you with your boy. In addition, helping many others writing that book. And yet, you feel, it’s not that you feel guilty, there’s a certain structure in their thought processes that produces the feeling of guilt. And the other two examples that you gave, there’s the mother that has a job nine to five. The child is with the nanny and the mother feels guilty about that, cannot accept that this is how it is and the other mother at home playing with the child.

OPRAH WINFREY (HOST): Choo choo.

ECKHART TOLLE (AUTHOR, “A NEW EARTH”): Feels guilty about not doing more in the world or what so. Whatever it is, if you don’t tackle or recognize the structure in your mind for what it is then you will always believe that the answer to solving this question lies in the realm of content. In other words, content is the situation. So if I change the situation perhaps I won’t feel guilty anymore. This would be if you think that this so-called problem, it’s not a real problem, it’s a mind created problem. If you believe that this problem can be solved on an external level by changing something that you do, it will not because no matter what situation you go into, the guilt will come back. Because in this world, you are limited, you can’t do everything. You either do this or you do that. But you cannot be both at home and at work at the same time. So the mind, no matter what situation you go into, will bring out the same structures. So unless you are very alert and you recognize that these are egoic mind structures, nothing to do with content, then you realize that what the ego, one of the jobs of the ego is to blame others. Another job of the ego is to make yourself feel guilty. Both of these things strengthen your sense of identity, they are negative senses of identity. And the ego loves to have a strong sense of identity and no sense of identity is stronger than the negative one, where you condemn yourself for something. And…

JENNY MCCARTHY: Wow.

ECKHART TOLLE (AUTHOR, “A NEW EARTH”): …so and you can see from an objectively speaking, it doesn’t make sense to feel guilty in your case and in many other people’s cases.

OPRAH WINFREY (HOST): Yes. Because if you have to work 9:00 to 5:00 to provide for your child…

ECKHART TOLLE (AUTHOR, “A NEW EARTH”): Yes.

OPRAH WINFREY (HOST): …and make, you know, a safe home for your child and food on the table for your child…

ECKHART TOLLE (AUTHOR, “A NEW EARTH”): You are doing the best you can. And your mind doesn’t, your mind works according to its old conditioning. So recognize when those thoughts come, recognize that these are not actual valid thoughts that are actually concerning a true situation. They are thoughts generated by the ego. And if you can recognize them as thoughts generated by the ego, structural, not content based, then in the moment of recognition, they begin to lose their power over you. They will try to come in. It’s not that you can’t do it just for once, they will try to come in the next day.

OPRAH WINFREY (HOST): ‘Cause you, Jenny, wrote that book. Obviously I read that book too because you were here and shared the book, you know, with our audience. You, you know, refused to take no for an answer. You fought for Evan. You did the best you knew how to do and when you didn’t know, you sought other answers to figure out the best to do. So there is a part of you, the part of you that is really you, right, Eckhart?

ECKHART TOLLE (AUTHOR, “A NEW EARTH”): Yes.

OPRAH WINFREY (HOST): …that knows that.

OPRAH WINFREY (HOST): True? True, Jenny?

JENNY MCCARTHY: True, absolutely.

OPRAH WINFREY (HOST): Yeah. And that little crazy talk in your head is just that. Crazy talk in your head.

ECKHART TOLLE (AUTHOR, “A NEW EARTH”): That’s a good expression.

OPRAH WINFREY (HOST): Yeah. But crazy talk in your head.

ECKHART TOLLE (AUTHOR, “A NEW EARTH”): Yeah.

JENNY MCCARTHY: It really, I just had a huge awakening moment when he said that within me. So I get it, absolutely. That’s a wow.

OPRAH WINFREY (HOST): That’s a wow. Thanks, Jenny.

JENNY MCCARTHY: That’s a wow. Thank you both so much.