When querying the meaning of non duality people often find themselves asking: “is nonduality oneness?”. In an attempt to explain and understand this, many articles offer contradictory answers. But here’s the simple answer, yes it is!
Non duality, to describe it as simply as possible, is “not two!” Which is, all things considered, oneness…
It’s crucial to understand that the question “is nonduality oneness?” is not fully answered by intellect. It usually understood after having a mystical experience.
A significant shift in consciousness takes place when nonduality is embodied. When you experience it, your whole worldview is permanently shifted. It is not limited to, nor can it be defined via the perspective of the mental plane.
It is also true that non duality’s meaning is already unconsciously known to all as it lays dormant in the mystery of the unified field.
As one delves further into the abyss, nonduality opens up ever-deeper strata of reality that lead to ever-deeper understanding for the seeker.
I welcome you to read this article to learn more about the concepts of non-duality and oneness as we go deeper into the mystical meaning of non duality.
Is Non Duality Oneness?
When searching for the concept of oneness online you will find a plethora of opinions on whether oneness and non duality are the same?
The argument is that oneness is not the same as non duality because the definition of non duality can’t be explained as any one thing.
Many voices with varying opinions attempt to overcomplicate this concept and miss the mark by trying too hard. The answer is more simple than some of the convoluted explanations available on the web.
Eliminating mental duality is a prerequisite and becomes necessary to attaining non-dual, oneness consciousness as it cannot be rationalised, it has to be experienced!
There is nothing but awareness; all else is a construct produced by the mind. Thus, awareness itself is Non-Duality. The ego/thought and the object/subject are one and the same. Because experience IS consciousness, experience is everything that there is.
Since consciousness is necessary for the existence of any experiencing situation, “being” is the only thing that really exists.
What is The Meaning Of Non Duality?
Two fundamental concerns are addressed by the meaning of non dualism: “What is the nature of reality?” and “How may we be free of suffering and find the lasting peace and happiness that all people long for above all else?”
Regarding the first query, the meaning of non dualism argues that happiness is our fundamental essence. Then, if happiness is a fundamental aspect of who we are, then why is it not always felt?
If you’re reading this, the chances are that your quest for happiness in objective experience has failed you enough times to make you question if it can ever be truly discovered there? The non-dual understanding suggests otherwise.
Simply said, while everyone feels like they know who they are, not everyone has a clear knowledge of that identity.
The sensation of lack that permeates most people’s life and motivates them to look for fulfilment in things, substances, activities, mental states, and interpersonal connections is caused by this lack of clear self-knowledge.
Indeed, it implies that in order to achieve long-term calm and contentment, one must first understand one’s true nature. Self-knowledge is seen as both a way to peace and happiness and the experience of happiness. For this reason, the non-dualistic meaning begins with an examination of our core essence.
The concept of non duality
The concept of nonduality is so profound that when you begin to grasp it, it can change your worldview forever.
Our worldview is shaped by binary reality and we trust our senses that what we see, hear, feel, smell and taste is the ultimate reality. Our senses report back to us that we are finite, made of form and separate from the world outside of us.
We persuade ourselves as we navigate reality that an objective reality exists outside of ourselves and that we have little influence over the lessons life throws at us. The truth is we are barely skimming the surface of who and what we really are.
Going Beyond the Illusion of Separation
Non-duality teaches us that, although there is a reality to what we perceive, the world of form is a mirage. Nonduality teaches us that we are one consciousness playing out the illusion of separation. Our ego (minds) serves as a tool for pure consciousness to explore itself as the experience of form.
“Space is just a construct that gives the illusion that there are separate objects”
DR. QUANTUM
In non-dual awareness, it begins to dawn on you that there isn’t really anything outside of yourself.
When non-duality is embodied, it can be decribed as an awakening however, truth seekers may still awaken in various stages.
You become a lucid dreamer, who is awake and conscious in a dream and wakes up repeatedly.
Non Duality Meaning Explained
Some individuals conclude that nonduality is not the same as oneness. The irony lies in the fact that the thinker arrived at this conclusion using dualistic reasoning. This illustration demonstrates the dualistic and fallible character of the mind, which constantly interprets the world via the prism of separation.
The question, “Is nonduality oneness?” arises from the idea in a distinct self. You cannot attempt to understand non-duality from the point of view of mind. Without the belief in a separate self duality doesn’t exist because all things become one.
The mind cannot experience absolute oneness because the mind operates in duality. The illusion of separation was necessary for conciousness to experience objective reality. Therefore a seeker needs to venture further than the level of mind, to understand the interconnectedness of all things.
Non-duality in Popular Culture
Popular culture illustrates the concept of non-duality best in the movie The Matrix. In this movie, Neo goes to work at a normal job and life is normal, but something causes him to seek hidden knowledge and the opportunity to explore the answers he seeks, meets him.
Spoon boy : Do not try and bend the spoon. That’s impossible. Instead… only try to realise the truth.
The Matrix
Neo : What truth?
Spoon boy : There is no spoon.
Neo : There is no spoon?
Spoon boy : Then you’ll see, that it is not the spoon that bends, it is only yourself.
Morpheus offers him a choice: take the blue pill to remain ignorant or the red pill to forever unplug from everything he believes.
After choosing the red pill, he learns that he has been living in a computer simulation his entire life. This new information causes so much cognitive dissonance that he almost has a mental breakdown.
In his new reality, they prophesy him as ‘The One’.Hhowever, Neo still harbors many limiting belief systems and, as a result, fails when tested.
In this story Agent Smith, a sentient and powerful program, has the ability to transform into anybody who has not yet been unplugged. Its sole purpose is to kill anyone unplugged from the matrix, (awakened minds pose a threat)!
When the agents meet the unplugged, they have no choice but to run as fast as they can. Neo only becomes aware that he doesn’t need to run from the omnipotent agents when he is able to see through the illusion. When he realises what he is, the illusion falls away!
Much like in the movie The Matrix, through non-duality we discover there is no other self and the illusion of Maya falls away. One of the names used to describe this phenomena is Samadhi.
What Religion Believes in Non-duality?
The deep concept of non dualism, often called oneness, originates in the ancient Hindu philosophical corpus known as Advaita Vedanta.
Advaita Vedanta refers to the non-dualistic school of Hindu philosophy. Advaita in short terms means absence of object and subject. Upanishads are sankrit text that “document the transition from the archaic ritualism of the Veda into new religious ideas and institutions” and the emergence of the central religious concepts of Hinduism.
What does Buddhism say about duality?
Zen Buddhism and Non duality maintains that if we relate to our experience from the standpoint of a fixed self, then we suffer. When we relate to our experience from the standpoint of no fixed self, then we don’t suffer.
Taoism is the concept of non-duality. Tao is one unified whole that originates all the elements of the Universe. Through the lens of Tao antimony of good-and- evil disappears, since good and evil are relative: they define each other and make no sense with- out each other
Christian mystics claim that the soul may be lifted into a union with God so close and so complete that it is merged in the being of God and loses the sense of any separate existence.
The Practice of Self-Inquiry: A Path to Realising Non-Dualistic Experience
Meditation is the most effective way to experience non-duality. In meditation we stop searching for answers and instead we lean into ourselves. We remember that what we are looking for is what is looking! We come to this understanding by going beyond thought, as long as we are attached to thought, we are still binary. Thought still belonging to the world of form, has limitations, thought comes from the mind, which is another way of describing the ego, and so thinks of itself as separate from the whole
When you look at the world of form and you are essentially looking into a mirror. Even more mind-bending is to look at your current reality and to become aware that there is no world outside of you. That life is not happening outside of you – that this whole construct is being experienced inside your consciousness. You are the dreamer as well as the dream! You are beyond mind, beyond thought, you are the awareness that observes its manifestation.
How to Achieve Non duality?
There’s an old zen proverb that goes “before enlightenment, chop wood carry water, after enlightenment chop wood carry water”
I believe that to truly understand the concept of non duality is to reach enlightenment. The Buddha was careful to describe enlightenment in negative terms so that the egoic mind does not try to turn it into something to achieve. However for people who fully embody this truth, the message is to carry on playing the role in the illusion of separation.
I do not think that enlightenment necessarily comes all at once but in stages. When you look at the world and all you see is aspects of your consciousness staring back at you, you begin to open yourself to a higher consciousness, unity consciousness.
When it starts to dawn on you that you are in everyone in everything and everywhere, it may feel maddening at first. Integrating non duality into relationships and interactions can be overwhelming. When you remember who it is that’s creating this world, it gets a bit strange.
To conclude…
Non-duality is observing that beneath the dualistic, binary nature of life, there is a single, aware and indivisible single point, that is pure consciousness and is the point from which all life derives their apparent independent existence.
Oneness is just an attempt of the finite mind to understand what is ineffable.
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Amazing insight thank you
Thanks for reading 🙂