Nonduality is the name that we give to the actual state of the world and everything in it. It is a word that points to wholeness despite the appearance of separation and diversity. It is all there is, and we are included.
The world as we know it is dualistic and composed of apparent opposites such as ‘hot and cold’, ‘right and wrong’, ‘inside and outside’, ‘tall and short’, and ‘good and evil’. Our conventional thinking is characterised by all kinds of duality, which are necessary and useful, but they are relative viewpoints stemming from a limited perspective.
All apparent ‘opposites’ in life are co-arising, and there is a unity that underlies them. Everything is interconnected and interdependent. It is only when we identify with common dualities that we get into trouble. We tend to confuse the polarities in life, infusing them with powerful emotions and thinking of them as substantial. We then come to accept conflict, aggression, possessiveness, greed and so on as norms.
Duality defines our human journey, and it is simultaneously connected to a deeper reality. Duality is a feature of nonduality. We are all individual expressions of a single entity, and interconnected to one another. It is the nondual nature of reality that offers us the opportunity to experience a relationship with all of life if we so choose.
Our choice, however, needs to be the result of an ongoing process of awakening into our lives and of finding a new relationship with all that is, a relationship that recognises wholeness.
Nonduality is a change in perspective that allows us to work towards a functional relationship with our body, mind, emotions and spirit. We stop trying to fix our broken parts in an attempt to make them match our perfect ones. Instead, we create a profound and kind relationship among all aspects of our being including the small frightened parts, the courageous parts, the selfish parts, the devoted parts and so on.
When we are in true relationship with every aspect of our being, we inhabit our own lives. We become aware of our conscious and unconscious limitations and prejudices, and we are intimate with the whole of our being. Such a relationship is founded on a deep understanding of the human condition. It recognises the whole spectrum of our thoughts and the full range of our emotions without denying them or pushing them away.
This is the nondual definition of freedom. We are not imprisoned by our history and the wounds of our past or anxious about the future. Our bandwidth expands to include all of life – past, present and future – without splitting reality into pieces. It expands to include life’s apparent opposites.
According to Jason Shulman, “There is no form of freedom that does not include our limitations and suffering.” He also says, “From a nondual perspective, we are called to participate in the world in a new way: to awaken, to engage and to awaken to that engagement. This is done through nourishment and not through knowledge.”
Nonduality is a path of awakening to our true condition. The more we are able to let this truth sink into our body, mind and soul, the greater the transformation in our thinking, feelings and intuition. Eventually we become open-hearted human beings who are capable of seeing reality in a holographic, non-linear way.
Nondual consciousness brings our humanity to its fullness. It returns us to wholeness, a state necessary to sustain and create life. This concept appears both simple and complex when we try to apply in our daily lives.
Let us consider an example of a mother with a sick baby. The mother might be worried and anxious, yet she does whatever is needed to take care of her baby. She doesn’t dismiss her feelings about the situation, and somehow her worry is integrated with the energy needed to take the necessary actions. Her worry is not ‘bad’. It is a legitimate feeling. She doesn’t attempt to run away from it in search of a ‘good’ feeling. She handles the situation from ‘whatever state she is in’, and this creates the space for movement.
Similarly, we can deal with every feeling, thought and experience in our lives by staying in relationship with ourselves as we are. When everything is included, magic happens.
As we cultivate our understanding of nonduality, we can awaken to the beauty of our individuality, which is always held within the whole of reality. The Universe is a hologram, and human beings have access to the highest levels of energy at any point and in every moment.
The Nondual Healing program
I will be teaching the Nondual Healing (NH) Program in Dubai in September 2018. It is a four-year program that consists of four classes per year, and each class will be three or four days long.
This contemporary program was created by Jason Shulman, the founder of A Society of Souls, a school dedicated to awakening the human spirit. A spiritual teacher, healer, musician and author, Jason is one of the world’s leading teachers of personal healing and spiritual awakening. He has received Buddhist Dharma transmission and has studied the Zen tradition.
Jason has created a radical approach to reality. Seekers on this path develop an understanding of what it means to be fully human and to be an individual who is simultaneously personal and impersonal.
Jason’s approach respects the personal ego self and places it back in its rightful and necessary place in human existence. Rather than viewing the ego as an obstacle to our evolution, he encourages us to embrace it as a creative portion of our uniqueness. He says, “This is at the foundation of our spiritual awakening.”
The work of NH is taught with integrity in a safe and loving environment. The classes can be challenging, but they are also filled with joy, laughter and kindness. NH leads to greater freedom, wisdom, creativity, joy, connection, and a deeper participation in life.