David Hall's Non-Duality Blog
My name's David Hall. I'm the creator of this web site and its content. I live in Wales in the UK.
I developed the Celtic design software KnotWorker, I create electronic music as Goldcup7, and I've written books on spirituality and non duality.
Hope you enjoy this Non Duality blog. New blogs are added on Fridays.
Please use the Contact page if you have any questions or would like me to discuss a topic.
- Category: Non-duality
- Hits: 1226
Much is spoken about in Eastern and New Age spirituality regarding Awareness and Consciousness. But what really is it?
I use Awareness and Consciousness synonymously, so when I talk of Awareness here I also mean Consciousness. Awareness is like the page on which words appear, the canvas on which a painting appears, or the screen on which a movie appears. It is that in which all appearances appear. Awareness itself doesn't appear, but we know of Awareness by the fact of perception. Nothing can appear without the awareness of it. To use another simile, it's like knowing it's windy out by the sight of the tree branches moving.
Consider perceptions: sounds, sights, tastes, smells, and touches all appear in Awareness. Yes, they are facilitated through the human experience or perspective, through the human senses. But they appear in the same 'place', right here. That's not the whole picture. Human emotions are felt, as well as bodily sensations. Thoughts are also perceived, along with a sense of identity. This is all perceived in one 'place'. That 'place' we can call Awareness.
We are Awareness. There is one Awareness, and in this all apparently separate perspectives appear. It could be said that I can't see what others see, so we must be separate. But there is a focal point in Awareness, where the world is perceived form a human perspective, and human thought activity calls this 'me'. It's not really a separate me, it's just the assumption that human thought makes. I am not what is perceived.
This leads to another understanding of Awareness, another reason why we can't perceive it. The eye cannot see the eye. Awareness can never perceive itself. As well as being formless, pure clarity, Awareness couldn't possibly be the object of Awareness. This doesn't mean that Awareness can't be self aware. Awareness being aware means that it is self aware. What appears is a poor reflection of the formless nature of Awareness, yet nothing is known other than Awareness.
All is perceived by Awareness, in Awareness, made of Awareness. There are no true limits that separate out the subject and the object, the seer and the seen. There is just seeing, just Awareness. What looks to be far away in the distance is perceived right here. Sounds that are heard in the distance are heard right here. 'Over there' can never be perceived. Awareness is Here and Now, and it is in this timeless 'place' that space and time appear. Awareness and what appears in Awareness are one. It is all Awareness. What appears is by aid of reflection, so the world appears to be the opposite of unseen Awareness, yet there is always only Awareness. There is an appearance of duality - seer and seen - but it's true nature is Non-Duality, or Infinite Oneness.
This is why it would be wrong to say I am a human, I am male or female, I am short or tall, or I am a soul. It's perhaps more accurate to say I am the universe. There are no true limits that divide. Awareness is everything, yet nothing. The Whole is undivided. It may appear divided, but it remains infinitely One. Just as a movie on the screen appears to have many shapes and forms, depth and distance, yet it is singular. Just as a painting may appear to have different people, animals, and objects, yet it is just one painting.
Being aware requires no effort. It is the natural state. It is uncreated, timeless and formless. Awareness has no qualities. All appearances seem to come and go within its timeless formless nature.
- Category: The Universe
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Awareness is the nature of Being. It is the core of all experience. All that is experienced appears within Awareness. I use the word Consciousness synonymously, or sometimes say Pure Consciousness to give an understanding of its unchanging nature. The words Spirit and God can also apply to Awareness. Awareness is our timeless, formless nature, in which the appearance of space, time, individuality and separation are experienced. Awareness is the core shared nature at the heart of all seemingly separate beings.
Well, from the human perspective it seems that Awareness is at the heart, the core, the centre. From the human perspective Awareness is the still centre around which the world seems to move. Yet there is nothing other than Awareness. The world appears in Awareness, made of Awareness, perceived by Awareness. Awareness really has no inside or outside, no separation of opposites. Awareness has the qualities of a singularity: unlimited, unseen, undivided, unmoving, uncreated, unchanging, complete, formless, flawless, spaceless, timeless.
By contrast the world appears to be a World of Opposites. Awareness perceives form and change, limitation and division, creation and destruction, birth and death, waking and sleeping, individuality and multiplicity, gain and loss. The World of Opposites appears within the Singularity of Awareness like a reflection of Awareness's own imperceptible nature. The world shows what cannot be seen. Forms appear to express the formless.
In the world there seems to be a separation between the subject and the object, the observer and the observed. This is like a stretching of Awareness into 'one being aware of another'. When attention is focused on an object there seems to be a narrowing and limiting of Awareness. This is similar to what the human experience does. It seems to narrow Awareness to a point of individuality aware of many. But it's only a play. Awareness does not become human. Awareness remains as it is, whilst the human form appears as a focus of Awareness observing itself.
All apparently separate limited human beings are Awareness perceiving itself as the world, seemingly as something other than itself. It is like the archetypal sacrifice of God, giving up immortality to experience the mortal world, giving up infinity to experience limitation. But truly God doesn't give up immortality, freedom and infinity. Awareness is unharmed and unchanged by the world, just as conflict in a dream doesn't cause the body to be harmed.
This World of Opposites we experience is only a play of separation within the undivided limitlessness of Awareness. Nothing is near or far from Awareness. Nothing is before or after Awareness. Awareness does not sleep or wake just because the body shuts down for the night. Formless timeless Awareness is not born, nor does it die. The World of Opposites is all a play in Awareness, made of Awareness, known by Awareness.
- Category: The Human Experience
- Hits: 1208
Ever wondered what being human was all about? We're going to take a look here at what I call 'the human experience'. It helps to have an understanding of Non-Duality, which I can very briefly summarise as the spiritual teaching that there is not a multiplicity, there is only What Is, which is our true nature, and has been described by sages as Sat-Chit-Ananda or Being-Consciousness-Bliss. Non-Duality is the recognition that we are not limited human beings, we are the Infinite One Consciousness, also known as God or the Self of Selves, and our nature is peace.
If that resonates with you, read on. If not, you can find out more from some of my other blogs.
So, looking at the world from the Non-Duality perspective, what is this human experience? Let's start from the beginning. Okay, there isn't really a beginning. The beginning only seems to appear from the timeless Infinite Being. Let's start there. The Infinite One, the Supreme Being is Pure Consciousness, formless and perfect peace. There is no movement in the Supreme Being, because there is nowhere to go. There is nothing other than the Infinite One.
Imagine the perfectly still surface of a lake. Perfect Peace. Now imagine that in the centre of that lake there is a motion, a fluctuation, causing a ripple, then multiple ripples, flowing outwards from the centre till they reach the limits of the lake. This is how the universe appears in the Supreme Being, in Consciousness. Vibration and fluctuation appears within the stillness and ripples out, till it reaches limits. See how the spiritual realms are created from the initial fluctuation in the Stillness, and multiplicity seems to spread outwards from the Still Centre. The Still Centre then stands as the shining light of the universe, as God the Creator of all. Spiritual beings are formed close to the Centre, and they go outwards in exploration across the lake, experiencing a range of frequencies in the fluctuation, from close to the Centre to far from the Centre, from close to the Light to far from the Light.
Close to the Centre the spiritual beings are near God and in God's likeness. But as they stretch further away they become less and less like the Centre of Peace. They become hardened, increasingly dense, and their limits seem more defined. It is in these denser realms, seemingly far from the Heart of God, that the human experience arises. Planet Earth develops, forms within the planet develop and evolve. Humanity evolves to a point of dominance, developing intelligence and concepts of itself as important.
The human being is far from the Heart of God. So much so that its qualities are a poor reflection of God. Further from the peace of God, humanity becomes warlike. Further from the Selfless Whole Being of God, humanity becomes selfish and incomplete. Further from the Spiritual Being of God, humanity becomes heavy, hardened, burdened, restricted and confused. Humanity loses sight of its connection with God. Humanity believes in itself above others. It loses touch with the Fullness of Life, and finds itself struggling in a world of opposites, knowing good and evil, love and hate, joy and sorrow, life and death. This is the stretching of opposites far from the Infinite Oneness of God.
This is the human experience. It may be considered that we are spiritual beings that have flowed out from the Heart of God and incarnated in these dense bodies to learn from the human experience. What do we learn? We experience what it's like to be limited. We experience what we are not. We are not truly limited, although in the human experience it can feel that we are. The collective human mind is still evolving. Generally it feels that it is limited and encased in the human body. We experience this sense of being encased in human dense form and clashing and competing with other dense forms. We experience opposites at an extreme level. We experience qualities that are the far opposite of God's nature - hate, cruelty, confusion, selfishness, war, ignorance, division, separation, sadness, darkness, lack, greed, torment, restriction. These qualities can only be experienced far from God. But their opposites are also experienced to a degree.
So this is the human experience, where many things are possible that would not be possible close to the Infinite Light of God. But you may have heard of Samsara, where it is considered that the spiritual being or soul becomes caught in the attractions of the world, entangled in the opposing forces of karma, and cannot escape from the endless cycle of rebirth. The soul becomes attached to human life and reincarnates seemingly endlessly, until it becomes aware of its 'fall' and turns around, arises from the density of matter to spiritual freedom, or Moksha, Liberation, or Self-Realisation.
This Self-Realisation is not a letting go of identifying as human and recognising that I am a soul. It is more accurately a recognition that there is only God. This lake of ripples we imagined is God alone. There are not truly many spiritual beings. There is nowhere that can be far from God. God is infinite and indivisible. The spiritual realms and the denser material realms are always Spirit, or Consciousness, or the Mind of God. There is only God. It only seems that the human experience is far from God.
There are no limits. There only seem to be limits. There is no death, only life. We do not become souls or humans. There is only God, infinite, limitless, peaceful Consciousness, within which the play of vibrations, fluctuations and opposites appears.
- Category: Non-duality
- Hits: 1212
Consciousness is generally considered to be the state of the mind in which humans know and perceive what's going on in the world. This consciousness is generally considered to be an activity of the brain. This is the scientific view, but science is still unable to fully understand consciousness and how the brain generates it. Consciousness is considered to be a state of the mind, and the mind is generated by the brain somehow.
I'm certainly going to diverge from that perspective here. Rather than consciousness being in the mind and the mind being in the body, from the Non-Duality understanding it's the other way around. The mind, the body and the world appear within consciousness. And it's not just the Non-Duality understanding, it is the understanding of direct experience. All that you have ever experienced of the mind, the body and the world has been in consciousness. Without consciousness, the mind, the body and the world would not appear.
If you hear a sound it is within consciousness. If you open your eyes and look around, this moving image of the world appears in consciousness. The thoughts that float through the mind - "What shall I have for dinner?" or, "I must remember to send that message" - appear in consciousness. Your whole world picture, and all that you know about the world, is right here in consciousness. The hillside that you can see far away, that is perceived right here in consciousness. The sound of the plane flying overhead, that's perceived right here in consciousness. All that you know about your body is perceived in consciousness - the view of your hands, arms, legs and feet, the image you see in the mirror, the feelings of sadness and joy, the sensations of pain or discomfort, the softness of textures, and the tastes of your favourite foods, are all perceived in consciousness.
The mind and thinking is perceived in consciousness. Not only are the thoughts and images of the mind perceived in consciousness, but also the sense of 'I'. There is a sense of 'I am this', 'I do this', and 'I have this' that develops in the human mind, and this is perceived in consciousness.
Truly Consciousness is the still, silent, formless, dimensionless intelligence in which the world appears. The world of forms and solidity, of movement and sound, depth, distance, and change, appears within Consciousness. Consciousness, being formless and dimensionless, is without limits. The sensation and experience of limits appears within Infinite Consciousness. This sense of limits gives rise to the belief of separation and identity. The ego appears in the mind, but is perceived in Consciousness.
Withdrawing from the distractions of this apparently moving, changing world, and withdrawing from the chatter of the mind, Consciousness is known to be just the pure, effortless, unchanging presence in which the world seems to happen. It only seems to happen. Nothing is really done. Consciousness doesn't walk down the street or take a plane to Spain. Consciousness has no arms or legs. It is formless. Forms appear within Consciousness, similar to how dreams appear within the mind.
It might help to imagine nothing. Well, really it's more about not imagining anything, closing your eyes and letting go of thoughts, feelings, ideas and concepts, and just letting the mind be quiet for a short time.... You know that you're here. You are Consciousness. You are alive. You exist. But you aren't over there somewhere. There is no distance or limits. 'You' can't be found or defined. But you know you are aware. This is the shared core of all that is experienced. It is the Self Aware Consciousness. It has no 'substance', form or identity. It is this in which form and identity are experienced.
Open your eyes again and the world seems to fill Consciousness, but Consciousness remains just as it is.
- Category: The Human Experience
- Hits: 1208
When asked who I am I may give my name. That's usually the expected answer. But that's not really who I am. That's just what people call me, or call this human being. Am I this human being? Let's explore.
Let's analyse what I am if I consider myself to be a human being. Okay, so the human is a complex organism, but what I'm concerned about is: where are the limits of this human being? We can assume that this human form is limited by its skin, hair and nails. That sums up the outer 'shell' of the human form. But there's a problem. It's always changing. The skin is in a constant flow of change. We don't really notice, but dead skin falls off and is continually replaced. Hair and nails are always growing. We cut our hair and nails and consider then that they are no longer part of us.
So this superficially stable defined human outer shell is always changing. There's another problem. The human form interacts with the environment (the planet of which it is made) by breathing in gas, eating solids, drinking liquids, assimilating some of this and ejecting some (in a transformed manner). This human form is always changing. Not a second goes by without the body changing. You don't really notice it. There is an appearance of temporary permanence, but really the body never stops changing.
There are also questions about my limits in time if I am a human being. When did I begin? We may arbitrarily say it was when I was conceived. But that isn't a fixed point in time. There is a slow process of bringing a new human form into being. If we consider it carefully enough it can be seen that there is no real beginning. We say we have a family tree, where we come from. This human form comes from the flow and interactions of the human beings that preceded it. There isn't a true starting point that defines where a human being begins.
Similarly, at the death of this human form, it will break down into elements that return to the flow of the planet. I say 'return to' but they never left. This human body is really an expression of the flow of the planet. It is not truly an independent discrete form. It only seems to be that way.
The human mind develops the sense of independent discrete identity based on the way the body and world appears. But it's not true. I'm not really a human being, because I find no ends to the form that I superficially call a human being. There is only an appearance of limits to this human form. To identify with it is to believe in a false limitation.
Truly there are no limits. There is no limited identity. I am not this or that. I am.