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.
- Written by David Hall
- Category: Non-duality
All beliefs are wrong. Everything that you believe is wrong. That sounds a bit blunt, but there is some relative truth to it. Beliefs themselves are based on flawed logic. It's not really possible to know Truth, so to believe that some knowledge is true is flawed.
For example, one may believe that the planet is spherical. It's not true. I don't mean that the Earth is flat. I mean that the Earth isn't really truly spherical. It's not a true sphere, and not just because it bulges at the equator. The planet only appears smoothly spherical from a distance. Up close there are jagged mountains, skyscrapers, cliff edges, and so on. Also, we can't really say where planet Earth stops being the planet and starts being space. There isn't really a fixed defining perimeter where Earth's atmosphere ends. So the theory that Earth is round is flawed.
No theory is accurate. It's just that some theories are less inaccurate than others. We could say that Earth is fairly spherical, and that's less inaccurate than some other theories, but they will all be flawed to a greater or lesser degree. The simple reason for this is that Truth is inexpressible. For there to be any expression, such as a written theory, a verbal argument or a conceptual belief, it must utilise a duality. Written words are contrasted with the empty page, verbal words are contrasted with silence, and beliefs are contrasted with the empty mind in which they formulate. This duality is itself flawed. There can't really be a duality. There can only be an appearance of division or separation within the Singularity of existence. A Singularity can't really be expressed. It is best to accept that the expression of the Singularity is an inferior appearance of the reality which is always here.
What that means is that, as Reality is a Singularity, it can only be expressed as what it is not. For instance, silence can't really be expressed. Descriptions of silence aren't it. We can whisper or describe silence as the absence of sound, but that will not be as accurate as the silence itself. So all descriptions of it fail, or at best point to what can't be described. It is the same with trying to describe Reality. It's like trying to point to the finger that points, or trying to see the eye that sees.
So it's useful to recognise that all our beliefs are flawed. If we believe something to be true, it may be relatively true, but not absolute Truth. The absolute Truth is just what is, right here and now. It is beyond words and beyond concepts, or rather it is wordless and concept free, yet all words and concepts appear and disappear within it. Truth does not need to be believed. It is always here, ever-present. This is why in Non-Duality practice the aim is to drop all beliefs, even the belief of Non-Duality, as these beliefs are like clouds that block the clear sky of what just is.
- Written by David Hall
- Category: The Universe
How many moments are there in a minute? We can't really answer that. The term 'moment' refers to an undefined short length of time. People often talk about "each moment" and "in the moment", but these are vague throw-away expressions that give a sense of time being divisible. Suggesting there are moments of time implies that time can be split up. But that's not our real experience of time. There aren’t chunks of time where one stops and another begins. Time is continually rolling on.
This applies also to our sense of time in seconds, minutes, hours, days, years, and so on. Time isn't really divided up into seconds, minutes, hours etc. Humans have devised ways to divide up time into manageable measurements. It's really useful to have a calendar and a shared structure of hours and minutes throughout each day. But it seems that we fall into the belief that time is really structured in this way. Days, hours and minutes become important to our everyday life, to the extent that sometimes it feels like our lives are ruled by the clock.
It's important to recognise that time is continually flowing. Then we can go a step further and recognise that time is the appearance of continual change in the universe. Time can't happen without the appearance of change. If the world didn't change then time would seem to stand still, or rather, there would be no time. The appearance of change, in turn, is dependent on space, or the appearance of distance. Without distance then space can't be perceived, but distance is itself the appearance of space between forms. For example, consider a vast empty space. We would have no idea of how vast it was until there were two or more forms or 'things' within the space to show a sense of distance between them. Without forms then there is no distance and no appearance of space.
So the appearance of forms gives a sense of distance, or space, and the change or movement of forms gives the appearance of time. The world of space and time appears as a continual flow of changing forms. But are there really numerous forms that change? I've never found any limit to forms. For example, consider an acorn that grows on an Oak tree. Its beginning comes from the tree, and the tree's beginning comes from an acorn, and so on. The acorn also doesn't have an end. It falls to the ground, takes root and develops into an Oak tree, in turn growing more acorns and scattering these. We can't say where or when the acorn begins or ends. Even if the acorn doesn't take root it will decay into the environment of which it is always made. The form of the acorn changes, but we can't really say that it is a limited form.
As it does with time, the human mind likes to divide the world of space, but into forms or things. We say there is an acorn, a leaf, a branch, a trunk etc. But these are vague definitions of 'things' that really are one 'thing'. The world of changing forms is one world flowing within itself. There are not really many forms. It could be argued that two rocks floating in empty space are two forms. But this would be an impossible situation. How would those rocks come to be rocks? There would need to be a flow of change from the empty space forming into a rock. In that case the empty space isn't really nothing, and there is again a recognition that there is one form flowing within itself, appearing as if there are two forms and empty space.
This leads us further into the recognition that space and time are not two separate things. Time is an appearance of changing space. And what can we say about the changing space that appears? It gives the impression of separation, division and distance, but really it is a singularity expressing a multiplicity within itself. The divisions of time and space are not real. There is only One, an Infinite One. The appearance of time and space is real in the sense that it is Here and Now.
It's helpful to understand the world or universe, space and time, as appearing from a Big Bang, and that the Big Bang came from a Singularity. What is often overlooked is that the timeless formless Singularity is still here now. The world of time and space appears within the formless timeless Singularity Here and Now.
- Written by David Hall
- Category: God
We've all heard of satan, diablo or the devil, but what is it really? It's the personification of the force in the universe that divides, separates, opposes and limits. In itself it's not an evil force. It's a force necessary for the world to appear. The world is created by (and ultimately destroyed by) the force that seems to separate Oneness into opposites, creating division and limitation simultaneously. Or at least appearing to do so. Division and separation in the world is not a real thing, but an appearance. The world appears by virtue of the force that gives the appearance of separation from a Singularity.
The Singularity, of course, is God. The Infinite One. Diablo (the duplicitous one) is deemed to be the opposite of God. It is separation, limitation and opposition taken to the extreme. It seems to be the ultimate opposite of God. It is the Selfish One, as opposed to the Selfless One; the one who opposes all, as opposed to the One who is all.
This opposite force is the opposite of truth, but the human mind has been tricked into believing that it is true. The human mind has been duped into believing that separation and limitation are true. The consequence of this is that the human mind believes itself to be a being separate from others. This brings suffering, need, greed, loss, incompleteness, competition, war, envy, hate, sadness, defensiveness, cruelty, power struggles etc. These all arise in the human world due to the dominance of the belief of separation and identifying as separate beings. But truly there is no other. There is only God, the Infinite One, without limit or division.
There are seemingly those that choose to follow the duplicitous being, and consider 'him' to be the god of the world. They depict him as two-horned, cloven footed, holding power over others, the high and the low, the chequerboard of opposites, and the subjugation of the human spirit. It's a recognition of the force of duality in the world, but positioned in way of control or dominance over the human being. However, this control, this duping, is only in the human mind. We are not the human mind. We are That which is beyond the apparent world of opposites. We perceive the human mind, and we perceive the world through the human perspective, or the human experience.
It is in this current state of development of the human mind that it has fallen into the confusion of mistaken belief. It's a natural development, as this planet gives an appearance of separation and competition, in its ‘survival of the fittest’ system. The human mind will continue to develop and rise out of its subjugation. It will free itself from its entanglement in the belief that separation and limitation is real. It will free itself in the realisation that there is only Freedom. Boundlessness is the nature of Being. It is the nature of the One Being, that we can call God. There is nothing other than the Infinite One Being. There can only be an appearance of others.
The spirit is not subjugated by matter. Matter is nothing other than spirit. The opposites are not really separate. There is only Infinite Oneness, and if the mind limits itself it will necessarily encounter problems, as the natural balance of Oneness seems to bring about its restoration. Truly there is never an imbalance. There is never a division of the Singularity. It only seems to be if looked at from a limited perspective.
Truly there is nothing other than God. What seems to be ‘other’, ‘opposite’ or ‘against’ is not what it seems.
- Written by David Hall
- Category: God
If God is an Infinite Being, how can there be any other? An Infinite Being has no beginning, end or division. Nothing can be outside the Infinite. Even 'inside' wouldn't be strictly correct, because there are no limits that enclose, and ultimately there is no 'thing' that is truly separate from the Infinite Being to be said to be inside it. There would only be the Infinite Being.
An Infinite Being can't be divided up into other beings. Not really. Conceptually it's possible, just as how we can label different parts of the body, although they're not really separate parts. The right hand isn't really separate from the left hand, for instance, although we label them as such.
It's useful to contemplate the infinite to challenge the mind's limited perspective. The mind thinks in terms of limitation. The mind uses names and labels for things and assumes that they are separate things. But really, if you look closely, you find that there are no real divides between a thing and the environment. The human body, for example, flows with the environment, breathing, drinking, eating, developing. It's not truly a separate discrete form.
Even if we consider a tin can, it seems to be separate from the environment, but that's only a temporary appearance of separation. The tin was formed from the environment (the planet) and its form is held in relative stability due to the conditions of the environment. If the temperature or pressure of the environment were to change then the stability of the tin can would change. Even now, a tin can is extremely slowly decaying, or losing its form to the environment. Its relatively stable condition is not permanent. It's just that its rate of decay or change is extremely slow, giving the appearance of fixed stability.
So when the mind thinks that there are many objects, or people, or animals, and so on, that's really just the mind conceptualising limits and labels on the world. This is helpful, but the error arises when labels and limitations are believed to be real. That's the important point. We can call a mountain a mountain and a valley a valley, but if we believe that these are separate objects then we are mistaken. They are useful words to describe the world, but they are not accurate.
Even the term 'world' isn't accurate. The 'world' has no real limits or edges, beginnings or ends. It is the Infinite Being. There is only the Infinite Being.