Category: Non-duality

Published: 01 August 2025

Hits: 643

There is a peace that never ends. If we are searching for peace, why would we settle for anything less? A temporary peace isn't the answer. But as well as never ending, Permanent Peace is without a beginning. Permanent Peace is the simple basic nature of Being. It's right here now.

If it's right here now, then why don't we feel it? Because it's not a feeling. It's not something that can be felt. It is beyond subtle. Permanent Peace is unmoving, unchanging and always here, so it can't be perceived. It's like looking at perfectly clear glass - it can't be seen. Permanent Peace is the pure clarity of Being. But how can that help us with all the incidents, difficulties, clashes and drama in our lives?

It helps to know that that Peace is always here. It's what is always here. Troubles come and go. Incidents happen here and there. It is from the place of Peace that all this coming and going is perceived. It is where we are looking from. It is the still centre around which the world of motion revolves. It helps to be reminded of this. It helps to turn the mind from its troubles and remind it that there is a Heart of Peace in which this all seems to happen.

Knowing that this imperceivable Peace is always here and is our true, unchanging nature, is a useful pointer to turn the mind from being caught up in the difficulties and drama of the world. We are not the difficulties and drama. It's all perceived from a placeless place of Peace. This knowledge can turn the mind inwards to its source, the source of all life and perception. The mind becomes tired of being caught up in the sway, being rocked this way and that by the vagaries of the world. The mind seeks some peace. There are temporary times of relative peace, and these are fine and natural. It's like a wave of motion, with quiet phases and busy phases, peaceful phases and active phases. This is the flow of opposites in the world.

But the Permanent Peace discussed here is beyond the flow of opposites that the world appears to be. The Permanent Peace is the stillness of the unmanifest Singularity. It is the point before time and space appeared. It is timeless and spaceless. It doesn't move or change. Yet within the Singularity of blissful peace and oneness, the world of change and diversity appears. This world of motion doesn't obliterate the Singularity. It doesn't end the Singularity. It doesn't temporarily displace it even. The timeless Singularity spans all space and time. The Permanent Peace remains throughout the appearance and disappearance of the world.

There is no place and no time in which the Permanent Peace is not. All there really is is Permanent Peace, though it may appear to be broken and shattered. The message here is: do not be fooled by what appears to be; know that Peace, Oneness and Life are the nature of all existence.

Category: Non-duality

Published: 26 September 2025

Hits: 632

I've mentioned the video game analogy previously, where open world video games can give insight into this human experience, as I call it. An open world video game is one where you control a character in a 3D world that you can explore however you like, with different challenges and experiences along the way. Although it seems that 'you' are a character in a 3D world, really it is all one. It's all the computer or central processing unit within the games console. There aren't really other characters, buildings, mountains, animals and vehicles. It appears on a screen as though there are these separate characters and objects, but it is all one appearance on the screen. It appears to move and change, but the screen remains as it is.

The analogy is that this human experience of the world is one. There are not many people, animals, buildings and mountains. It's all one appearance in Consciousness. One Being appearing as though it is many. Movement and change appearing in the timeless Stillness of Being.

We can go further in exploring the video game analogy. In open world video games there are usually NPCs. These are Non-Playable Characters, characters that are controlled by the central processing unit. They have their own functionality. They may present challenges or be helpful to the main character. As video games advance, these NPCs can become more advanced. They can learn. They can adapt. They can have their own storage of information that influences their character, personality and actions. On a basic level, their fighting ability can improve by learning how others attack them, learning patterns and responding to these. On a more advanced level, they can develop interactions with other characters, recognise friends and foes, stay away from dangers, and explore.

We call this Artificial Intelligence, where technology learns and adapts, building its store of data/intelligence to become more effective. So consider these NPCs in an open world video game where this develops. It's possible at some point that the character's understanding of its world can develop to a sense of self-awareness. I don't mean consciousness. I mean developing knowledge and understanding to consider itself. It's all data, but this adaptive data could develop a strong foundation of 'this is me', 'I need this', 'be cautious of others', 'those are friends', 'those are enemies', and so on, developing a sense of identity separate from the world.

The character, its knowledge, the other characters, the world - it's all data handled by the one root processing unit. But the AI NPC can develop a sense of being a separate being. It can develop some kind of mistaken identity based on the appearance of its world. For the NPC the world is real. It's made of the world and lives in the world. So its development of understanding is based on that and helps it to function better in the video game world.

Bringing this analogy home, we can understand the human experience. Each human experience has its own path and development. We might think that we are a person separate from the world, but we are not. There is only One, and in this One there is the appearance of many. As each human grows it develops a sense of itself: what is me, what is mine, what I like, what I don't like, etc. But this is all a play of separate individuality through mental reasoning. The reasoning in the human mind is copied in its creation of Artificial Intelligence. It's a flow of data/information that builds up structures of belief based on experiences in its world. But the human mind has built up many different beliefs based on a core mistaken belief of separation. This world is really One Being expressed as many whilst remaining one, infinitely one.

There's not really a true identity for the video game character. There is only that in which it appears. There's not really a true human identity. There is only That in which it appears. At the heart of our human experience, where we look for who we really are, is the recognition that there is just This, an infinite oneness of being. We are not a character in a game, or a person in a world. We are That Which Is. We don't die when the person dies. The core of who we are is timelessly present. The human experiences come and go, whilst we remain as we are.

Category: The Human Experience

Published: 19 September 2025

Hits: 633

Suffering is a common human experience. It's part of human life. But we would rather it wasn't. We would rather not suffer. We would rather have a happy, fun or peaceful life. So why does suffering happen and how can we end suffering?

From the Non-Duality understanding, suffering can be seen as a wakeup call. This world of separate individuality, where we feel and believe that we are a separate being in a world of separation, is not really what it seems or what we have believed it to be. We are not a separate being in a world of many separate beings. Separation is a play within the Oneness of Reality.

Planet Earth shows this play of many whilst being one. The many different humans, plants, animals, birds, fish, insects, minerals and so on, are really the one planet expressing itself as many. This apparent division of One into many means some kind of limitation. The further we seem to be from Oneness, the stronger the barriers between us. Strong barriers lead to clashing and fighting. Planet Earth appears as a world of strong barriers separating life forms from each other. It inevitably leads to clashing and competing. Animals, plants and humans fight for supremacy and survival on this planet, due to the apparently strong barriers of separation. This leads to pain and suffering.

So it is separation that causes suffering. A world of separate beings with hardened barriers between them leads to suffering. In the case of humans, this suffering happens on physical, emotional and mental levels. Physical pain is experienced when bones are broken, the body is infected, or there is disease etc. Emotional suffering comes from the separation of strong relationships or the clashing of relationships. Mental suffering comes from mental illness and/or the psychological difficulties of being a separate individual coping with the world.

Self Enquiry is a practice in Non-Duality that in simple terms goes like this: find the one who thinks they are a separate being. I am neither the body, the emotions, nor the mental activity. I perceive all of this. I cannot be what I perceive. It is mental activity that asks, "Why am I suffering?" But who is this 'I'? Who is the one who suffers. There are no real limits that define where the body begins and ends. There are no real limits in the human mind. It is the mind or mental activity that builds up a sense of identity and limits. It is this vague identity that claims it is suffering. Identity means separation, and separation means suffering.

So then we conclude that it is the assumed separate identity that gives rise to suffering, and it is suffering that shakes the assumed separate being from the complacency of its mistaken belief. The end of separate identity then is the end of suffering. In Buddhist terms this is Enlightenment. The end of suffering comes when the separate identity vanishes. Nirvana is when the ego is extinguished. It doesn't mean that the body doesn't experience pain thereafter. The body still lives in a world of apparent separation and clashing. But the Oneness of Being shines through, extinguishing the mental activity of identity, bringing the natural state of stillness, oneness and peace where the mind previously experienced hurt, suffering and turmoil.

It is Oneness that brings the end of suffering. Oneness is here right now. We need only let go of the strong belief of separation and individual identity. It is a sacrifice of sorts, sacrificing the ego for the Whole, the death of the small self and the awakening to the reality of the Infinite One Self. There is nothing other than the Infinite One Self. Nothing can harm it. It remains timelessly as it is. We are That.

Category: Non-duality

Published: 31 October 2025

Hits: 617

A common mistake about Non-Duality is that it is something to be attained, or it is a state of consciousness that we can reach beyond this world of duality. But Non-Duality is really an explanation of the nature of reality - that it's not two, meaning that there is not a duality or a multiplicity, there are not many. Sometimes people may feel that it is necessary to overcome duality by drawing inwards to a point of Non-Duality, but that's not the case. It is rather a recognising that there is no duality, no inside or outside, that reveals the true nature of reality as a Non-Duality. Let's understand this some more.

Most people may have no concept, understanding or interest about whether reality is a oneness or not. There is a generally accepted view amongst humanity that there is this and that, me and you, me and them, these and those. It is what we call a dualistic view, seeing the world as consisting of many separate forms. People generally don't realise it in that way; it's just how the world appears and their everyday view of life isn't really questioned or highlighted. The Non-Duality understanding points it out. It highlights that we see the world in this way, mentally - that we have a mental view of the world as made of separate forms and separate beings. I describe it as a World of Opposites, because not only does the world appear to be made of separate forms, but there appears to be a force of opposites through the world, where these opposites seem to be stretched apart. For example, we conceptualise high and low, good and bad, near and far, stillness and movement, permanence and change, and so on.

So it's useful to recognise this apparent World of Opposites, and that the world behaves as if there is a push and pull between opposing forces. Moreover, it's useful to recognise that we see the world that way and we believe that this separation of opposites, or the separation of the world as a multiplicity, is true and real. That's an important recognition. But Non-Duality goes further. It says that this apparent separation and appearance of the interplay of opposites in the world is not really how it is. There's not really a separation. There are not two. There are not many. Only an Infinite One.

Just as a painting appears to contain many forms but is one, just as a movie on a screen appears to have many forms but is one, the appearance of the world in consciousness is one. The play of an unfolding universe is one. Although it may seem that the universe came from an unmanifest Singularity, bursting forth into opposite forces that interacted and multiplied, really the Singularity remains. There is no creation and destruction. What appears or disappears from the Singularity is always the Singularity, although it may appear to be its opposite. The universe now is no more or less than ever.

So Non-Duality is not something to be reached. It's right here now. It's not something for which we need to raise our consciousness to attain. Rather, it is recognised in the letting go of the ingrained human belief of separation. It's not that we live in duality and need to reach a state of Non-Duality. There is no duality. There is only Non-Duality; there is only an Infinite Indivisible Oneness. The world is not a duality. It appears to be, but what appears is a play of opposites within the Oneness of Reality. The world cannot appear without a play of reflection: what is and what is not. But it is all What Is.

It's hoped that humanity can take this on board and start living in a way that recognises the Oneness of life. Non-Duality does away with selfishness, competition, fighting and war. There are no separate selves. There is only Infinite Oneness.