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: The Universe
How many moments are there? What is a moment? A moment is a vague concept of an unspecified length of time, generally considered to be a small point in time. But are there any real points in time? Can time really be divided into points of time?
Although we use a system of years, months, weeks, days, hours, minutes, and seconds, these are all manmade measurements of time. A year is based on the orbit of the planet around the sun, and a day is based on the rotation of the earth relative to the sun. There is a natural pulse and cyclic repetition in the world that allows for a sense of periods of time. But that's not to say that periods of time are really set.
We come to accept and believe in our terms for time, assuming that time is really divided in this way. But time cannot truly be divided. It is a flow of change. We will find no true beginnings, ends or divisions of time. Time cannot be truly grasped and labelled.
It is more accurate to understand time as the appearance of change within an unchanging permanent. That is, the appearance of change that is perceived as the flow of time is known relative to One who remains unchanged and unmoving. Namely, Consciousness.
It is in Consciousness that the experience of change is perceived. Consciousness is unchanging and timeless. Change appears as a reflection of the unchanging nature of Pure Consciousness, like floating clouds reflected on the still water of an infinite lake. The lake remains still and unchanged whilst change appears within it.
There are not moments in time. There are no seconds or minutes etc. There is only Now. Now is not a point in time. Now is timeless, experiencing the illusion of time. Now is the Pure Consciousness which allows the perception of its opposites. But there is nothing other than Now, only an illusory appearance of 'not now'. There is only Now.
- Written by David Hall
- Category: Non-duality
There are many teachers of non-duality, including the world itself. But let's look here at the difference between those that say there is nothing that can be done and those that say there is something that can be done. If you look into Non-Duality enough you will encounter teachers who say that there are practices that can be done to reach self-realisation, and some who say that you can't do anything because your true nature is self realised already.
The latter is perhaps the most truthful. A core teaching of Non-Duality is that the separate self cannot achieve enlightenment or self-realisation. This may sound strange to some, but the reason is simple: there is no separate self. Separation is illusory. The sense of being a separate self is a mistake in the mind. The identity of oneself as a human separate from other humans is flawed. Your true nature is the formless Awareness of the human experience.
So, as much as human longing is for happiness due to the sense of separation and being incomplete, this is more of a muddle in the mind. The unhappiness arises due to the mistaken identity as a separate being. The true Self is the selfless self, which is complete, infinite, formless, without separation or division. It is the true Self seemingly at the heart of all apparently separate selves.
But humans are driven by this sense of being separate. We compete against and clash with 'others', we seek happiness, we have wants and needs, we are always incomplete. Even spiritually seeking enlightenment is an expression of this search for happiness, peace and wholeness. But the separate self cannot achieve it. True Peace is already here. True Peace is the nature of our timeless being. So the teachers who say that people can do nothing to achieve it are right. It is like trying to be yourself. You are yourself already. There is nothing to do. And, in fact, your true nature does not do. All actions and movement, space and time, are illusory. The True Self is unchanging, beyond concepts of space, time, distance and movement.
This high level of Non-Duality teaching does not help most people. It may for some bring about a leap from searching to self-realisation, where suddenly the illusory sense of being a separate self is shattered, and Awareness is as it is. But for many people there is no immediate satisfaction in this knowledge. Knowledge will not satisfy. People still want practices. People still feel the need for something to be achieved. It is for this reason that many Non-Duality teachers give practices and guidance for seekers to 'reach' self-realisation.
Are practices necessary? Well, yes and no. If they seem necessary and the spiritual urge rises in a person then they will be or seem necessary. Will they achieve enlightenment? Well, yes and no. If a person feels the need to reach enlightenment then spiritual practices may be the way to get there. But it should be recognised that 'there' is right here, right now. There is nowhere to get to. Enlightenment or self-realisation is not experienced by the illusory person, it is the underlying nature of what is.
Self-realisation is the core of the apparently separate world. It seems to be the Oneness at the heart of the separate being. But there is no separate being or world. There is only self aware Oneness. If a human feels the need to turn inwards and seek its true identity, then it will do so. The sense of separation will always seek unity or oneness, which consumes the illusion of separateness.
- Written by David Hall
- Category: Non-duality
Are you tall or short? Thin or wide? You are none of these. People may be relatively tall or short, thin or wide, but that's not who we really are. If you believe you are the body then you may describe yourself in these dualistic and relative terms, but generally if you have some spiritual insight you will know that you are not the body. So you should know and consider that you are neither tall nor short, thin nor wide.
The dimensions of the world in which the human form lives do not apply to our true nature. Truly we have no dimensions. Consider that. There is nowhere that is far from you or near to you. There is nothing that is outside you or within you. There is no-one separate from you or apart from you. What appears to be near or far, tall or short, thin or wide, is right here. Our experience of the world is right here. We experience the sense of depth, height and width, but we experience this right here.
Most people have seen a movie projected on a cinema screen. On the screen we can see tall mountains in the distance, faces close up, wide buildings and narrow streets that taper off into the distance. But this distance and size we see isn't real. It's an illusion of depth, width and height upon the flat screen.
The world appears in a similar way within the dimensionless nature of Awareness. Awareness is our formless unseen being within which the world of forms appears. The sense of depth, width and height reaches out from an apparent centre of awareness. There seems to be a centre from which we perceive the world's depth and distance. The centre is right here, from where we perceive. But it is not truly a centre. In the centre of being, the centre of awareness, it can be found that there is no depth or distance, and therefore no centre. There is only What Is, our formless, dimensionless being.
It is our formless, dimensionless being that allows the appearance of forms and dimensions from an apparent centre of awareness, like an explosion of dimension from an infinite core. The world of depth and dimensions is an illusory appearance within the formless, infinite Awareness or Consciousness, that is the reality of our being.
- Written by David Hall
- Category: The Universe
This is a tough one for people and the mind to grasp or accept: nothing ever happens. But it can be explained to a degree. We must start by recognising that the nature of Being, the nature of Reality, is an Infinite Singularity.
The world that is perceived as moving and changing appears within the Infinite Singularity, and it seems as if the Singularity has exploded into different perceivable forms. I call it The World of Motion, because everything is moving, relatively speaking. Even things that appear to be still (like houses, mountains, tables and chairs etc.) are moving, as the universe swirls in its expansion and contraction. You see, it's also a World of Opposites interacting. Or so it seems.
Consider an Infinite Singularity. There is no inside or outside of it. There is nothing other than it. There is no distance or division in it. There are no dimensions to it. It cannot go somewhere else. It cannot move at all. Movement doesn't exist in it. It cannot change. Change doesn't exist in it. It is formless and invisible. It is pure clarity and unblemished perfection, although there is no-one to see it and call it this. In fact it really has no qualities. The descriptive words I've used here are plucked from a world of duality and opposites, where comparisons can be made. But an Infinite Singularity has no comparisons, as there is nothing other than it.
This Infinite Singularity is the unseen reality of the illusory world. The world appears as if the Singularity has been split in two and multiplied exponentially to form a multiplicity. Points of perception arise within this multiplicity, human beings, where we can look at the world as if it is the Singularity in separation. The Singularity is able to perceive itself in terms of duality, and concepts of opposites. It is from this standpoint that a human being can say, "Reality is a Singularity, and separation is illusory."
So the World of Opposites / Motion appears, and it seems that things happen, things are done, activity goes on between the opposite poles of beginning and end. But this is illusory. The Singularity is not broken in two. A multiplicity is not formed. There is never a separation in the Singularity, only an appearance of separation and illusion. The Singularity remains as it is. All the motion in the universe goes nowhere. It all seems to happen right here in the Singularity. Time seems to span out between the beginning and the end of the universe, but it is all right now in the Singularity.
The Singularity does not have space and time. It is Here and Now. There is no real movement or change. Nothing ever happens. There is a Law of Opposites that applies in the world that seems to appear, because even in the illusory appearance the Singularity must be maintained. That is, whatever is done in space and time must be undone. Space may appear to stretch out, but it must also stretch back in. The world may appear from a singularity, but it must return to a singularity. Whatever happens must unhappen. Its opposite must counter it to restore the balance of the singularity.
The Singularity is never out of balance, of course, and nothing is ever done. Yet the world appears as if something is happening, so it necessarily must unhappen. This happening and unhappening is commensurate with space and time. So space and time is the appearance of the unfurling and refurling of the Singularity.
If this is difficult to grasp at first, recognise that in a dream nothing ever happens. Dream images may appear and disappear. Distances may be travelled but you never go anywhere. It is similar with the universe but with a more formal structure. What happens within the unfurling and refurling of the universe has infinite possibilities, but it must all be counterbalanced by the nature of opposites.