During this year I had a lot of anxiety about death. Death is a concept which contains lots of emotions and feelings. Maybe even within you? Historically these emotions are stories given over the from past generations. Christian concepts like Hell or Heaven and Judgement day in the Islam. But also stories told by friend or family in Atheist families. We all have some sort of "story" of death. Death is one side of the duality. The other side is to be alive, to live. Non-duality is the philosophy which sees them as one and the same. There is no duality; only existence or consciousness.
The Concept of Non-Duality:
Recently, I read a book of Alan Watts which explains it with a simple story. Image a landscape with mountains and valleys. This all is the same material, earth. But without the mountains we wouldn't have the valleys. It is relative to each other but the same. In a similar way we don't have the best days of our life without the worst days of our life. This relative view is a way of our mind to see the difference between light and dark or peace and chaos. It is a way to make living easier for the consciousness. Although this glass (of seeing the world as separate from our-self) we put over our consciousness hides what is in plain side. The sense of existence is one and the same according to non-duality. Light and dark is the same without light we wont have dark and vice versa. Another results of this Oneness is that there is no separate self. Non-duality states that you and the "outside" world are the same. This can be an overwhelming lonely feeling, which I have experience multiple times thinking about this concept. But on the other hand this sets you free in the sense that you have all the freedom to explore and get to know your world. Moreover, non-duality gives us the inside that everything you are searching for, is already here. There is no magical future or something external to your being. When you search for meaning you only find yourself in the end. This can give peace to some people but it is a hard fact to understand. Especially if you are trapped in the way you framed how life is suppose to be. Non-duality is a concept which explains that there is just this: to be alive. So, in the sense we have one thing which is fundamental to our lives: Existence, the Absolute, God, Consciousness or whichever name you put on it. This is the story of non-duality.
Critic to this philosophy
It is my belief that you cannot introduce a philosophy without seeing the negative side or introducing ways how lot to interpret this philosophy. Oneness explains our experience but is not a way we control the “outside”. In fact non-duality does not explain the way the world works or how consciousness works. It only says experience is the only thing there is. But in fact we can be influenced from outside signals. So, there can be maybe more then just the experience. The opposite to non-duality is materialism which is the belief that everything there exists is made out of material. This belief is common and is so mainstream most people state this as a fact whether or not we can explain everything by material or not.
Man has hypnotized himself into thinking that he is a human being, whereas in reality he is one with God.
~ Paramahansa Yogananda
In conclusion, this philosophy is really profound and complex to teach but really interesting once it is understood. It can give people a sense of relaxation or a feeling that "the search for meaning" is over. But this is a philosophy like every other where at the end you can still suggest: is there more? In the end I only introduced the concept to give a more in depth information about being as a human. To learn from philosophy which has been there around for a long time. In the introduction I state that I still fear death sometimes and thus have not yet fully embraced non-duality. Will getting the know this concept is one this, it is harder to implement it in daily life and mind. If you are interesting in this topic I encourage you read more about this. For example, materialism is baloney by Kastrup which goes in depth about the fallacies of materialism. Hope you found this introduction useful and find peace in this philosophy.
p.s. if you want to go more in depth about the history of non-duality I suggest to watch this video.
Ingmar
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