Duality and Non-Duality

We experience duality in the world when we feel duality within ourselves—when there are some parts of us we accept and others we don’t, some we embrace and others we reject. Until we can learn to love all of what’s inside, we’re bound to perceive our external reality from division, instead of love.

Therefore, to perceive our external reality in a non-dual way, we need to practice loving whatever our experience is, loving our Inner Child no matter the conditions. It’s simple, yet difficult. There are some days when I don't feel like loving my inner world, and so find it difficult to love my outer world. But the more I practice, the more I look to my environment—at the animals, at nature, at people—and feel more love for what I see. I feel less separate from them. I feel a oneness and connection. I smile within myself.

At a recent talk I attended on the topic of duality and non-duality, someone asked the question, “Why engage in the practice of entering the darkness within ourselves?”. The answer came from within quite readily. I enter the darkness to love what is there. As long as I resist the darkness, there will be parts of me that are unloved, thus perpetuating an inner duality. But when I walk with Love into the darkness and embrace the parts of me that are scared or hurt, angry or ashamed, I enter into a non-dual experience. And this experience then affects how I perceive the world around me.