Duality

[ajay00]

Originally Posted by declan

Up Down, left right , good bad, yes no,etc our thinking is trained to be dualistic.However we can learn to see in a non dualistic way whereby everything just is as it is ,without putting any label on it.The glass is neither half full nor half empty , its a glass with water in it!, There is no judgement involved.

This is very well put.

The needing to put a label on things arises out of compulsive thinking . Due to this disorder, you live in your own mental world instead of being in direct correspondence with reality. This results in duality and resultant conflict, both inner and outer.

In the unitary perception, you just see reality as it is, without projecting one's ideas or beliefs which distort perception , and brings in wrong action.

[Floatsy]

Originally Posted by Baile

I met Thich Nhat Hanh once, he spoke to a small group of us and then we had an informal get-together after. He seemed to interacting with reality differently than anyone I've ever met. I never got the impression that he used his mind to "compare and contrast" that which was going on around him. Rather, it seemed he was just was. He was his environment. And I can (intellectually) see how, when you have achieved that state of unity awareness, you become the environment you inhabit. At that point it seems to me there would be nothing left to compare and contrast. All there would be, would be experiencing the experience.

Intellectual dualism-thinking and analyzing has its place as I said already. It's a learning tool. But I think it's clear, looking at what the various masters have taught over the centuries, that one of the path to enlightenment includes transforming dualism-thinking into something along the lines of pure experiential unity-beingness.

I've also met a few Masters: undoubtedly, it transforms your (my) realms of "normalcy" and possibility.

Thay is ill - here is a report from his senior students and the progress of his amazing recovery: http://plumvillage.org/news/an-updat...8th-june-2015/

[Maguru]

Originally Posted by Starman

Hi lemex, below is a quote from The Kybalion, a book on Hermetic teachings which are used by many who are consciously on the spiritual path.

THE KYBALION, CHAPTER X POLARITY
"Everything is dual; everything has poles; everything has its pair of opposites; like and unlike are the same. opposites are identical in nature, but different in degree; extremes meet; all truths are but half-truths; all paradoxes may be reconciled."

You can download this book for free at the link below. It has helped me form a lot of my metaphysical insights.

http://aoda.org/pdf/Kybalion.pdf

Do you believe that nothing is unique, that nothing stands alone? Isn't this the opposite of duality that does stand alone? Duality relies on it to exist but not vice versa.

[RyanWind]

Originally Posted by strsd

Duality... The sun, the moon... White, Black,... When everything is duality, what role do the stars play? Sun or moon? And grey? Is it just a mix between the two opposites?

For physical objects such as Stars, the duality would be perceiving a difference between me and that.

[Maguru]

Originally Posted by RyanWind

For physical objects such as Stars, the duality would be perceiving a difference between me and that.

It is always that way. The differences show us who we are.

[Shivani Devi]

Duality exists wherever relativity exists.

*I think I just heard Schrodinger's cat meow*

Wherever there is perception vs perceived, experiencer vs experience and God vs Soul.

The opposite of this, of course being non-duality or unity.

This is something that cannot be described, as it would be necessary to come back down into the dual state to do it.

...and, the opposite of 'coffee' is 'tea'...duh! :p

[Shivani Devi]

Originally Posted by Lorelyen

Even a state such as dead v alive, mutually exclusive it would seem, is only so by definition.

...photons travel as a wave = perception A.
...photons travel as quanta = perception B.

...photons travel as both wave and quanta = perception C.

[lemex]

Originally Posted by RyanWind

For physical objects such as Stars, the duality would be perceiving a difference between me and that.

When you say perceive a difference between me and that, is the word "that" duality or the star?

Though you use only the word duality, do you mean relative duality?

Of course, one cannot have full duality now. In our (physical) realm, too much duality and you cannot have physical life, so duality here doesn't work it's watered down, it is relative if we are to exist.

For those who see opposites is there an interplay between unlike as opposed to variations of engery's that balance each other.

Another answer to consider is, physical objects probably have physical reasons and certainly relationship to all objects, even us. For instance, the first generation of star formation produced all the heavy elements, and atoms that are part us, now they fuel life, but it is not about one specific one.

[Shivani Devi]

It was only through understanding the very nature of Duality that I was able to see this Unity.

For years, I was torn between basically 'loving God' and 'becoming God' so I was living in this dual existence anyway without even realising it.

Eventually, one thing I knew for sure was I couldn't keep doing both - well, both within my own mind anyway.

Saying "I am God" was the same thing to me as saying "God doesn't exist"...massive ego probs...bigtime!

I was stuck on the non-dual treadmill and getting basically nowhere...saying 'neti neti' (not this or that) to everything...every experience.

I wanted to negate all this duality through introspective inquiry to find the nature of Unity...prob was, my unending, unconditional and total love for God stood in the way and there was no way I was going to give that up...no way on earth - it just felt way too damn good. <3

So after years, I dropped my search for for Unity...I dropped being an Advaita Vedantin and embraced the path of Duality with all my heart and soul.

The very microsecond I turned from 'neti neti' (not this nor that) to 'iti iti' (this and that) I experienced the full unity of consciousness, rose above the duality and embraced the Absolute (which only the Devil deals in, or so I hear).

Now, I am a very proud Dualist.