Duality and Non-Duality

We experience duality in the world when we feel duality within ourselves, when there are parts of ourselves that have not been embraced by our love. Unless we turn to these parts and love them, whatever their experience, we'll feel an inner division. And as a result, we’ll be less likely to perceive our external reality from love, but rather from distress and fear, and will struggle to take what is outside of us into our hearts and respond to it lovingly.

And so it's very simple, this notion of bringing non-duality to our experience, and that is to engage in the practice of just loving whatever our experience is, loving our Inner Child no matter the conditions. It’s simple, yet difficult. Over the course of many years of engaging in this work I have become more open to my environment with love. But it's a daily practice. There are some days when I don't feel like loving my inner world, and therefore find it difficult to love my outer world. But more and more, when I look to my environment, at the animals, at nature, at people, after having first embraced my own pain, I have more love. 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 quite suddenly to me. 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 and un-embraced, duality within myself and duality outside myself. 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.