Nonduality: Experiential Realization Beyond Concepts
Nonduality is a nice buzzword. There are conferences about it (e.g. Science and Nonduality) wherein a plurality of nondual orientations are presented. However when we use this term in such a general fashion, it’s easy to get mixed up. Its easy to conflate different perspectives and ultimately miss the point.
In essence, nonduality refers to experiential, nonconceptual realization. We might also say primordially-preconceptual experience. Why utilize this description? What is your experience prior to thought in this moment? You might say, well, how can I say because I am already thinking...? Good! Go on…. Well prior to thought I can’t say anything about experience because there is no way to ascribe labels, make statements or descriptions without thought…. OK, So what is that experience like? I can’t say. Things begin to lose their solidity, there is open space that reveals itself without edges. I notice when thoughts resume but its almost as if I am seeing outside of thought.
Prior to our ascription of labels to our experience, we exist as a matrix of suchness (tathātā). Prior to thought there is no this or that, good or bad, or even me or you. Does this mean those things do not exist relatively? Of course not, they absolutely do. However the heart of nonduality is the realization that awareness is never broken or fragmented in any way. It simply is as such.
One Nonduality, or Many Nondualities?
Some might say that all expressions of nonduality are the same. Because nondual consciousness goes beyond conceptual comparisons, it would be impossible to differentiate one nondual from another. In fact, that would be oxy-moronic! Others might say that there are different expressions of nonduality, or as Ferrer (2001) describes “shores.” From that view, there are different ways to embody, express, and experience nondual consciousness.
Through my training and experience, I have come to believe that both have relative value as interpretations. However the truth is, I really don’t know because nondual consciousness is not object of knowledge.
However when it comes to the application of Nonduality in a psychotherapeutic framework, I find an relative-absolute framework as providing the largest runway. In other words, we as individuals experience challenges related to our circumstances (fate, karma, etc.). These circumstances illuminate our patterns of reactivity, or in Buddhist terms attachment and aversion. The patterns of reactivity unfold in relationship, or in an inter-relational field.
Therefore a nondual approach to psychotherapy includes the relativistic framework that our identification with contracted ways of being obscures our clear-seeing. Contracted ways of being are not something that shouldn’t be happening, rather they are why we are having this conversation, they are why we are here in the first place. On the relative level, we work to de-animate our contracted states of being through presence.
However, ultimately nondual consciousness does not require any de-animation or work. It is primordially complete. Nothing is missing. When we become identified with our conditioning we are prone to contracted states of being. These states narrow our attention to our sense of separateness. They reinforce the identification with this painful experience is really me rather than I am the open space through which my experience unfolds and liberates without meddling. Nondual consciousness is the beginning and the end of liberation.
Integrating Spirituality and Psychology: Jung, Animism and Nonduality
Worldview is a concept used to denote the way our beliefs shape our interpretation and experience of reality. I have the presupposition that the hegemonic modern worldview is systematically and structurally alienating to the individual. Freud’s theory of psychoanalysis spoke to this. However, his method was focused on a narrow interpretative lens. While I believe that lens continues to be relevant, it does not offer much of an alternative worldview and thus it reinforces the modern conception of self.
However from Freud’s conception of the Unconscious, Jung was able to articulate a more holistic vision of psychology. His theory provides a rich alternative to reductive materialism in that it attributes collective and personal intelligence to the Unconscious. The Unconscious now can be seen as a psychic field that contains our greatest conflicts as well as our greatest potential for evolution. This is a teleological perspective. The dynamics of Jung’s Unconscious give us a framework to describe the way our life force becomes trapped, stuck, or channeled psychically. Through that framework we are invited to be in dialogue with our personal, familial and the collective Unconscious. By being in this dialogue we are giving room for what is Unconscious to be revealed to our conscious mind. Herein, we have a teleology of the ‘Soul’ which is accessible to modern beings through their own self-observation. Our conflicts become the means for our transformation. It is through such upheaval that we re-establish connection with our innate wholeness.
Animism is common amongst indigenous worldviews. Scientific materialism has argued against it as being magical thinking, regressive, or solipsistic. I wholeheartedly disagree with materialism. Simply put, Animism is the view that all reality, including material reality is infused with spirit. In essence our reality is animate, it is alive, has its own force of consciousness whether we perceive it as living or not. Nothing is truly inert. In Animism our consciousness is not isolated from the consciousness of the world. Rather it is mutually interpenetrating. The principle of reciprocity is a natural outflowing of Animism, wherein we do not see ourselves as separate from the environment, but as mutually or co-arisen with it. Chinese Medicine comes from this perspective.
These two were given as brief examples to highlight the concept of worldview. Nonduality could mean different things in different worldviews, including those listed above. Regardless if we adopt a Jungian, an Animistic, or any other worldview, if we approach Nonduality from the perspective of consumers in a modernistic paradigm we will be disappointed to discover that it is not a commodity. Modern consumer and marketing trends lead us to want “tools,” so that we can “live our best lives.” While some of these methods may genuinely offer deep potential for healing, we can not in good faith approach them and expect to be protected from our cosmic vulnerability. We can not expect through any program to accumulate any object of knowledge that rids us of our suffering or the messiness of our world. As long as we approach these hoping to gain this, we have already lost what we hope to have gained.
It is only through a relationship of reciprocity that we can realize and embody nonduality, which has nothing to do with achievement, loss, or gain.
Nondual Therapy Supports Individuals In:
Experiencing and relating to challenges through altered-states of consciousness
Learning to live from altered-states of consciousness
Differentiating nondual consciousness from other altered states and ordinary states of consciousness
Going beyond our normal identification with who we are—”transpersonal”
Creating opportunities to rest-in the consciousness of total completion
For those interested in specifically Nondual work without a psychotherapeutic element, I can work with you from anywhere in the world. We will focus on presencing Nondual Awareness together.
For those interested in more traditional psychotherapy wherein we can include exploration of the Nondual dimension as an aspect of your larger psychotherapeutic process, I can work with you if you live in California.
In addition to completing a 10-month Nondual teacher training in 2012, Dr. Scott Menasco completed his PhD with an emphasis on the intersection of Buddhist nondual concepts and the concept of mental health. Scott studied with a nondual teacher for over 10 years, and previously served as a coach in nondual courses.
Contact me.
scott@scottmenasco.com
(415) 449-7953