Dualism vs Non-Dualism Explained - with visuals

My personal interpretation of the difference, with a heavy focus on how the senses compose most our conscious experience.

[TheSunnyD]

This is really something that needs to be talked about more in the scientific fields. In the future Nondual perception will add as much value to our understanding of consciousness as the telescope did for astronomy.

[fitscfo]

I can think of experiences that are less meaningful when devoid of concepts, associations, prior history, etc. Example: if I hear my granddaughter’s voice, I instantly experience joy and happiness. If I were to hear her voice simply as sound and nothing else, it wouldn’t be nearly as sweet.

[youwhoniverse]

Trying to get to? How can anyone be anything other than THAT! In the mind’s dream we are the figure on the left, but no one has ever been anything other than the right

[consciousnessbasedcosmos]

Let's analyse "I see an apple".
If it means I as a body am seeing an apple as another, independent thing, that is dualisty. This is what most assume the world to be. Time, space, matter are regarded as physically real.
But the fact is no one has ever experienced physical things, if they indeed exist, directly. All we ever known, and can ever know are the content of our own consciousness. This is a fact that no one can deny. No matter what we "discover" about physical reality, it is only an assumption. We cannot prove or disprove physical reality.
Non-dualistic interpretation of I see an apple is;
There is no seer (body), there is no seen (apple) as 2 separate independent things. There is only a seeing in which both the body and apple appear as part of the seeing. The seeing is an "appearance" in consciousness. It appears, disappears.
The same principle can be applied to perceiving of the whole world. There is no perceiver, there are no perceived, only a perceiving in which both the perceiver and the perceived are part of. The perceiving appears, then disappears, in consciousness.

[chadrickjared]

Very helpful! Wish you included a bubble for verbal and visual thoughts though. If I’m looking at something and suddenly imagine a fantasy scene, that feeling is still felt but it doesn’t exist directly in the visual field. Yet, surely it is still in the scope of conscious perception.

[frun]

I think, Lucid dreaming explains Nonduality the best.

[hansenmarc]

Beautifully clear explanation. Thank you.

One of my favorite pointers to describe the nondual experience is to imagine how a newborn experiences the world. It has the same five senses you do. The difference is that a baby doesn’t attach words and concepts to what it experiences because it has not yet learned words and concepts. The point is to experience the universe and not confuse the direct sensory experience with the words and concepts our minds attach to perception. (This is sometimes expressed as: don’t confuse the moon with the finger pointing at the moon.) What would the experience be if you were a baby seeing a tree for the first time? You wouldn’t even have concepts for shapes, colors, distance, or separation. All you would have are ever-changing experiences arising in awareness.

[florida]

this perception is only the physical dimension or "body". there is also the dimension of "mind", which means all the senses for the mind; you "see" a thought, you "hear" it, you have the effect of the thought or visualisation etc, and the third dimension which is "feeling", so watching your moods, like seeing that you have "pink glasses" on (idk if this phrase works in english xD), or seeing that you are in certain state of sadness, with this, the whole circle would be in a certain color which distorts everything a bit in that direction for example

[johncox]

Good explanation. It's like having awareness of the 5 senses (or 6 senses). The senses give us awareness in the world but it's like we have "this observer" that WATCHES the senses without mental comment. We then have this heightened awareness of being aware.

[KK-sggl]

If your foot was numb with no feeling, you wouldn’t know it was touching the floor unless you saw it with your eyes. If you were blind and numb, then you wouldn’t know unless another part of your body could feel around for it and decipher that it was touching the floor. If you had no other body part that could physically do this, you’d never know for sure that your foot was touching the floor.

BUT IT STILL IS!

So even if our perception of reality doesn’t work, or is somehow different, it doesn’t change reality itself. There’s still a foot, and a floor, and the two are touching. It’s only you that can’t sense it or prove it any longer. But it’s still happening.

So what’s the benefit of not knowing about what’s going on in reality?

[mintakan]

Awakening to the nature of one's own mind ...

[JamesBS]

Great that you made this, a visual representation has really been lacking in non-dual teachings. The model on the left makes sense when we believe we are the body. The model on the right becomes obvious when we pay close attention to our experience and realise that the body is just another thing we experience. PS: Strictly speaking, the model on the right is not non-duality. Non-duality is the recognition that I am pure consciousness and the whole world is made of me. In other words all the circles denoting separate objects in the right hand diagram would fall away as we realise reality is indivisible.

[AtomkeySinclair]

Achieving @ 1:00... So, that's an issue. We don't achieve the state. We already are the state. Instead, we achieved duality out of singularity, to such magnitude that we believe with certainty that we can achieve that which we already are - which is not dual. Pointers are often more an obstacle to the without - the outer self, and yet, the without we have, appears to be no direction. We are sitting in the center of the cosmos so to speak, so enthralled with the cosmos that our fascination points us away from the reality of where we reside. Know that knowing - transcends thinking and reasoning, yet without thinking and reasoning we cannot capture knowing from knowing. And yes, there is a difference between knowing, and knowing. One is driven by the computations of the mind's logic, the other is a state of awareness. We achieve neither. We do. This first step in finding the greatest pointer in non duality is to stop talking to yourself when your mouth is not moving. You cannot sense your own subtle persistence while you are busy. And we are extremely busy in the mind. The mind is the room in which duality persists with the greatest depth. The bottom of the pool is dark beyond dark, and in that darkness is the greatest of all light.

[michaelchase]

After experiencing the non-dual state for years, I'm more inclined to the dualist perspective now. Is-ness, Intellect, heart, they are connected but are separate. The nonduality doesn't go away, but duality is where thoughts rule and make sense between true and false, up and down.

[alteregoAtlas]

Don’t “label” or “analyze” anything. There’s no need to put your awareness on the bird when you’re merely hearing it sing; or the leaves in the wind, or the highway etc etc. Keep doing it and soon you’ll naturally do this at a broad level, and when you are able to all these things become not unlike a “song” that you can perceive and appreciate. Blessings.

[oldrusty]

I think 99% of the time when I hear a bird I don't think anything at all. It is just background sound, and I am only semi-conscious of it. In those rare moments when my attention really is drawn to birdsong, I relish what it stirs in my conceptual mind. I might find myself recollecting facts about birds, wondering about the bird's experience, visualizing episodes from its life, thinking about how birdsong has played a role in human music and culture, etc.

[mearss]

This is brilliant, I've struggled to explain to people what the non dual experience is like and this is such a great representation.

[deronr]

YES! This on the right is what I feel like, where the whole of reality feels 2D because even distance just feels like a more subtle sensation

[sanekabc]

Is a thought an object in non-dual awareness?

[BoundlessJon]

Very late to the party but wow this is profound and amazing, we need more and more stuff like this