Nonduality: Why Reclaiming Wholeness Matters in a Fragmented World
December 11, 2024
By Jennifer Finch, M.A., LPC, NCC, SEP
Nonduality is one of those words that seems destined for the pages of a dusty philosophy book or like it belongs on the lips of someone trying to sell you mood rings, mala beads, or a $10,000+ Costa Rican ayahuasca retreat. But beneath the clichés that social media has repackaged as new-age spiritualism, nonduality holds wisdom that resonates with the deepest threads of our shared humanity. Nonduality is profoundly human.
In my 30 years of soul-seeking, I have learned that it’s not about chanting your way to enlightenment, hacking your nervous system to convince yourself that life isn’t suffering, or popping Delta-10s while you scribble out your grocery list, hoping to transcend the sheer drudgery of everyday tedium and ordinary banality.
Nonduality, at its core, is about waking up to the raw, unfiltered reality that everything, yes, everything, is already connected and happening in the now. It isn’t about lifting ourselves out of painful experiences to avoid discomfort or clinging desperately to the fleeting moments we like best. Nonduality doesn’t play favorites, and it doesn’t cater to the duality of preferences. No separation. No self-versus-other. No inner world pitted against outer chaos. Just the profound reality of wholeness, where nothing is excluded. It is already all right here.
And the better we get at embracing all that is, the beauty and the mess, the more profound joy we will uncover. Life isn’t a puzzle to solve, a game to win, or a race to a finish line, but a mystery to inhabit. It’s about reclaiming what we’ve forgotten, that we are not separate from the vast, interconnected whole. The wholeness we seek isn’t out there. It’s right here, waiting to be seen, felt, and lived. And we don’t have to DO anything or perform in any way to get it. We just have to be willing to relax and open to it.
There is Only One Substance, And We Are Not Separate From It.
Nonduality suggests that all things, every sentient being (yes, including us), and every fleeting moment are expressions of a singular essence or consciousness. It frames the perception of separateness as a mental construct or illusion, often referred to as “maya” in Advaita Vedanta or “ignorance” (avidya) in Buddhist teachings.
Intriguingly, this ancient wisdom aligns with the discoveries of modern physics, particularly quantum mechanics, where interconnectedness, a unified field, isn’t just a poetic ideal but a fundamental truth of our foundational reality.
As an unabashed nerd for all things quantum, I find this overlap endlessly fascinating. Science and philosophy shake hands in mutual recognition, reminding us that we are not separate from this one unified field of existence. There is only ONE SUBSTANCE. And we are a part of it. We cannot diminish or escape it, no matter how much we try to close ourselves off. When we close off parts of ourselves, we don’t diminish the wholeness of life itself—instead, we stifle our own vitality, mute our essence, and erode our connection to the truest sense of self.
The unified field, the wholeness, or the one substance that binds all things, remains unbroken, perfectly unified, and undiminished by our perception or resistance. The question isn’t whether it exists; it does. The question is whether we choose to feel it, to be open to it, and to experience it absolutely, as it is.
Opening to All of It
We cannot selectively embrace only the joyful or the comfortable moments while shutting the door on pain or past wounds. To live holistically means to be open to all of it. Avoiding pain fragments us, denying the wholeness of our experience. Ironically, it’s only by facing what hurts that we free ourselves. The past doesn’t lose its grip because we ignore it; it softens when we meet it with presence.
Nonduality invites us to this openness, but it doesn’t demand recklessness. We can open gently at our own pace while staying grounded in the spaciousness that’s always here. Gradually, with patience and practice, we can open progressively and step into the vastness of being without retreating into fear, control, or self-protection. That said, discernment matters—there are times when protecting ourselves is essential. But often, what we’re shielding ourselves from stems from outdated belief systems tied to a false-core-false-self that no longer serves us. True freedom begins on the spot when we recognize this and stop clinging to the armor we no longer need. This is growth. This is maturity.
Holding a Spiritual and Psychological Lens At The Same Time
Nonduality is far from a new idea. It threads through countless spiritual and philosophical traditions going back a millennium. In Advaita Vedanta, it teaches the unity of self (Atman) and ultimate reality (Brahman). Mahayana Buddhism speaks of emptiness (Śūnyatā) and the interdependent nature of existence. Taoism reveals the undivided harmony of opposites in the Tao, while Mystical Christianity and Sufism describe the experience of oneness with the divine. These immutable traditions all point to the same truth that the illusion of separation dissolves when we recognize the inherent unity of all things.
Nonduality isn’t confined to spiritual traditions. Its emphasis on interconnectedness and unity also intersects with various familiar therapeutic approaches. In Bowen Systems Theory, the concept of differentiation mirrors nonduality, teaching us how to maintain a sense of self while staying deeply connected to others. This balance between autonomy and connection reflects the recognition of an underlying unity within relational systems. Similarly, Gestalt Therapy emphasizes the holistic integration of mind and body, encouraging us to experience thoughts, feelings, and actions as a unified whole rather than fragmented parts. Even somatic therapies like Hakomi and Somatic Experiencing echo this truth, guiding us toward an embodied presence where the divisions between inner and outer worlds begin to blur and integrate.
Dr. Judith Blackstone’s Realization Process takes this further by inviting us into the body to experience fundamental consciousness, a subtle, unified dimension of being that is both pervasive and intrinsic to all of existence. The One Substance. She would say that it is the foundational essence of who we are, experienced as an embodied presence that underlies and infuses both our inner and outer worlds.
These modalities, in their own unique ways, remind us that healing isn’t about fixing what’s broken—it’s about opening to each moment with unfiltered, direct experience from the fullness of our being. They all point to the same truth: a state of being that is fully alive, fully aware, and fully here. This isn’t about intellectualizing my way into believing I’m present, nor is it about engaging in spiritual or drug-induced acrobatics to catapult myself into some mythical elsewhere where a “fully healed presence” is waiting. It’s about settling into what’s already here and bravely opening to it all exactly how it is, without wanting to rewrite the script, control the outcome, or airbrush and filter over the imperfections of your life.
Direct Experience Over Education And Intellectual Analysis
One of the most compelling aspects of nonduality, and one that deeply aligns with my work in somatic psychology, is its emphasis on experiential realization over intellectual understanding. My students often hear me say, “Experience over education.” When we insist on understanding something to the nth degree before actually experiencing it, we rob ourselves of the richness only direct discovery can provide. Allow yourself the freedom to see for yourself. Don’t take anyone’s word for it. If fear of stepping into the unknown holds you back, remember the wisdom of the kitchen towel that quips: “Life is a test I didn’t study for.” The best learning often comes not from preparation but from living it. Step by step.
This perspective transforms not only how we approach the mind, but also how we inhabit the body, offering a framework to move beyond limiting beliefs and access a profound inner freedom. At its heart, nonduality invites us to recognize the essence of mind, what Dzogchen calls rigpa, a direct and effortless awareness that is both empty of conceptual overlays and vividly present. Life will always say, “Here I come.” The question is not whether we are ready or not, but if we can meet it with unhindered openness and presence.
From this more confident lens, there is no need to suppress or manipulate our experiences. They are seen as natural expressions of awareness itself. This practice is not about achieving or analyzing; it is about feeling and knowing in a whole-embodied way. It is about stripping away duality’s distortions, such as “life is easy” OR “life is hard,” and recognizing the inseparability of all things through inhabiting as presence. Life is easy AND hard. Or even more accurately, “Life at this moment right now, just is.” We can finally rest in the all-encompassing space when we close the duality that keeps us on a reinforcing loop (thinking “life is easy” actually reinforces the thought “life is hard” when it is NOT easy). The only question that matters is this: Are we open, or are we closed at that moment?
Body And Brain
Our culture glorifies thinking, equating mental certainty with safety and predictability. But relying solely on the mind to navigate life fragments us from the body, which carries its own deep intelligence. As Ken Wilber aptly describes, this disconnection between body and brain turns us into nothing more than “a head on a stick.”
We love to think about anything, everything, and often nothing of consequence. And even more than that, we love to think we know. And, we love to be right. We cling to our ideas, beliefs, and opinions like life rafts in an ocean of uncertainty, mistaking the act of knowing for the comfort of being in control or safe. We string together beliefs, judgments, and assumptions, spinning a falsified cocoon of certainty around ourselves, forgetting that much of what we “know” is little more than a patchwork of guesses dressed up as truths. It’s all just a giant attempt to predict correctly, to feel safe in the face of the unknown. And if we get it right, we somehow believe we’ll advance to the next level with more bonus health points, as if life were some cosmic game. But this overthinking doesn’t guarantee progress, it merely constricts our vision. There are no guarantees in this life. And in chasing certainty and predictability, we overlook the one thing that is certain: the interconnected wholeness always present, the unshakable anchor of our internal steadiness of being. Ironically, it’s the very thing our striving keeps us from seeing.
Let’s face it, we’re living in a time when duality is having its day. Our bodies are tethered to screens, our minds oscillate like swivels and are split between past regrets and future anxieties, and our culture keeps feeding us a diet of “us versus them.” We’re disembodied, fragmented, and utterly convinced we’re separate from the very ground we’re standing on.
This endless mental churning, overthinking, overanalyzing, and over-performing is a human pastime. It is a way to keep ourselves entertained, distracted, shielded against vulnerability, and numb the discomfort of living in a world that is, at its core, unknowable, inherently marked by uncertainty, and inevitably touched by suffering. It’s astonishing how much energy we invest in trying to get the world and life to adapt and mold to us, to fit our expectations and ideals. If we had our way, we would prefer everything to be predictable ahead of time and delivered in a soft and gentle manner. This approach is wasting our energy and utterly exhausting. Imagine instead if we expanded in our capacity, adapting ourselves to fit life as it is, forceful and unyielding as mother nature often can be. How much more confident, spacious, and prepared would that feel? We would be unstoppable and fierce, living our best lives.
Nonduality, at its core, is a radical and embodied truth. It invites us to stop running—from our bodies, from gravity, from the sheer aliveness of being human.
Wholeness in Practice
Nonduality isn’t about transcending the messiness of life but meeting it with presence. The great irony is that in chasing spirituality, or in our desperate quest to get rid of pain, we often abandon the very thing that connects us to life—our physicality. But this body, this breath, this moment, this is it. As my teacher, Dr. Reginald Ray, reminds us, wisdom isn’t floating somewhere above us in an ethereal realm. It’s humming in your bones, vibrating in your cells, and rooted in the earth beneath our feet.
When we stop seeing the body as an obstacle to enlightenment and start seeing it as a doorway, we realize the stillness and deep connection we’ve been chasing has been quietly waiting inside us all along—not as a grand revelation, but as a gentle, unshakable presence.
What would happen if we stopped seeing our bodies as obstacles to enlightenment and began to see them as doorways? If we let go of the duality that splits mind from matter, spirit from flesh, we might realize that the stillness and connection we’ve been chasing has been quietly waiting inside us all along, not as some grand revelation but as a gentle, unshakable presence.
Nonduality is a timeless reminder that the division between body and mind, the very foundation of our fragmented worldview, is the biggest lie we’ve ever bought into.
The Practicality of the Practice
Nonduality isn’t just a lofty idea. It’s profoundly practical. And to open to the spaciousness and stillness it offers takes no time at all, which is good news because most of us don’t have the time to sit in a cave contemplating emptiness and form. It profoundly asks us to stop resisting life and start inhabiting it and ourselves thoroughly at step one. From the very start, we are learning to meet every aspect of ourselves and our lives with an openness that doesn’t flinch.
In the work of the Realization Process (RP) crafted by Dr. Judith Blackstone, we are guided toward this realization that we are already residing in our wholeness. This is not done through a slide show with bullet points, tedious companion workbooks, or more advanced educational seminars; nor is it done in handing us more definitions of abstract terms or performed in a meditative vacuum. It is realized through the direct experience of embodied practices that seamlessly integrate mind and body with the infinite wholeness of the one substance. RP teaches us to live in our messy, beautiful realities of daily life from this inhabited spaciousness and deep connection we carry within our bodies.
The beauty of nonduality is that it doesn’t ask us to become something else. It doesn’t demand we fix ourselves or ascend to some higher plane. No mind-altering drugs are needed and are, in fact, not recommended. It whispers, often with maddening simplicity, that there’s nothing to fix because there’s nothing broken. You’re already whole, even in your most chaotic moments. In fact, those hard, hard, moments might just be the gateway to realizing it.
Why should we care about nonduality? Because it’s the antidote to the disconnection that’s eating us alive. It’s a way of remembering that there is no “other” to fight, no “perfect self” to become, and no separation between our world and the awareness that sees it. In a culture that thrives on duality, work versus rest, body versus mind, us versus them, nonduality dares to suggest that the lines we draw are arbitrary illusions. And when those lines dissolve, what’s left is breathtaking, the simple, unflappable wholeness of being alive.
This isn’t an intellectual exercise. It’s not something you figure out or achieve. It’s a recognition, a remembering. And it starts now—with this breath, this body, this moment.
Be Here. And Be Now.
Jen
