A Single Recognition
The spiritual journey is often framed as a quest for liberation, a striving to break free from the limitations of the self and the suffering of the world. There are concepts like “spiritual enlightenment” and being “born again,” and movements from states of bondage to states of freedom.
However, the very notion of a separate individual achieving liberation becomes a paradox in the nondual understanding. For if reality is ultimately one seamless consciousness, who is there to be liberated?
The nondual understanding suggests that the experience of liberation is not a transfer of ownership or the acquisition of a new state of being. Instead, it is this simple recognition: separate consciousnesses do not exist.
To be “spiritually enlightened” or “born again” from this viewpoint is not to achieve some extraordinary state, or to merge with a distant divine entity. It is the dawning awareness of this fundamental truth: the consciousness that animates your thoughts, feelings, and perceptions is the same consciousness that animates the entire universe. The “you” that you take yourself to be is not a separate, self-contained unit along with consciousness, but a unique manifestation, a particular perspective being held within consciousness itself—made out of consciousness and known by consciousness.
Take, for example, an actor fully immersed in a role in a play. She experiences the character's joys, sorrows, and struggles as if they were her own. However, the actor, in her true identity, is aware that she is playing a part. Similarly, consciousness is playing the character you call "me,” experiencing the world through the limitations and possibilities of your particular body-mind.
The longing for liberation, the feeling of being constrained, arises within this play of consciousness. It is the inherent impulse of the one to recognize its own wholeness, to see beyond the confines of the individual role. The “seeker” is not a separate entity striving for freedom. It is consciousness itself.
Therefore, liberation is not an escape for someone who is imprisoned, but a shift in perspective, a remembering of what is always true. There is no journey to undertake, no destination to reach. There is just the recognition that the feeling of separation was a misunderstanding, a temporary identification with a limited viewpoint.
The simplicity of this recognition can be startling. It cuts through the layers of spiritual striving and brings us back to the fundamental truth of our being. You are not a separate individual trying to become one with the universe. You are the universe experiencing itself through this unique body-mind. The awakening is simply the recognition, the realization.
After this recognition, awareness feels fresh, renewed. So on we go, playing the parts, transformed, entirely.