Nonduality and Native spirituality—how do they relate? How are they similar?
At first blush, it may seem like they are very different. Non-duality is about attaining the non-dual state. This means attaining a state where you know through your own experience that everything’s connected—that there is a dynamic oneness between everything, that there’s not two. This is a state, particularly, where you have stepped beyond your own habitual sense of internal division. That’s nonduality. It’s about dropping the clinging the conditioned mind: ego. Enlightenment. Realizing you are not the mind and being free from it.
For those of us who are not native, we see Native traditions from the outside as beliefs that are magical, mystical, and powerful, headed up by Shamen. It’s ceremony from tribal traditions, and we may even think of it as “one” tradition.
But if you look closer at nonduality and listen to some of the Native philosophers who are starting to write today, you’ll see that there’s a deeper meaning underneath everything. All of the ceremonies and all of the individual practices in Native spirituality are about maintaining this connection to everything. Making the assumption that’s it’s a given, rather than something to be attained.
So, they are both about the intrinsic togetherness and unity of the entire existence.
The big difference is that in Nonduality, the assumption is that you’re not there, and you need to get there. In Native spirituality, the assumption is that this is the natural human position, the natural human state, the natural reality. It’s also known that it’s very easy to fall out of this, so you need to constantly remember to bring yourself back… bring yourself back… bring yourself back… AND, most important, Native wisdom tells us that it is awake community that both brings you there and keeps you there.
So they’re very similar and also very different.
What’s really interesting is that when we see the intersection of the two, we start getting an idea of how we, as modern human beings can attain this Nondual state. How people here today, people who are clearly not indigenous such as myself, can attain this state, can live in this state of non-dual awareness or unity with all.
It’s the difference between the two that creates a fantastic way to look at what a human being truly is. It’s the similarity between the two that gives us the proper vision to move forward.
How did they come to be so similar and yet so different?
With Native spirituality we are literally talking about the spirituality of human beings for something like 60,000 years — until any civilizations started being created. With Nonduality, we’re talking a very brief period of time compared to that, maybe 3,000 years. A flash in the pan.
Nonduality is trying to get back to this original state. Native spiritually is how to live there.
Most people haven’t put this together. The civilizations that Nonduality grew from (Hinduism) operate from the basic assumption that the broken state is the natural state. This, then, means that enlightenment is an attainment.
This is very important to think about. It reveals the seed of the hierarchy of Hinduism. From this seed, the belief that darkness is the natural state, everything has built up. If we believe that enlightenment is difficult to achieve then everything becomes hierarchy. If we believe that enlightenment is rare then we’ll happily spend our lives avoiding our true nature under the guise of seeking.
Whereas native spirituality tells us that we are born inside a complete unity with everything and everyone… the human and the non-human. The basic assumption is that this is where you can easily abide if you just know the basic steps of staying there. Those steps include the ceremonies and stories that we see from the outside. We mistakenly, then, think the ceremonies and stores define native spiritually, when in fact it’s the underlying assumptions which define it. Millions of tribes can have millions of stories and still be teaching the same thing.
This difference is huge. This gives us the secret.
What do we do?
How can Nonduality learn from native wisdom? What does native wisdom have to add to our understandings and practices of nonduality?
I think that when we honestly explore this interconnection, each of us, this is where we’re going to find the ability to become a new human being who is capable of living on the earth without conflict, without being destructive.
So, I’m going to try numerous ways to explore the way these things fit together.