Nonduality cannot be defined, and this is the trick of authentic spiritual studies, because we are addicted to our language. It’s natural. Human beings are born craving language. Take a little child and raise them with people who speak six different languages, and the child will grow up speaking six different languages fluently. Our brains are geared for language.
Most of us have been embedded in just one language, and that’s the language of English. And this language, English is very, very good at dividing things. Literally, the grammar structure of the language that we all live with is based on dividing things, because you have nouns. Verbs come along and can kind of make the nouns do different things. But the entire language is based on defining things. Then we have adjectives that can tell us all the different qualities of this thing.
We can even talk about the different qualities of the actions that these various nouns can be taking. But the language itself is based on division and separation. All of the languages that are written languages are the same way, because in order to write a thought down, you have to turn it into something static. Whereas in the natural world, nothing is static—everything is interrelated.
So, we have this language inside of our heads that is infinitely incapable of describing unity. The very description of unity would take so many words that we would have to invent new words, fill a whole dictionary with them, and it would take an infinite amount of time to actually describe it—and we’d all be dead by then.
So, this is the trick of spiritual studies… I want to say ‘authentic spiritual studies’, because there’s a lot of spiritual studies that are about simply feeling happier—which can be described—or simply being richer (which is how to make more money). Some people consider that to be a spiritual endeavor.
Authentic spiritual studies are about reaching that single point of unity inside yourself that can’t be defined. The wordless being of yourself cannot be described with words. That’s why, in serious spiritual studies, we’re taught to calm our mind and slow it down, because underneath the mind is where that place of unity lies—you don’t need words to describe it.
That’s the beauty of it. It can be found very, very simply. This is the way you perceive things: like, listen to a sound. You don’t need to describe what it is—you can simply listen to it. Look at a color, look at a shape. You don’t really need the name of the thing in order to look at it, right?
So, this actual awake being that you are, that is what nonduality is pointing to. Thoughts and words can only circle around it constantly because it can’t be defined and described. And yet, it’s actually there, and it’s easy to relax. Be the being who is thinking all this English.