Recent moments are fresh, like and unlike all other moments, but there is no substitute for now. When I am caught up—identified with—my views, thoughts, feelings, sensations, situations, and actions, I am not in the now; I have mentally separated from reality and headed into my cognitive landscape of understandings (aka delusion). It’s important to realize that this is not only common, but natural. The part that is so crucial to remember and practice with in life is that identification is the aspect of attachment that stagnates us in the limited, permanent, separate view of reality which births our dualistic modes of thinking. A positive or negative thought, a painful or exhilarating sensation, a traumatic or desired situation is not the issue! It is not ‘what,’ but ‘how’ we live. Dualistic thinking attempts to address ‘how’ we live through ‘what’ we think, feel, and do. Dualism, an ideological system we typically automatically utilize, is better understood as a highly efficient thought process for understanding and discerning reality. It’s easy to use given the infinite complexity of reality. It helps us limit, separate, and define everything we can think about in a convenient system of opposites. And, for that purpose, for the ends in which the system itself enables, it is a powerful tool.
What about reality beyond thinking? The phrase ‘not two’ helps to discontinue the dualistic thinking, even discontinuing thought for a moment. Yes, this moment can be transcendent if we are open to the experience of being being thinking, resting in the reality of harmonious presence.
Carl Jung’s description of the ouroboros in alchemy is a striking new way for me to open my mind and being further to understanding and living harmony amid the conditional duality dominant in contemporary culture. An ouroboros is a purifying sigil depicting a snake or dragon in a circular form eating it’s own tail which symbolizes the oneness of reality and being. Inside and out along with all other conceptual dualistic opposites are in process of transcendence or being eaten and understood.
What are non-dualistic thought processes? Zen Buddhism and Taoism are non-dualistic means for understanding and thinking. Here’s insightful writing on zen logic.
