CONSCIOUSNESS: Ideas and Research for the Twenty-First Century Volume 6 | Issue 6 Article 3 7-23-2018 Complexities and Challenges of Nonduality Elizabeth Stephens Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.ciis.edu/conscjournal Part of the Clinical Psychology Commons, Cognition and Perception Commons, Cognitive Psychology Commons, Other Life Sciences Commons, Other Neuroscience and Neurobiology Commons, Philosophy Commons, Psychiatry and Psychology Commons, Quantitative, Qualitative, Comparative, and Historical Methodologies Commons, Social Psychology Commons, Social Psychology and Interaction Commons, Sociology of Culture Commons, Sociology of Religion Commons, and the Transpersonal Psychology Commons Recommended Citation Elizabeth Stephens (2018) "Complexities and Challenges of Nonduality," CONSCIOUSNESS: Ideas and Research for the Twenty-First Century: Vol. 6 : Iss. 6 , Article 3. Available at: https://digitalcommons.ciis.edu/conscjournal/vol6/iss6/3 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals and Newsletters at Digital Commons @ CIIS. It has been accepted for inclusion in CONSCIOUSNESS: Ideas and Research for the Twenty-First Century by an authorized editor of Digital Commons @ CIIS. For more information, please contact [email protected]. : Complexities and Challenges of Nonduality Consciousness: Ideas and Research for the Twenty First Century | Summer 2018 | Vol 6 | Issue 6 Stephens, E., Complexities and Challenges of Nonduality. Complexities and Challenges of Nonduality Elizabeth Stephens California Institute of Integral Studies Abstract: States of consciousness referred to as nonduality, awakening, enlight- enment, moksha, peak experience, unitive states, or void states, among other terms, have garnered increasing secular attention and have become a topic of psychological and neuroscientific research. A review of the literature revealed many challenges to studying this set of states, such as inconsistent conceptualiza- tions, a variety of models and theories, and conflicting descriptions indicating that the actual experience may not live up to the superlative descriptions found in historical texts or the expectations put forth by nondual teachers. A great deal more empirical research on this topic is needed, and researchers should bear in mind the complexities and challenges that have surfaced on the related topics of mindfulness and meditation. Keywords: Consciousness, meditation, nonduality, nondual consciousness “By itself, there is an interest in waking up Sacred texts contain remarkable and tantaliz- coming to more and more people...by itself ing descriptions of nonduality (Conze, Horner, people are popping up that have direct experi- Snellgrove & Waley, 1954; Hixon, 1978) and ence of truth…we are now at a point where speak of nonduality as an ultimate attainment. the stage is set for a mass awakening.” - Isaac Historically, the pursuit of it meant leaving Shapiro (Lumiere & Lumiere-Wins, 2003, p. home and family to join a spiritual or monas- 97). tic community, and the process was heavily managed and hierarchized by a guru or spiritu- The experiences or states of consciousness al teacher. In recent times, however, nonduali- known as nonduality, awakening, enlighten- ty has become a layperson’s pursuit. Devices ment, moksha, peak experience, unitive states, and technologies have even been developed, or void states, among other terms, are chal- such as binaural beat audio recordings, that lenging to describe and define, and it has not purport to induce or facilitate these states. been established that they are referring to the Nondual teachers abound, and increasing same category of experiences. For the purpos- numbers of people are reporting the experi- es of this article, nonduality will be defined as ence, if they are describing the same set of states of experiencing reality as one and expe- phenomena. riencing separation or multiplicity as illusion. The term nonduality literally means “not two” in the Advaita Vedanta philosophical system The research that has been conducted on non- (Torwestern, 1985). Awakening will be de- duality is insufficient. Several questions need fined as the process of arriving at nondual elucidation by rigorous empirical research, experiences and deepening within them. both quantitative and qualitative, including: Corresponding author: [email protected] Retrieved from https://digitalcommons.ciis.edu/conscjournal/vol6/iss6/ ISSN 2575-5552 Published by Digital Commons @ CIIS, 2018 1 CONSCIOUSNESS: Ideas and Research for the Twenty-First Century, Vol. 6 [2018], Iss. 6, Art. 3 Consciousness: Ideas and Research for the Twenty First Century | Summer 2018 | Vol 6 | Issue 6 Stephens, E., Complexities and Challenges of Nonduality. Can nonduality be consistently defined and world became quite quiet, as though it described? Does it consist of a single state, had reached full perfection. Joy spread multiple states, and/or a developmental through the ranks of those gods who process? Are lived experiences of these states longed for salvation; joy also spread actually desirable, as often advertised by non- among those who lived in the regions dual teachers and gurus? Are studies of nond- below. Everywhere the virtuous were uality useful for informing fields such as psy- strengthened, the influence of the chology and psychiatry, either to help train Dharma increased, and the world rose therapists to correctly identify nonduality and from the dirt of the passions and the not misdiagnose it, or to determine whether darkness of ignorance. (Conze, 1959, any therapeutic value is conferred by these p. 157) states? Finally, can nondual states be correlat- ed with meditation, and thus can the chal- Such florid and hagiographic literary depic- lenges that have arisen in meditation research tions of awakening have given the impression inform research on nonduality? Because so that awakening is an absolute state and an little research has been done on nonduality, ultimate attainment. Nonduality has been and because numerous complexities and chal- described by many names (Loy, 1983) and has lenges are apparent, much more empirical probably been used as an umbrella term to research is needed. represent a category of mystical experiences. Review of the Nonduality Literature It is certainly possible that it has been conflat- ed with other states of consciousness. A look When dawn broke...the great Seer took at both popular and academic literature reveals up the position which knows no more a great deal of complexity, contradiction, and alteration, and the leader of all reached theoretical models. the state of all-knowledge. When, through his Buddhahood, he had cog- Nondual teacher Bonder calls awakening a nized this fact, the earth swayed like a “fundamental wellness and integrity of woman drunken with wine, the sky Being” (1998, p. 115), but also warns readers shone bright with the Siddhas who ap- of what he calls the “Wakedown Shakedown”: peared in crowds in all the directions, and the mighty drums of thunder re- You probably have been trained to sounded through the air. Pleasant think, if you have been thinking about breezes blew softly, rain fell from a such matters as enlightenment or cloudless sky, flowers and fruits awakening at all, that once it happens, dropped from the trees out of season-- you are from then on forever free of all in an effort, as it were, to show rever- karmas. From then on, nothing can ence for him. Mandarava flowers and touch you. From then on, you are lotus blossoms, and also water lilies above and immune to all the chaos, made of gold and beryl, fell from the disturbance, and sheer weirdness of sky on to the ground near the Shakya being a human being …. [but] the real- sage, so that it looked like a place in ity is almost precisely one hundred and the world of the gods. At that moment eighty degrees on the opposite arc….to no one anywhere was angry, ill, or sad; put it bluntly, awakening is when the no one did evil, none was proud; the real work of purification of karmic, or Corresponding author: [email protected] Retrieved from https://digitalcommons.ciis.edu/conscjournal/vol6/iss6/ ISSN 2575-5552 Page 2 https://digitalcommons.ciis.edu/conscjournal/vol6/iss6/3 2 : Complexities and Challenges of Nonduality Consciousness: Ideas and Research for the Twenty First Century | Summer 2018 | Vol 6 | Issue 6 Stephens, E., Complexities and Challenges of Nonduality. p r e v i o u s l y b i n d i n g , h a b i t s , 4. Blessedness, peace, etc. preferences, conditioning, illusions, 5. Feeling of the holy, sacred, or divine and prejudices, really gets underway 6. Paradoxicality (pp. 109-110). 7. Alleged by mystics to be ineffable. (pp. 131-132) Given this caveat, awakening may not match the expectations of readers and scholars alike. Stace theorized that in further, or more ad- The following review of literature will consid- vanced mystical states, dissolution of the “em- er a range of writings and research but does pirical” ego occurs: not do justice to the myriad systems and con- ceptualizations of nonduality in the Buddhist One may say that the mystic gets rid of traditions. the empirical ego whereupon the pure ego, normally hidden, emerges into the Stace was an early influential scholar of mys- light. The empirical ego is the stream ticism who classified mystical experiences of consciousness. The pure ego is the into two main types: introvertive and ex- unity which holds the manifold of the travertive (1960/1987). He associated the stream together. This undifferentiated extravertive type with earlier stages of mysti- unity is the essence of the introvertive cism, and characterized it as having a sense of mystical experience. (1960/1987, p. oneness with all things, or a sense of expan- 87) sion or merging of self into nature or an object. The introvertive type, on the other A paradox arises because writers speak of the hand, he associated with advanced stages of realization of the Void or nothingness, but also mysticism, in which perception of reality the One and the Infinite (Stace, 1960/1987).