The World as Modulations of Consciousness
Consider your immediate experience. When you see a tree, hear a bird, or feel the sun, what are you truly experiencing? You are experiencing seeing, hearing, and touching, or, colors, sounds, and sensations. Naturally, we infer that these are perceptions of independent, physical objects existing externally, outside consciousness, but our direct experience is only of the perception itself, within consciousness.
In fact, our entire experience of the world comes solely through our senses. Since we have no direct access to a physical world presumed to exist independently of sensory engagement, we can only legitimately claim that there is seeing, hearing, touching, tasting, and smelling. We cannot definitively claim that these senses are perceiving a material, external world separate from consciousness. Nevertheless, our mind will take these raw sensory experiences and, through a process of conceptualization and labeling, conveniently organize them into “things,” a tree, a bird, a sun.
And yet, when science drills down into the fundamental nature of what we call matter, it finds not solid, independent “things,” but fields of energy, probabilities, and quantum information. No scientific evidence has ever definitively corroborated the existence of material things as fundamentally separate, inert, or self-existent, apart from consciousness. The closer we look, the more matter dissolves into patterns and relationships of information and potentiality, challenging the notion of a purely objective, mind-independent, material realm.
A question may then arise: If the experience of the world is not of an external material realm but instead a modulation within consciousness, why does it appear largely the same from billions of different points of view? Why do we see the same tree, hear the same bird, and agree on the basic structure of reality?
We do so because individual minds arise from a unified source, which is consciousness. What appears as billions of separate minds are localized expressions or modulations within an awareness that has no borders or limits. Just as different waves arise on the same body of water, each appearing distinct from another, individual minds are specific points of view within a singular perceiving consciousness.
The similar perceptions we experience are not evidence of a shared external world, but evidence of a shared consciousness. The patterns, structures, and laws of the universe are consistent across individual perceptions because they are all unfolding within the same underlying reality. The light of consciousness shines universally, and through its various localized expressions (our minds) it presents a coherent and consistent experience of the world to itself, which the mind (largely unaware of its source) then represents to itself through conceptual thinking.
Ultimately, the presence of awareness is not just in our perceptions, it is our perceptions. It is the very light that illuminates every experience. Recognizing this fundamental truth—that the world is a modulation of awareness and that individual minds are expressions of one universal consciousness—transforms our relationship with reality from that of a detached observer to that of the conscious presence that is both the witness and the world. ⬚
Ignorance Isn’t the Problem
Conventionally, ignorance is seen as a flaw related to a lack of knowledge. It is something to be overcome. From a nondual perspective, ignorance is the root of psychological suffering for it is the belief of being a separate person in an indifferent or opposing world.
Wisdom says the appearance of ignorance is not an error that fundamentally mars reality, but is rather a natural phenomenon within the flow of consciousness itself.
As an example, the dreamer is the sole reality of a dream, but the dream character is ignorant or unaware of its true nature as the dreamer. The dreamer isn’t negligent because the dream character appears ignorant; the appearance of ignorance is simply a feature of the dream.
The acknowledgment that ignorance is a natural phenomenon does not, however, imply a passive acceptance of suffering. Compassion, ethical action, and the alleviation of pain remain vital expressions of wisdom within the narrative of life. These actions can arise not from a judgement of ignorance as a fundamental flaw, but from a recognition of its role in the drama of life. Suffering, though very real from the relative experience (within the dream, so to speak), is understood as a temporary state born from a temporary identification.
Ultimately, wisdom recognizes that the entire play of ignorance and knowledge, separation and unity, suffering and liberation, is happening within and as the reality of consciousness. The appearance of ignorance does not diminish reality in the same way that shadows do not diminish the sun. Shadows are merely a natural phenomenon that occurs when light is obstructed. Similarly, the belief in separation is a natural phenomenon that occurs when awareness identifies with form.
Wisdom says there is nothing fundamentally wrong with reality. Ignorance is simply a phase, a particular expression within the dream of consciousness, the same dream in which we catch glimpses of love, beauty and truth. ⬚
Consciousness Cannot Be Captured
The elusiveness of consciousness is a natural consequence of its fundamental nature: consciousness is not an object; it is the reality in which objects appear.
Our minds excel at categorizing, labeling, and creating theories about the universe. We turn phenomena into objects and ideas. Yet, when we attempt to do this with consciousness itself, we are presented with a dilemma. If consciousness is the ultimate subject, the fundamental awareness that illuminates all experience, how can it simultaneously become an object of its own knowing in the same way it knows a tree or a thought. The eye, for example, cannot see itself directly.
When we try to make a word or a theory about consciousness, we are in the realm of the mind. The words we use, “awareness,” “the Absolute,” “the Self,” “God,” are pointers, analogies, metaphors. They are like fingers pointing to the ocean; helpful for direction, but never to be mistaken for the ocean itself. The moment we cling to the word or the theory, we risk creating a new conceptual barrier, imagining consciousness as a separate entity that can be understood.
Yet, the reality of consciousness is our most undeniable and intimate experience. We don’t infer its existence; we are it. It is that which knows the experience of the world.
This direct, felt knowing precedes analysis. It is the simple fact of “I am,” the pure presence of awareness that remains when all thoughts subside. It is the unchanging background against which the content of mind arises and dissolves.
The goal of nondual understanding is not to define consciousness, but to recognize it directly, to be it. This realization is not about acquiring new knowledge but about dropping conceptualizations and identifications that obscure what is already present. The “I” that seeks to understand consciousness is consciousness itself, seemingly separated from itself by its mistaken belief.
The elusiveness of consciousness to conceptual understanding is, therefore, its very perfection. Consciousness cannot be fragmented, categorized, or reduced. Why? Because consciousness is the totality of reality, and consciousness cannot be limited or captured by any qualities of mind. Consciousness is the seamless whole in which conceptual thinking arises. ⬚
The Body-Mind is a Lens for Awareness
The experience of being a separate person residing within a physical body moving through time and space is a stubborn and persistent illusion. Surely awareness is localized behind the eyes, right? Indeed, the body and mind are faculties through which consciousness perceives time and space, but awareness itself is not confined within the body, despite how it seems.
Sensory organs and neural networks are like date gathering instruments through which localized awareness can perceive the dimensions of space and experience events in time. It could be said that eyes are like cameras and ears are like microphones.
But the awareness which illuminates creation cannot be limited by any part of that creation, just as a screen cannot be fundamentally limited by any part of the content it displays.
The finite mind, accustomed to locating everything in space and time, struggles with this concept. We instinctively try to place awareness somewhere, either inside the body or, if not, then outside it. But both inside and outside are spatial concepts, creations within time and space. To apply concepts to awareness in an attempt to understand awareness is to misunderstand the fundamental nature of awareness itself.
Rather than think about awareness as outside time and space, it may be more helpful to think of awareness as inherently timeless and dimensionless. It is not that awareness exists at some point beyond the cosmos, but that it is the very source from which the cosmos arises. Awareness is the limitless light that illuminates all forms while remaining formless.
Awareness, then, is fundamentally unknowable to the mind in a conventional, objectifying sense. Awareness cannot be made an object of its own knowing.
Awareness is our most intimate experience. It is the undeniable fact of “I am.” It is the knowing presence even in the absence of thoughts or sensory experiences. Pure awareness transcends conceptual thinking precisely because it is the very ground from which conceptual thinking springs. ⬚
“No Longer I Who Live, but Christ”
The Apostle Paul declared, “I have been crucified with Christ, and it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me” (Galatians 2:20). This verse is often interpreted as a call to moral transformation or spiritual surrender to a distinct, divine being. From a nondual perspective, it points not to a new identity acquired by a separate self, but to the recognition that the separate “I” never existed in the first place.
When Paul declares, “It is no longer I who live,” this isn’t a statement of self-annihilation. Instead, it is the recognition that the separate “I,” the belief in being a separate person, never truly lived as a fundamental reality. It was an appearance, an activity within consciousness.
The “Christ who lives in me” can be understood not as a distinct person taking over a body, but as consciousness revealing its true, indivisible nature through and as the apparent individual. Christ, then, symbolizes the recognition that aware presence, the ever-present reality, transcends the illusion of separation. In other words, Christ represents the essence of being, the perceiver recognizing itself as the sole reality.
“It is no longer I who live,” can be interpreted as an existential “crucifixion,” a psychic death where the separate, limited “I” dissolves. It is the surrender of the belief in egoic agency. This “death” of the ego’s belief in separation is precisely what facilitates the experience of the eternal life in Christ as the embodied reality of awareness. ⬚
All in the Divine
We do not experience consciousness through the body; we experience the body through consciousness.
The pre-Socratic philosopher Parmenides, through logical deduction, famously asserted that being is one, eternal, and unchanging. He argued against the possibility of non-being or multiplicity in any ultimate sense, concluding that all change and distinction are merely appearances. This ground-breaking Western insight aligns with the nondual understanding that if there is truly only one ultimate reality, then it cannot be fragmented, multiplied or fundamentally divided from itself in any way.
Applied to experience, this means that you are not a separate piece of reality. You are a localized expression within one reality of awareness. In other words, you are the awareness that illuminates your experience, and you as awareness are not limited or local, despite appearances.
Advaita Vedanta, the nondual school of Hindu philosophy, encapsulates this truth with the saying, “Atman is Brahman.” Atman refers to the essence of the individual. Brahman is the ultimate reality, the Absolute. Atman is Brahman because that which appears as the individual self is the universal reality. There is not a separate perceiver within the body-mind; there is only awareness, and awareness is one.
The Hermetic principle, “As above, so below,” points to the mirroring of the macrocosm (the universe, the divine) and the microcosm (the individual, the earthly realm), suggesting that the essence of reality-at-large is the same essence as the individuated self.
In the Gospel of John, Jesus’ declaration, “I and the Father are one,” is another expression of this truth, which, here, is not a claim of exclusive divinity for a single historical figure. It is an articulation of the recognition of the reality of awareness speaking through a particular form. In other words, the “I” here is not a separate awareness, but the universal awareness recognizing itself as the ultimate source of all being, as that from which all forms arise (in awareness).
The nondual truth is also echoed in the Buddhist concept of emptiness, which does not mean nothingness, but rather the empty nature of all phenomena which lacks its own discrete, independent existence apart from awareness.
Another concept of unity is seen in the mystic tradition of Sufism where all phenomena are understood to be appearances of God's infinite being.
Many Indigenous cultures speak of a Great Spirit or an interconnected web of life where all things are related and infused with the same animating essence. The land, the ancestors, the animals, the people, are not fundamentally separate but are expressions of a single, sacred reality.
Here, that sacred reality is the reality of awareness. ⬚
The Body of the World
In religious traditions, God’s infinite being is often referred to as the ultimate reality. By definition, the ultimate reality is the fundamental and foundational nature of existence; it is the source from which all known phenomena appear and disappear. Experientially, this source is consciousness. Consciousness is verifiably our most direct experience (in fact, consciousness is all that we have direct access to). We are not experiencing nothing here. What we call reality is real. Even if, like a dream, this is all an illusion, it is still something, and that something, whatever it is, is known by consciousness, or God.
If consciousness is the ultimate knower, there is simply no room for a separate knower or personal self without that personal self arising as an activity of consciousness. Why? Because the idea of two or more fundamentally separate consciousnesses creates a logical dilemma. In what larger reality do these multiple consciousnesses co-exist? If they are held within some overarching domain, then that larger domain, the container, is the more fundamental unifying reality. And wouldn’t this ultimate reality through which all conscious experience unfolds necessarily be a conscious reality itself?
At this point in the investigation, the idea of consciousness arising from that which is inert brings us to physical materialism, where objections are made to the idea that consciousness is fundamental. Materialism, however, is stuck at a philosophical impasse on this issue due to the “hard problem” of consciousness. How can the subjective, qualitative experience of watching the sun set over the ocean and feeling an emotion, for example, arise from the quantities of matter, from arrangements of atoms, molecules, or neural impulses? Science, despite its progress in understanding the way phenomena behaves, has not successfully bridged this explanatory gap from quantitative interactions to qualitative experience.
From a nondual standpoint, there is no hard problem because the starting premise is inverted. Consciousness is not a product of matter; rather, matter and all other phenomena are appearances within consciousness. The qualities of experience do not arise from quantities; quantity and quality arise within the qualitative ground of consciousness.
The belief in being a separate consciousness is not just a minor misunderstanding; it is the illusion responsible for the world we live in today. Additionally, the cause of psychological suffering, like the anxiety of loneliness or the fear of death, is rooted in the false belief of a fundamental separation within the reality of consciousness.
The nondual understanding is an invitation to see through this ignorance, to recognize that the feeling of separation is merely a thought-form, an appearance within awareness. Because awareness has no real boundaries, and awareness knows all that can be known, there is no fundamental separation in the reality of awareness. All division is a product of the mind, an activity within awareness.
To rest securely in this understanding is to rest as the ultimate reality, a reality that is inherently peaceful, whole, and free. ⬚