Discovering True Wellbeing According to Nonduality
As humans, there seems to be an almost universal search for something – a sense of well-being, peace, fulfilment, or joy. In many spiritual traditions, this search takes the form of seeking freedom, liberation, awakening, or enlightenment. Our conventional understanding, or consensus reality, often assumes that what we are looking for is conditioned by what is happening in our lives. We believe that well-being depends on securing particular circumstances or having certain pleasant experiences. This perspective suggests that some experiences serve as evidence of well-being, while others indicate its absence.
This approach, however, is inherently unstable and ultimately doomed to fail in securing lasting, reliable well-being. The very nature of phenomena in our dynamic universe is that conditional well-being is transient; it constantly slips away. No matter how hard we try to hold onto conditional well-being, it will inevitably vanish. This constant coming and going of preferred experiences creates a cycle of searching, feeling dissatisfied, and experiencing unease. We find ourselves asking, “How do I get it back?” when the desired state disappears.
However, the message of nonduality invites us to explore a radically different perspective: the possibility of a well-being that is not fleeting. This enduring well-being is not dependent on particular experiences or circumstances. It is unconditioned by how life appears or how we describe it. The message of nonduality suggests that the most profound sense of wellness and freedom is unconditioned by anything whatsoever, which runs counter to our typical way of thinking, including often within the spiritual search itself.
What, then, is this unconditioned well-being? It is found in the fundamental nature of reality itself. This nature is indefinable, inconceivable, and unresolvable. It is the sheer presence of what is here, the raw sense of existence that has no story, definition, or description. It is the basis, the common fundamental ground underlying all experiences. We could call it life, aliveness, being, presence, singularity, the undivided, the whole, the ground of being, absolute reality, God, source, the Tao, the great perfection, or the mystery.
This fundamental reality encompasses everything that arises. It is a well-being which is intrinsically present in and as all experience, not just certain ones. It is non-hierarchical; there is no experience that is somehow “more life” or “better” than another. All moments, regardless of how the mind conceives them, are this singular, absolute, all-inclusive reality. This inherent inclusivity means that reality doesn’t look or feel any particular way; it looks, feels, and appears in all ways, as all seeming descriptions, designations, and qualities.
Nonduality reveals that conventional efforts to achieve well-being often involve attempting to manage, control, or transform our experience into something we imagine would be better. We try to shape the moment, understand it, or modify it. However, this effort is unnecessary. The invitation is to relax any effort to modify what is appearing. Nothing about the present moment needs to be different. At this very moment, exactly as it is, is the expression of infinite reality. There is no “correct experience” to have.
Why is this effort unnecessary? Because what we are looking for is already present. The very appearance of all phenomena, all experiential forms, are the well-being. They are the expression of this basic state of reality, just as waves are an appearance of the ocean. The waves don’t need to be manipulated because they are the arising of reality itself; they are the presence. Our effort to control the flow of experience can actually create a sense of unrest, rather than leading to peace.
A core aspect of this understanding is the dynamic nature of reality. It is a ceaseless flow, a relentless unfolding that never stops. Experience is not made of static “things,” but of movement, like thoughts, feelings, and sensations which are flows, not fixed entities. This flow is constantly changing shape, always becoming something new. Yet, paradoxically, this ceaseless flow is what is always here; it is the abiding stability. This stability is not a particular flavour or state, but the basis of all the flavours of life. It is the constancy found in the coming and going of phenomena.
The nondual perspective also cuts through the idea of separation. Conventionally, we experience ourselves as a subject in a world of objects, bounded by our skin, with an internal world separate from an external one. However, the exploration of nonduality invites us to explore the feeling of experience itself. If we feel what we call the body, for instance, we find no discernible edge; the experience doesn’t come to a stop. From the perspective of the whole, there is no clear boundary separating self from other, no division between subject and object. There is simply a seamless whole, an indivisible experiencing, where there are no opposed forces or conflict. This recognition of indivisibility often brings a sense of deep ease and peace.
The reality of this moment is awake, knowing itself effortlessly. It is pure aliveness and vitality, in endless expression. It embodies qualities we often seek, such as openness, love, belonging, worth and wholeness, not as states to achieve, but as its fundamental nature. Openness is simply the way life is; it is unbounded. Worth is inherent in reality allowing its own expression. Wholeness is already accomplished because reality is inclusive of everything, so nothing is lacking.
The understanding of nonduality offers genuine relaxation, the end of seeking. It reveals that nothing about us or life (which are not different in essence) is fundamentally out of place or broken. It is like waking up in a dream and realising you don’t have to fix the dream to be closer to it; the dream is simply the luminous display of dreaming consciousness. Similarly, life as it is, is the luminous display of reality.
We are not separate from this reality; we are reality in expression. We are both the waves that are inseparable from the ocean and the ocean itself, never having left the sea. The sense of being a separate self, while a valid experience, is ultimately like a balloon containing its own share of air, air that is separate from that which surrounds it. We are the divinity; there is nothing to eradicate or get rid of. This primal sense of being, which is the sense of “I,” is also completely impersonal, boundless, and fathomless. Being is both the seeker and the sought.
Therefore, true wellbeing is not something to be found in the future or in a different state. It is not conditioned by the particularities of how the moment is expressing. It is the very presence of what is, the flow of reality itself. It is always here, as whatever is here. It is the discovery that nothing has ever been absent, but is always here, as whatever is here.
