Chinese philosophical literature, we read that:“… non-existence is the beginning of heaven and earth.‘ Existence’ is called the mother of individual beings …. Both are one in origin and different only in name.”( Tao Te Ching, Richard Wilhelm Edition, 1985 English Edition, pg. 27) This is a creation narrative that incorporates existence and non-existence in a holistic, unified view of the cosmos, where creator and creation are one and the same. In this nondualistic vision, creation is a constant act, happening now, and we are active participants in an infinite unfolding present moment of creation.
In a nondualistic consciousness the boundaries between inner and outer reality begin to dissolve. This is the world, the entirety of existence, and we’ re part of it, intricately wrapped up in it, always, whether we are embodied consciousness or dead flesh. From this alternative philosophical perspective, the idea that the world needs to be fixed would be nonsensical. The very fact of our existence would be proof of the perfection of things as they are. But we have been taught that there is an external reality that each of us— a metaphysical, embodied self— is exacting its will upon, and we’ ve been taught that it’ s actually our job to understand the world and then exact our will upon it.
When we seriously entertain the philosophy of nondualism, we are forced to confront the idea that we are literally experiencing a form of collective insanity that we call civilization. Creating change in the world has become standard operating procedure, and each of the changes seems to have a never ending set of unintended consequences attached to it that we are then forced to make new changes to adjust to. We are mortals acting like gods who have the power to see from an infinite perspective, to actually know the outcomes of an invented world that we are constantly recreating, apart from nature, around ourselves. How can we cease our collective, civilized war on the planet, each other, and the rest of the interconnected web of life on earth until we face the collective and individual insanity that our fundamental assumptions about how the world operates amount to? Was nature really not good enough for us without us adding poisons to our food supply, exterminating native species, and inventing nuclear weapons?