#45: Mindfully Pondering Duality 🧠 🤔 ☯️
Returning to Non-Dualistic Living
I’ve spent a lot of time thinking and reflecting over the last few weeks, contemplating the total solar eclipse and my more recently nomadic lifestyle.
I spent the week in Cabo for a friend’s wedding, and haven’t had time to write a full entry (sorry Vilhelm, will get to your blockchain questions later 🫡).
But that’s okay 😊 One of the aspects I like most about this newsletter is that I'm able to structure it in a way that matches my lifestyle at the moment.
Remember, the goal with Recalibrating is to build a sustainable creation system. Sustainable creation arises by recognizing the ebbs and flows of life. A natural cadence of existence.
It’s been great taking a break from technical deep dives and spending time experiencing reality as it is, with friends and loved ones, in beautiful places with awe-some phenomena.
To prime my rest & recalibration last week, I lined up a podcast for the plane that I have been meaning to listen to for a long time.
On the way to Mexico, I listened to a podcast on mindfulness and meditation:
Huberman Labs discussion with Sam Harris on Using Meditation to Focus, View Consciousness & Expand Your Mind. It's a long one, but so far has been an excellent refresher on mindfulness and what it means to live an engaged life.
In Mexico, I spent a lot of time talking with friends about mindfulness, meditation, and mental health.
On the way back from Mexico, I continued the podcast, pondering the nature of reality and my place in it.
Rather than writing about new technology and my excitement over Farcaster again (the future of social media), I thought I would share some mindful reflections from my recalibration over the last few weeks.
It’s interesting how much my eclipse experience aligns with the discussion in the podcast: duality vs non-duality.
Recalibrating Recap
Welcome to Recalibrating! My name is Callum (@_wanderloots)
Join me each week as I learn to better life in every way possible, reflecting and recalibrating along the way to keep from getting too lost.
Thanks for sharing the journey with me ✨
Over the last few weeks, I've been taking it easy from technical writing, focusing more on my actual experience. I went to Portugal & Spain, New York City, shot the total solar eclipse, and went to Mexico for a wedding.
This week, I thought I'd briefly share some reflections I've had related to my sense of self and the limiting and normative nature of dualistic living.
I'll share a few resources that help make sense of the sentence above, which I know is a confusing topic.
But, in my opinion, it is one of the most important topics you will ever learn to understand in your lifetime.
Even if it takes some time, it will be worth it ✨
The Bigger Picture of Mindfulness
Mindfulness is a vague term that is often thrown around to refer to things like yoga, meditation, hobbies, and life in general.
Mindfulness means different things to different people, so I won't try to provide a blanket definition at the moment.
Instead, I'll refer to what I believe is a core tenet (philosophical element) of mindfulness: intentionality.
Like many things in life, the best definition from mindfulness likely arises from a look at its opposite: mindlessness.
They are a duality. Two sides of the same coin.
On one side, we have mindlessness, a completely lack of intentionality. Reacting.
On the other, we have mindfulness, completely intentional. Acting.
Whether mindfulness arises from meditation, yoga, or hiking through the woods, a core element is that it's a step out of the normal routine of life to take time for the self. Time to ground that self in the actual experience of reality. To become self-aware.
To me, this is mindfulness Level 1. Becoming aware of the self requires a separation of that self (subject) from the world (object). There is the creation of a subject-object duality.
This type of mindfulness often involves focusing on breathing. An anchor point to focus attention.
But if we are focusing attention, even though we are using intentionality, we are diverting the natural state of existing through that spotlight of attention. This is, in and of itself, a somewhat unnatural action.
Most of life is not spent with focused attention (that would be exhausting).
Instead, we can move to Level 2 of Mindfulness: Non-Duality.
In a non-dualistic state, there is no separation of the self from the objects of the world. The subject and object combine into one to form a pure state of experience. Non-duality.
... what?
Mindfully Podcasting on the Plane
The interview of Dr. Sam Harris by Dr. Andrew Huberman has been on my list for a long time.
For context, Sam Harris is the founder of Waking Up, the meditation/mindfulness app I have been using for ~four years. I've recommended this app many times over the course of Recalibrating, and today is no exception. I'll give more direction on how to get started in a moment.
Andrew Huberman is a professor and researcher at Stanford, working in the field of neuroscience. I referenced one of his lectures in Entry #27: The Power of Writing Protocols.
Both Huberman and Harris are renowned in the field of neuroscience and optimizing human experience.
The podcast is called: Using Meditation to Focus, View Consciousness & Expand Your Mind:
Rather than diving more deeply into the topics they discussed, I want to suggest that you listen to the episode. I recognize that it is a commitment (it's about 4 hours long). I personally broke it up into three sessions: 1 hour, 2 hours, 1 hour.
If that sounds too daunting, don't worry, I have a few much, much shorter recommendations to help you get started on these topics, though I still highly recommend listening to the full episode if you get the chance. It is a bit technical, so I completely understand if you want to start with more beginner topics (which I will describe in a moment).
The depth to which they discuss the practice of meditation and Sam's view of mindfulness was excellent.
I note that Huberman was a bit... disillusioned with traditional meditation and its benefits, yet Sam's explanations were so impactful that Huberman now sees meditation and mindfulness in an entirely new light.
That light is non-duality. Level 2 Mindfulness.
But what is non-duality?
Non-Duality
To understand non-duality, it helps to consider our progression of self as we move from child to adult.
As children, we view the world non-dualistically. The world is us, we are it. We do not question our place in the world because we merely experience life as experience itself. We are not "self-conscious".
As adults, we split the sense of self into subject (us) & object (the world) as we become self-conscious. We introduce duality to our experience.
Mindfulness practice enables a return to the non-dualistic state. Pure experience. There is no bifurcation ✨
Through mindfulness, we experience the totality of our own experience.
Some definitions:
Bifurcation: dividing into two
Duality: contrasting between two aspects or concepts
Totality: the whole of something (also a phase of the Total Solar Eclipse, more details here) ☀️🌑🌎.
Do Or Do Not, There Is No Try
I recognize a lot of that language sounds confusing and is strange to think about.
Unfortunately, there is no way for me to "teach" you how to understand the next level of mindfulness (i.e., more than breathing exercises/yoga). It is something you must do in order to understand.
Sam Harris provides the analogy of a mind's eye optical illusion. These are the ones where you can stare at a blob on the page for an hour... and it looks like a blob... until suddenly you see a cat on the page.
Non-dualistic mindfulness is like that optical illusion. You can practice over and over again, focusing only on breathing (spotlight attention), and you'll likely never reach the non-dualistic state. Once you let go of the focus on breathing) and enable yourself to just be, all of the sudden the non-dualistic experience reveals itself, and you get a "glimpse" of the next stage of mindfulness.
Again, I recognize that this sounds kind of trippy and a bit wishy-washy, but I assure you that there is a very clear difference. Once you see it and feel it, you will know what I am talking about.
To help guide you on your mindfulness journey, I thought I would suggest a few resources ✨
Getting Started With Mindfulness
As a very beginner overview, I wrote a guide on what Mindfulness means to me and how you can get started: What Mindfulness Means To Me.
I also talk about it a lot in Entry #4: Beginning With Breath (can't believe that was back in July 🤯).
Once you've read either of those, I recommend getting the Waking Up app (which I explain more in the blog post above). Here is a free 1 month guest pass to Waking Up (I am not affiliated, I just think it's a great app).
If you do not want to pay for the Waking Up app, you can request a scholarship and get one year for free. Do not feel guilty about requesting this. If money is the reason you are not willing to try the app, please request the scholarship, they will be happy to give it to you.
The Waking Up app has a 30 day introductory course by Sam Harris that touches on a lot of the topics discussed in the Huberman interview. It's a great way to expand your understanding of mindfulness.
Once you finish the 30 day intro course (or perhaps sooner, I can't remember) you will unlock the full library of different mindfulness series.
Each series has 10-15, ten minute sessions as a "course" that goes deeper into a specific topic (i.e., stoicism, procrastination, deep rest, CBT, etc).
Related to the topic of Non-Duality, I have two favourite series:
The Course of Awakening and the The Direct Approach.
The Course of Awakening gives an excellent overview on what it means to "glimpse" true experience, along with some questions that will help you look at life different (aka recalibrating questions).
The Direct Approach is a bit more advanced, but greatly helped me understand much more deeply what it means to view life non-dualistically.
My recommendation would be to do the following:
30 Day Intro Course
Course of Awakening
Direct Approach
You can listen to the Huberman podcast with Sam Harris at any time. I think it will benefit you if you start or finish with it.
Final Thoughts
For me, mindfulness is at the core of what it means to live a psychologically engaged life (which I talk about a lot with reference to flow).
If we are reacting to life, instead of acting, we miss out on so much experience. We miss out on the depth of moments, of connection with others and the world around us.
We limit our self through self-consciousness, fearing/overthinking what others view us as (also talked about a lot in Entry #17: Esteem Growth).
Instead of viewing the world as me vs you, us vs them, self vs other, we can take a moment to recognize that life is not so binary.
Life does not need to be split into two, viewed dualistically.
Instead, we can recognize the harmony that exists with natural experience in and of itself, and learn to tap into that non-dualistic state of being.
Mindfulness is not something that resides purely in dedicated practice sessions. It is a way of living. One of mindful intention instead of mindless reactions.
The more mindfully I live my life, the more sustainable it becomes, the more my overthinking reduces, and with it, my anxiety.
I know others have found many benefits with practicing mindfulness. The physiological benefits are clear, likely related to the grounding effect of breathing exercises and taking time each day to reduce distraction. But the psychological benefits are, in my opinion, much greater.
Mindfulness can help with anxiety, burnout, stress, depression, overthinking, low self-esteem, and many more psychological negatives.
I hope this was a helpful overview of some of these concepts. Please let me know in the comments if anything is confusing, I'm happy to elaborate more ✨
Next week
I realize that I've been very bad at predicting what I am planning on writing a week ahead. Since I completed the structure of Maslow's Hierarchy after Entry #28, I've been free-flowing.
I'll continue thinking about the format of this newsletter, recognizing that the freedom to write about what feels natural each week is more of a blessing than a curse ✨
Is there a particular topic you'd like me to write more on? Let me know! Happy to expand on anything you find valuable.
Stay tuned ✨
P.S. consider joining the regular mindfulness discussion I'm having on Farcaster in my /mindfulness channel ✨