Hi Kathy, you had brought up some very broad and far reaching issues on this thread, and so i addressed some of those issues, which i believe are relatively important to get a more holistic understanding of.

   I read the quote by Dave you shared.  I agreed with and liked much of it, yet to some extent, i was seeing a similar thing that i was trying to address before hand and to begin with.   Which is the labeling of differences/uniqueness and of perceiving those to be somehow non constructive in nature, and Oneness/sameness to be the end all and only that which is constructive. 

  For awhile, i looked at it in a very similar way.   But, i've come to understand that the differences and unqiueness in Creation are just as sacred as the Oneness/sameness aspect, it's just that in this dimension too much focus on the former, without ideals and focus on the latter, can lead to separatist actions, ways of being and perceiving, etc. 

  But, it's not that differences/unqiueness=bad in and of itself, it's the imbalance and over concentration of same, for lack of the Oneness/sameness, which is what causes so many issues within our selves, within our cultures, and within the whole World (and in other worlds too, though some worlds are overly focussed on Oneness/sameness believe it or not, not enough individualization). 

   In a way, i see it almost as some people trying to cut out the left brain, because they consider its role and function to be non constructive.   

  I can understand this extremity, because in our Western culture (which seems ever to be taking over the world), the left brain aspect of us, has been over concentrated on, over idealized, forced on others, and over worshiped oft at the expense of the Heart-Right brain aspects.   

   So, sometimes to facilitate a balance for the long term, we have to over concentrate for awhile, on the Right brain-Heart aspect.  But too often, this then becomes our ultimate truth and we start shaping our perceptions according to our beliefs.   

  What i like and respect about Bob Monroe is that he seemed to understand this whole polarization thing fairly well, and even developed technology to help facilitate and foster at least a mental merging of these two different but completely connected states--i.e. Hemi-Sync., a state wherein the left and right brain hemispheres completely work together, balance and thus "merge" and the Whole become more than the sum of two parts.   

  Have you used Hemi-Sync?    I've found it to be a good outer tool, to help one to get more into the space of merging the thinking and feeling aspects of self.    It has helped me to more deeply realize the schism that so many have between these flows within self, the imbalance, and how often what polarity we are more innately balanced too, we tend to idealize at the detriment or expense of the other--based on like attracts, likes, perceives and begets like.   I see it so often, even with many spiritually developed folks, that i feel its a pretty important issue to get clearly across. 

  So again, one could say that our Left brain aspect=innate differences/Uniqueness and Right brain aspect=Oneness/sameness, and when we merge these, then do we experience full Wholeness, completion, true and transcendent reality, etc.     And the more we merge these within self, the more we can perceive and act/be from that space.    This needless to say, seems to be rather hard to fully and completely accomplish while in physical, for whatever reasons, but we are coming to cycles of great facilitation in that regard.

Hi Kathy. What's interesting about oneness vs. duality is that as Justin said it's neither. It's a continuum. All possibilities seem to be simultaneously true.

An interesting illustration of this is the way in Buddhism that many perspectives are taught differently according to the level of the view. At the basic C1 time/space Hinayana level you can for example make a perfectly logical explanation using conventional logic to show why the idea of an independently existing independent self is 'empty' or actually not true.

You can then go on to show by the same means that compassion towards others is the natural consequence of this - the Mahayana view.

Yet when one starts to work with higher states of consciousness that in essence are less bound up by ego we connect with both of these perspectives as experiential realities.

Yet in the more realised person both means of sensing (the head and the heart you could say) and knowing blend seamlessly together, as does access to varying levels of consciousness - depending on circumstances. It's not like they flip a switch, go clunk and drop from one state to the other.

Not sure that I'm making a lot of sense, but I suppose it's another example of the old 'as above so below' saying....

Bye!!