Wherever you look you see your One Self

When you declare, "I am he, I am God," there is still some duality, because there are still two entities, I and God. So, this is still not complete non-dualism. At the very beginning, when you say, "O Lord, I am your servant," the Lord is separate and the servant is separate, and their status is clearly different. On the other hand, when you say, "I am God," although there is still a trace of duality, the distinction is not one of separate subject and object but more like seeing the reflection or image of yourself in a mirror.

Whenever people are different, when there are many separate entities, then there will also be many different images or reflections. But in the stage of qualified non-dualism, you see only your own image everywhere, because you are all there is. You are the one self being reflected as many images, just like the one sun is seen as separate images in a number of different water-filled pots. So, in the stage of qualified non-dualism, you are alone; there is none other. The only thing that still comes between you and the divinity is the mirror. You constantly perceive your own reflection, and so you see yourself as very near and very dear to the Lord - face to face with him.

But when you perceive only the one God who is all-pervasive, then where is the need for any image at all? Can there be a place where he is not? When the entire world is the mansion of the omnipresent Lord, then where should you look to find the door to enter his mansion? If there were a separate street and a separate house then there would have to be a door which opens onto the street; but in truth, there is no street at all. When the all-pervasive Lord is everywhere, how can there be any special place where you must seek him to find him? No, there is no special place where he resides.

Once you realize that he is everywhere at all times, then the true perception of the divinity is not that of an object whose reflection is seen in various places but the realization that there is only you, the one immortal self, abiding everywhere, present in everything in all its fullness. This all-pervasive perception of the divinity as the one without a second, is called non-dualism.