True freedom is nothing at all. Emptiness, sunyata, isn’t a thing: it’s empty!
One difference between Hindu-based, Vedantic Nonduality and Buddhism, is that sometimes in the Advaita Vedanta traditions, they tend to suggest that nonduality is a thing. That is to say: there is a thing to be found, and it’s The Nondual.
Sometimes modern Neo-Advaitans will call it Consciousness or Awareness, meaning an all-pervasive Something of which we have always been a part. It may in effect even be an alternate form of God, and some openly call it that.
Buddhism doesn’t entirely agree. It says: no thing. The non-dual is not anything. There is nothing there to be glimpsed, discovered, known or turned into a Thing. From the deep Buddhist perspective, to say there is a thing of whatever kind, to which we must recognize our belonging, isn’t true freedom.
True freedom is nothing at all. Emptiness, sunyata, isn’t a thing: it’s empty! But it also produces a new universe every moment. Freely it’s nothing; freely it’s all. Freely it’s this very moment, just as it is.
That is the wonder, the marvel, the joy, the peace, in every moment. Our practice is first to settle, then to realize this, and then to be able to be aware of it all the time, and live it out in our ordinary lives – which requires ongoing training that some traditions say needs more than one lifetime to be fulfilled.
In other words, patience is in order… It all takes time, and that is fine.