Veganism Is Not About the Animals: It’s About You. A Nondual Perspective on All Beings.

The deeper truth is this: protecting animals is not about them. It’s about us—about realizing our true, undivided nature.

We often think of veganism as an act of compassion toward others—toward animals who deserve mercy. But from a nondual perspective, this idea still arises from the illusion of separateness.
The deeper and ultimate truth is this: protecting animals is not about them. It’s about us—about realizing our true, undivided nature.

Most of us live our entire lives with the conviction that we are separate from everything else—especially from animals. But is this belief grounded in observable reality, or is it just a persistent idea in our minds that we've mistaken for truth? Let’s take an honest look. If humans and animals truly exist as two fundamentally different selves, then each would have to be one complete, self-contained entity made of its own unique essence, existing independently. And this distinction would need to be evident even without any mental labels.

So let’s look honestly—at the facts, not the beliefs.

1. The Illusion of the Separate Self.

What we call a “person” or an “animal” is not a single, solid thing. Look closely: the body is not one thing—it’s a composite of countless cells and molecules, always changing, growing, dying, renewing. Even the smallest elements like atoms and quarks are made of smaller particles, on and on without end.

The mind is no more unified. It’s a stream of fleeting moments—thoughts, emotions, sensations—none of which are fixed or graspable. Every mental moment dissolves into shorter and shorter events, never forming a true singularity.

There is no central “me” orchestrating this process. No enduring self that owns or stands apart from it. What we call “me” is just a habit of thought—a story.
We are not things—we are processes perpetually unfolding. Like rivers, we flow. And no part of us stands alone.

So too with animals. No animal exists as a separate or independent being. There is only the whole of life, appearing through different forms—human, dog, bird, elephant. But the essence behind the form is one.

2. We Are Not Self-Generated.

No one created themselves. Every being arises from a web of conditions: genetics, parenting, food, time, biology, environment, even stardust from collapsed galaxies. No one is the author of their existence.

What we call a “human” or an “animal” is not a fixed essence. A dog, a cow, a bird—these are not beings with their own independent natures, but expressions of the same universal source. There is no internal nature inside any body—human or animal—that created itself.

There is no essence of “humanness” or “animalness.” These are just names we assign to forms based on appearance. But the force behind them—the animating presence—is the same. It belongs to no one and to everyone. It is the universe expressing itself.

One life. One being. Infinite faces.

“What we call ‘others’ are not others at all. They are ourselves in disguise.”

3. The Person or Animal Is a Mental Label.

So how do we come to believe in all this separation? Through the mind.

The mind sees a form and assigns a label: human, animal, friend, food. But these are not inherent truths—they are mental inventions. A body is just a body.

One body is not a cow nor is it “meat.” Another body is not a dog nor is it a “pet.” A third is not a person nor a “human.” These are labels we project, not realities we perceive. The body is not giving us these distinctions—our minds are.

Without these labels, there is only the whole—life, unfolding in countless forms.

The tragedy is not that we invent these labels. It’s that we believe them. We believe our thoughts reflect the outside world, when in truth, they reflect only our own minds.

Reality remains whole. Every being is our own being—appearing differently.

“Every cut made ‘outside’ slices through our own being.”

4. Traits Don’t Belong to Anyone.

Skin color, gender, language, culture, species—none of these belong to anyone. They are not “my” traits or “their” features. They are movements of the whole of life, expressed for a while, then gone.

To say “I am human, you are animal” is to forget that neither label has any grounding in reality. They exist only in thought. Without the concept, there is only this moment’s expression of life.

When we cause harm based on a label, we are not hurting “others”—we are harming the entire fabric of being, that is ourselves.

5. There Is No Hierarchy in Being.

The illusion of separation gives rise to the illusion of superiority. We imagine that humans are “higher” because we speak or build things. But these traits don’t make us more real or more valuable.

A spider weaving its web and a monk meditating are both equally valid expressions of being. Life does not rank itself.

There is no ladder to climb, no pyramid to sit atop. Nonduality flattens the imagined structure. All beings stand equally on the ground of one being.

6. Suffering Is Not Local.

Pain is not isolated. It is not contained in individual bodies. When one being suffers, the whole field of life is disturbed. That suffering reverberates through all.

When we inflict pain, we do not harm just “them.” We inject suffering into the very fabric of what we are. Because there is no “them”—there is only us.

Nonviolence is not sentimentality—it is clarity. When the illusion of separateness fades, hurting another simply makes no sense.

“If there are no others, then who else would receive the consequences of our actions but us?”

7. No One Is More Virtuous—Only More Clear.

Veganism is not a sign of moral superiority. From a nondual view, there is no separate self to be superior. There is only more or less clarity.

When the illusion falls away, violence stops—not because we force it to, but because it no longer makes sense. It becomes absurd.

No badge is needed. No pride. Just the quiet knowing: this is me too.

8. Love Without an Object.

When division dissolves, what remains is love. Not love for a particular being—but love itself, flowing freely, without center or boundary.

This love does not need to be cultivated. It is what we are, once the labels and stories drop away. It is the whole recognizing itself everywhere.

To live from this love is not to become soft or naive—it is to become whole again.

9. Animals Are Closer to Silence, a Mark of Nonduality.

Words divide. Labels separate. But silence is already whole. Many animals live more deeply in this silence. They do not create mental identities. They do not need to defend self-concepts.

In this way, they are closer to the source than we often are. They are living reminders of the place we never truly left.

To respect animals is not to elevate them to our imagined level—but to meet them where they already are, and to return there ourselves.

The End of Division.

Veganism, then, is not ultimately about animals. It is about seeing clearly. It is about waking up from the illusion of separateness and remembering the One Life behind all appearances.

To stop harming animals is not a sacrifice. It is a homecoming. It is the end of the false idea that there is anyone else here at all.

The same presence that lives as you lives as the bird, the cow, the fish, the forest. You do not need to change reality to see this—you only need to look without labels.

Compassion is not an act performed toward others. It is what remains when we realize there are no others.