If Reality is formless and there is nothing other than this, how does the form of the world appear?Okay, this is going to be perhaps a more advanced Non-Duality exploration. The basic understanding is that there is only One, an Infinite One, which is really no number, there is no true separation of things in the world, there is no separate identity, and our true nature is That Which Is, the Infinite One Being or Beingness, Pure Consciousness or Aware Being. Recognition of this infinite indivisible oneness, or the dropping of the notion of separation and division, is Enlightenment or Self Realisation.

This Pure Consciousness or Aware Being in which the world appears (as everything appears in consciousness) is formless, complete, content, timeless, dimensionless, unmoving and unchanging. The world of motion and change that appears within the Changeless is known to be an illusory appearance, a play of change, and has been called Maya or Lila. So form and change are illusory. Reality is dimensionless stillness, complete and content.

We can go further in the understanding of Maya. The world that appears seems to have fallen out of the Singularity of Being. Where once, timelessly, there was no appearance of the world, there now seems to be an appearance of time and space, ever changing and moving. The Singularity is not broken, yet the world appears as if it did break, was divided, causing ripples of interaction and fluctuations between opposites. This world of opposites appears as a division of the timeless and formless Singularity, stretching out in time and space.

So this is the nature of the universe, an interplay of opposites (or 'The World of Opposites' as I call it) that seems to have appeared from the primordial Singularity. In Taoism this is described as the opposite forces of Yin and Yang arising within the oneness of the Supreme Ultimate. The appearance is not really 'from' the Singularity. The Singularity remains. So the world appears in the Singularity. It appears in the Pure Consciousness. There is no true division of Consciousness into what it is and what it is not. It's all Consciousness always.

Now to take this to a deeper level, so to speak. If Reality is formless and there is nothing other than this, how does the form of the world appear? The answer must be that it does not really appear... This seems to go against our observation, but it can be understood. Where does this form of the world begin or end? It doesn't. The apparently separate forms are not separate, so there are not numerous forms. We could say the universe is one form flowing through different appearances or expressions. Consider it like one continuous piece of string making many different shapes or forms, rather than many separate pieces of string making separate forms.

So the world appearing is not separate from the one in whom it appears. We usually consider the world as a subject-object appearance, but it is more like Awareness being aware of itself, or Consciousness knowing itself. There are not forms separate from the seeing or knowing of them. We could call it one form, but it is not just form. The one form is 'part of' the formless knowing of it. So the form and the formless are one. The form and the perceiving of it is like the stretching of Aware Being into the subject-object relationship of knower-knowing-known.

Aware Being, which is timelessly self-aware, seems to stretch itself apart in what we call space and time, and sees itself within itself.  But the substance of 'form' (or what appears) is nothing other than the formless in which it appears. The form only seems to be 'solid' or dense because there is an apparent restriction, and restriction prevents it from being seen through. Yet the restriction or solidity of anything is only relative. Form cannot be wholly restrictive. The shapes and forms that are seen are not true shapes and forms. They only appear to be forms. They only seem to restrict awareness.

The forms that are seen are made of consciousness. Everything is consciousness. There is only consciousness. So there are no forms. Only formless, unseen Consciousness.