Brahman and Atman

At the deepest level, Hinduism teaches that all apparent diversity conceals a single reality called Brahman — the ultimate, formless, infinite ground of existence. Everything you see, touch, and experience is Brahman wearing different masks.

In Advaita Vedanta, your individual self, called atman, is not ultimately separate from Brahman. The Upanishads express this with the phrase "tat tvam asi" — "thou art that." Other Hindu schools interpret the relationship between self and ultimate reality differently, but the non-dual image is powerful: the wave thinks it is separate from the ocean, while at a deeper level it belongs to the ocean.