DISCRIMINATION IN VEDANTA

In Vedanta the term discrimination refers to knowledge of what is eternal and what is noneternal.  Discrimination is the first qualification of the spiritual aspirant, according to Shankara, defining it as “the firm conviction that Brahman alone is real and the universe unreal.”

Brahman is eternal, unchanging, constant, permanent, abiding, and reliable, whereas the universe is noneternal, ever changing, impermanent, transient, not abiding, and unreliable.
 
Since the universe is forever changing, there is no one thing that is the universe; there is not one instant where it can be said that there it is, that is the universe, as an instant later it is something else.

Brahman is absolute consciousness, experienced by us as that consciousness behind our conditioned, day-to-day consciousness.  This background consciousness that is Brahman does not change and therefore is real.