Reflections on Realization

By George A. Boyd © 2020

Q: What brings about Realization? How can I move beyond simply receiving information and truly grasping the essence of what I am taught?

A: We begin the process of Realization through inquiry, or questioning.

Questioning requests an answer from the ensouling entity, when you ask your ensouling entity; from the spiritual Master, when you query him or her; and God, when you invoke Divine guidance.

When you receive information, your first task is to understand it. This process of understanding engages your intellect and your Illumined Mind (Buddhi). As you study new information, you add to your conceptual map of your own nature and the Path ahead of you. You keep revising this map, as you gather more information and have more experiences.

Whereas information layers on the thread of insight and understanding, which we call the Antakarana, experience occurs when you contact one of the ideas referenced in the information you have learned. You do this through focusing your attention, your attentional principle, or your spirit upon this idea.

Examples of these “ideas” you can experience include:

  • The meaning of spiritual ideas or “seed thoughts”
  • The content of inner vehicles of consciousness
  • The inner centers of vehicles of consciousness, such as chakras
  • The seed atom of a vehicle of consciousness
  • The movement of energy in a vehicle of consciousness, such as Prana or Kundalini
  • The array of vehicles of consciousness that your ensouling entity animates
  • Your attentional principle
  • Your spirit associated with your ensouling entity at the cutting edge of spirituality
  • Your spirit in other domains
  • Your ensouling entity at the cutting edge of spirituality
  • One of your ensouling entities at another Octave of Being
  • A personal integration center, such as the ego in the Conscious mind or the Self in the Metaconscious mind
  • A Superconscious integration center, which we call a nucleus of identity
  • A universal nexus of consciousness, such as the Holy Ghost at the entrance to the abode of the saints in the First Mesoteric Planetary Initiation, or the Supreme Light of Creation at the top of the Ideational Plane in the First Cosmic Initiation
  • A form of the Divine, such as the Father God in the First Mesoteric Planetary Initiation, or Brahman in the First Cosmic Initiation

When you experience something, you gain a new perspective on the object of meditation you focus upon:

  • You gain new information.
  • You make new connections and correlations.
  • You begin to fill in the missing pieces of the inner map of the Continuum you are building.

With each new experience, you gain insights, and begin to truly know the essence of the idea you have used to lead you to the object of meditation. So for example, you truly recognize what is your ego, what is the Self, or what is your attentional principle—you truly grasp the essence to which the idea or concept points you.

The next order of processing is Realization, or enlightenment. Realization means that you know something, because you are one with it:

  • You know your Soul directly, because you are the Soul.
  • You know your attentional principle directly, because you are the attentional principle.
  • You know your spirit directly, because you are your spirit.

Realization is not description [information] or attentional union [experience]; it is identity. You know the essence because you are one with it.

As you progress upon the Path, you come to know the nodal points, Subplane and Plane markers, and the forms of the Divine that operate on each level, as your cutting edge ensouling entity actually traverses this terrain—you know each aspect of the Path, because you have taken each step upon it.

Q: What allows you to know what your ensouling entity has realized?

A: The key that allows you to release the Soul’s knowledge, to open its Buddhic capsule, is Samadhi. When you turn the four outgoing streams back to their core, there is an inner explosion of Realization that takes place: this is the Illumination that takes place during Samadhi.

We teach you how to generate Samadhi at the level of the Soul and each higher Octave of Realization in the Samadhi Week Program. Those who complete the Mudrashram® Advanced Course in Meditation are eligible to take this class.

So when you can achieve Atma Samadhi at the level of the Soul, you can extend this to higher Octaves of Being. This opens the full spectrum of Realization, which includes your Monad, Astral Soul, Supracosmic Soul, the Soul of the Bridge Path, and each of the ensouling entities of Transcendental Paths one to seven.

Q: What if I have difficulty in experiencing Samadhi?

A: Like any skill, it takes time to master it. If it is important to you, you will devote the time to reach Samadhi.

It won’t come instantly, but in time, you will get it. This will allow you to truly know and realize what you’ve opened on the Path. It won’t be conjecture or speculation; you will genuinely know.

Q: What happens if the ensouling entity I’m meditating upon has been liberated?

A: You’ll know the Source from which this ensouling entity has emanated—and the complete Path of the ensouling entity, from beginning to end. In this vortex of Creation from which your ensouling entity has originated, you will also intuit the other ensouling entities that dwell at that level, and their distance from the Source.

If you’ll reflect upon these three levels—information, experience, and Realization—you’ll be able to differentiate them. With practice, you will begin to be able to shift between them at will, when it is appropriate to operate at that level.

Stages of Experiencing the Attentional Principle

By George A. Boyd © 2020

Q: I’m not clear about how the attentional principle gains a greater ability to perceive and operate in meditation. Can you describe how the experience of the attentional principle changes with greater inner development and how it gains enhanced facility for meditation?

A: There are three major stages of experiencing the attentional principle:

Perceptual Union – At the first stage, your attention gains union with the attentional principle. With practice, you begin to be able to see and hear what the attentional principle is seeing and hearing in the present time.

Conscious Intentional Activity – At the second stage, you become aware of your attentional principle’s activity. For example, you become aware that your attentional principle is intending your transformational mantra; it is receiving the Light and sending this out via an attunement; or it is traveling in full consciousness through the dimensions of the upper Subconscious, the Metaconscious, and the Superconscious mind.

Independent existence – At stage three, you become aware that your attentional principle operates 24 hours a day, whether you are awake, dreaming, or are in sound sleep.

Regarding the progressive development of your encounter with the attentional principle, we can characterize a spectrum of states where your experience of this conscious essence deepens.

  1. Initial discovery of the location of the attentional principle (passive) – Through the use of hypnosis, psychoactive drugs, or reception of an attunement, you experience temporary union with your attentional principle. However, you cannot under your own efforts, return to this experience.
  2. Discovery of the attentional principle (active) – You move your attention through the focal points of the Conscious and Subconscious mind until your it reaches the feet of the tiny form of the attentional principle behind the pituitary center of the system of chakras of the Subconscious mind. After some practice, you can replicate this at will. We call this method, Purusa Dhyan. We describe this method in our article, “How to Open Your Own Third Eye” on our website. This meditation is the precursor to the more advanced practice of Raja Yoga, which we call direct projection.
  3. Fusion with your attention with the wave of consciousness – This state marks the dawning of stage one. When you achieve this level of control over your attention, you can experience what your attentional principle is sensing in the present time.
  4. Awareness of the intentional activity of your attentional principle – This deeper level of perception marks the beginning of stage two. You become aware of your attentional principle using its intention to travel through the inner Planes of Light, to activate your transformational mantra, and to make attunements. In this state, you become aware that you are doing conscious inner work; you can detect that you are consciously meditating.
  5. Microconcentration on the activity of the attentional principle’s chakras – In addition to intention that operates through the point between the eyebrows chakra of the tiny form of the attentional principle (Purusa), in this state you become aware of the activity of the other chakras of this form. In the throat center, you become aware of its ability to receive intuitive and telepathic impress. In the heart center, you become aware of its ability to contemplate. In its solar plexus center, you become aware of its ability to anchor suggestions in the vehicles of consciousness of the mind and in the unconscious mind. In its navel center, you become aware of its ability to empathically enter the experience of others. At the center at the base of the spine, you become aware of the attentional principles ability to marshal its forces to affirm and create what it wishes to manifest.
  6. Encounter with the guide – At this state, you become aware of your attentional principle’s dialog with an inner guide and its reception of guidance from that guide’s form. You become aware that your attentional principle is listening to the guide’s discourse and it is speaking to the guide through silent, telepathic thought. When you are able to maintain your attention in union with the attentional principle in this state, you experience conscious encounter with the inner guide, which we call Guru Dhyan.
  7. Enhanced noumenal experience – In this state, you have a heightened awareness of your attentional principle’s experience on the higher Planes, and you are able to clearly cognize what it sees and hears. You may become aware that it is attending inner schools or Temples of Wisdom. You may behold it carrying out directed Light Ministry under the aegis of the Masters. You may discover it is consciously communing with Masters of the Hierarchy of Light or Initiates of other spiritual traditions. You make this initial discovery of your attentional principle’s activities when you are meditating while you are awake.
  8. Turiya – This is the start of the third stage of experiencing the attentional principle, where you realize it has a fully independent existence. You become aware that your attentional principle is inwardly awake during all states of consciousness—waking, dream, sound sleep, coma, and death—and you experience your attentional principle is immortal, eternally conscious, and has full remembrance of its experiences on the inner Planes. You realize that its activity is not governed by where your attention is focused—rather, it has the ability to allow your attention to become aware of what your attentional principle is experiencing, and it has the ability to direct your attention to any focal point within the personality or any nodal point in the Superconscious mind, up to the attention’s origin.
  9. Spiritual empowerment – In this state, you become aware of the attentional principle’s ability to guide the attentional principle of others on the inner Planes. In the Mudrashram® tradition, this ability first dawns when we train advanced disciples, who reach the Form of the Disciple on the Bridge Path, to bestow the Raja Yoga Attunement during Teacher Training One. This ability is significantly augmented during Teacher Training Two, which occurs when disciples reach the Mahatma Stage on the Bridge Path, and they learn how to manifest the guide form to the attentional principle of others.
  10. Maha Chaitanya Samadhi – In this deepest stage of meditation, you gain the ability to return attention (chittam) to its origin, the form of the attentional principle (purusa) to its source, and the wave of consciousness (chetan) to where it originated in the Infinite Stage.

During the neophyte phase of spirituality, you may have the passive experience of your attentional principle of state one. You do not have control over this experience, but it shows you aspect of your mind beyond the confines of your Conscious mind.

The aspirant phase of spirituality activates states two through five. You become aware of your attentional principle and its abilities.

In the disciple phase, you have a heightened experience of your attentional principle through states six through eight. You are able to commune with the guide, have full awareness of your attentional principle’s adventures in the inner Planes, and finally realize it as an immortal, eternally conscious spiritual essence.

When you become an Initiate, you activate state nine. Here you are empowered to send the Light to awaken and guide the attentional principles of others.

You can learn to consciously encounter your attentional principle in state two through using the Purusa Dhyan technique. This allows you to open the inner seeing of your attentional principle, and experience what mystics call the opening of the third eye.

We teach you how to activate states three through five in our intermediate mediation courses, the in-person Mudrashram® Master Course in Meditation and the by-mail and online Accelerated Meditation Program. We teach you how to activate state six, which enables you to commune with the inner guide (Guru Dhyan) in the Mudrashram® Advanced Course in Meditation.

Steps seven and eight mark the attainment of advanced discipleship. This comes about gradually after several years of meditation, as your ensouling entity progressively opens deeper and deeper bands of the Great Continuum of Consciousness. Regular practice of Raja Yoga is key to this enhancement of your attentional principle’s experience; those who ignore this important aspect of core Integral meditation practice often lag behind in their ability to experience these more profound stages of attentional principle development.

Those spiritual traditions that grant the ability to bestow the Raja Yoga attunement can awaken and guide the attentional principles of others—these can demonstrate state nine. We empower out students to make this attunement in our advanced Teacher Training programs.

You experience state ten when you complete your spiritual journey in Mudrashram® and you arrive at the Infinite Stage at the top of the Seventh Transcendental Path. This is the most profound state of the experience of attention and the attentional principle, where you consciously experience their origin—where they originally came forth from the Divine.

If you will learn the steps of Raja Yoga meditation and practice it regularly, you will in time experience states two to ten of the development of the abilities of your attentional principle. Your meditations will become ineffable immersion in boundless vistas of sublime knowledge and endless love. And God will not be an abstraction: you will know the Divine As It Is.

Reflections on Spiritual Experience

By George A. Boyd ©2018

Q: How do people have a spiritual experience?

A: They focus their attention on a spiritual essence. There are several layers of experience: the way you have an experience at any particular layer is to focus your attention there. These layers include:

  1. Sensory experience – This type of experience is the most common level of experience. It occurs when your attention is focused at the waking state of awareness. In this level of your experience, you are aware of the environment around your body.
  2. Astral or dream experience – You experience this when your attention is drawn into the astral body during the dream state, hypnosis, or after ingestion of psychoactive drugs.
  3. Attentional experience – You begin to experience this level when you collect your attention into a sphere and become present and conscious in the present time. This initial phase of attentional experience is called mindfulness. With further practice of meditation, attention begins to travel along the thread of consciousness and view the different levels of the mind.
  4. Attentional principle experience – When attention moves along the thread of consciousness to the presence of the intentional consciousness, which we call the attentional principle, it unites with this essence. Once this occurs, you become aware of the independent experience of the attentional principle, which can objectively witness the activity of the mind, and can also us intention to perform a variety of “conscious inner work.”
  5. Individual spirit experience – When the attention moves yet further along the thread of consciousness, it encounters the loving spiritual heart, which we call the spirit. This essence, when activated gains the ability to travel in the channels of light and sound that connect it with its Source. The capacity for spiritual experience enables you to witness the many dimensional Planes that are contained in those channels.
  6. Self experience – When attention focuses on the core of the personality, it discovers the Self. The Self is the director of all personal activity. It creates personal destiny through its choices. It sets up the experiences of human life.
  7. Soul experience – When attention follows the thread of consciousness upward through the Superconscious mind, it gains union with the Soul. As the Soul “wakes up” within, you experience Gnosis, knowing the Soul in its essence; and enlightenment, knowing all levels of the mind and consciousness from the Soul’s vantage point.

Those of you who wish to learn how to focus your attention on your attentional principle, your spirit, your Self, and your Soul can acquire key techniques in our intermediate courses, the in-person Mudrashram® Master Course in Meditation and the by-mail and online Accelerated Meditation Program.

Most people just keep their attention in type 1, the sensory experience of their environment, and type 2, dream and hypnotic states. They never break through into spiritual states of awareness.

With the new popularity of mindfulness, more people are breaking through into type 3, and at least come to the experience of the present time. This is at the entrance to the path to spiritual experience.

People who do coaching, or humanistic or transpersonal psychology learn to focus their mind on the Self at the nucleus of the personality—this is type 6. This is the aspect of your personality that can take charge of your life and your mind and create change through choice.

Types 3 (in its more advanced practice of traveling along the thread of consciousness), 4, 5, and 7 comprise the spiritual experiences that you have in meditation. So if you want to have spiritual experiences, you need to focus your attention on one of these essences.

Once you have mastered the rudiments of attentional travel, you can learn to focus on a wide variety of objects of meditation—nuclei of identity, spiritual guides, and spiritual Masters, and the Divine at different levels of the Continuum.

So to recap, you have a spiritual experience by placing your attention at one of these strata of the mind, and focus on the essence—the attentional principle, the spirit, the Self, or the Soul.

  • To have an experience of the environment, maintain your attention in the waking state of consciousness. This is the ground state of the attention at the bottom of the thread of consciousness.
  • To experience the subconscious mind, the world of dreams, you place your attention in your astral body.
  • To experience the layers of the mind, you move your attention along the thread of consciousness.
  • To experience what the attentional principle is sensing and intending, you put your attention on your attentional principle.
  • To experience what your spirit is sensing or feeling, you contemplate your spirit.
  • To experience what is going on in your life and what you are creating through your choices, you focus your attention on the Self.
  • To experience the fullness of your Soul’s existence, consciousness, and bliss, you merge your attention with the Soul in the Superconscious mind.

People only encounter a fraction of their potential spiritual experience because they don’t fully withdraw their energy and awareness into the object of meditation. So if you are focusing your attention on your attentional principle, but your energy is still locked in the physical body—you are having maybe one tenth of the experience you could be having.

It takes time for this energy to begin to awaken. If you are spending 20 minutes in meditation, this may not be sufficient time for this energy to fully awaken. For example, if you focus on the attentional principle as it’s traveling through the Superconscious mind, and your energy is not fully awakened, you might:

  • Feel something is moving
  • Hear a subtle change in frequency
  • Detect the essence at a new location
  • See some random flashes of light

But will you touch the attentional principle’s actual experience? No: it will be fuzzy and vague.

Focusing your attention on the object of meditation is the first step.

Allowing your awareness to open into this object of meditation is the second step.

Fully withdrawing your energy into union with the objet of meditation is step three.

Uniting your energy with the object of meditation is called samadhi. You actually become one with the essence. At his stage, you have the full experience.

If gaining this complete experience is important to you, you will need to fully withdraw your energy to become one with the essence upon which you are meditating. If you are serious abut this, you will need to free up your time to have the longer mediations you need to extract you energy and have these deeper experiences.

Without this full withdrawal, you may do the spiritual work of transformation or open the channels of light and sound, but your experience will be dream-like, distant, vague, and mysterious.

If you penetrate into the core of that experience, it will be crystal clear, immediate, palpable, and unmistakable. You will not guess at what your attentional principle is… your spirit is… your Self is… your Soul is… You will know without a shadow of a doubt.

We train our students who have completed the Mudrashram® Advanced Course in Meditation to enter the higher levels of Samadhi in our Samadhi Week Program. Any of you who have completed the Mudrashram® Advanced Course in Meditation and have facility of the three core techniques of Integral meditation are eligible to take this course.

Reflections on Levels of Thought

By George A. Boyd © 2018

Q: There are certain coaches, eastern Gurus, and New Age teachers who state that there is no thinker, that thoughts “arise by themselves,” and that thoughts are a false story that veils the truth of our inner Divinity and perfection. Can you shed some light on this?

A: If you hold your attention in certain altered states of consciousness, this appears to be true. You have to keep your attention fixed in this altered state of consciousness, however, to maintain this perspective.

For this reason, these exponents of this view advocate that people do continual inquiries or process meditations, or keep their mind fixed or absorbed in this “enlightened” state. They may teach a number of techniques to keep you merged in this state, or they may have one key method to bring about this state of awareness.

If you simply notice the layers of thoughts you experience, you may discover that there are several different bands of thinking, some of which directly impact human life and others that transcend it and view it from a detached perspective. These 16 major platforms of thought are shown below.

Levels of Thought Directly Impacting Human Life

  1. Stimuli – These are thoughts that your contact with objects in the environment generates. They typically remind you of things you want or things you need to do.
  2. Reactions – These are emotionally laden thoughts that events or things people say trigger in you. These are your issues or “buttons” that express as upset, rage, sadness, or terror.
  3. Dreams or fantasies – This is where you imagine what you want to do, be, or have in your life.
  4. Logic – This is the activity of reason, which operates like a computer—making the calculations for your behavior, analyzing probable outcomes, and assessing the truth or falsity of statements. This aspect of your mind is responsible for reality testing.
  5. Schemas – These are associated thoughts that you organize into categories. These are integrated within the role identities of your ego. For example, if you are a bowler, you have all bowling-related thoughts compartmentalized within the capsule of your “I am a bowler” role.
  6. Task oriented thoughts – This is the activity of your concrete mind, which plans, schedules, identifies key points, and steps to completion of a project.
  7. Conceptual thought – These comprise the problem-solving and conceptual reflection functions of the intellect. You use these intellect’s cognitive strategies to learn, solve problems, and explore ideas.
  8. Emergent thought – These are mental impressions that arise within the present time, which come into conscious awareness—they seem to arise independently from the “thinker.” These enter the Conscious mind through the preconscious portal. They enter the Metaconscious mind in the state of being, where it seems that behavior and decisions happen spontaneously. They arise in the Superconscious mind in the wave of the present time on the Akashic Aether—the Soul’s thought and intention enters human life at this stage. Many process meditation groups, coaches, and metaphysical teachers consider union with the wave of the present time to be the state of enlightenment.

Levels of Thought that Do Not Directly Impact Human Life

  1. Psychic impressions – These images and ideas become impressed on conscious awareness. They arise from your vehicle of consciousness on the Psychic Plane, or they may be channeled from guides or spiritual beings from this Plenum. Typically, you need to enter into an altered state of consciousness—through hypnosis or meditation—to become aware of these thoughts
  2. Voice of wisdom – This marks the emergence of the teacher within, which gives you guidance for your life and answers your questions. This arises from your form on the Wisdom Plane. Your mind has to be silent and receptive to receive this thought stream.
  3. Inspired thoughts – These are revealed truths and insights that arise from your revelatory mind and from the Holy Spirit. You contact this level through contemplating the nucleus of identity of the First Planetary Initiation, the Moon Soul or Christ Child.
  4. Voice of the Mighty I AM Presence – These are decrees that you speak aloud or you hear as “power thoughts” that arise from the Mighty I AM Presence in your form on the Second Planetary Initiation. You must raise your attention to this level to be aware of this thought stream.
  5. Thought ministry – These are the higher mental activities that operate in your Manasic Vortex in the Third Planetary Initiation. These activities include contemplation of seed thoughts, visualizing blueprints for projects and organizations, creating mental synthesis and synergistic cooperation between people, actualizing the gifts of the Soul, enacting Soul Purpose, receiving intuitive guidance from the Masters of the Planetary Hierarchy, and participating in thought ministry through reception and transmission.
  6. Illumined mind – This downpour of intuitive knowledge arises from the Illumined Mind or Buddhi from your vehicle of consciousness in the Fourth Planetary Initiation. It purifies your attitude, reveals truths, uproots ignorance and superstition, shows the content of your vehicles of consciousness and the inner Planes, awakens the abilities of your forms in the Superconscious mind, guides your spirit and attentional principle on the inner Planes, and brings remembrance of your Soul’s essential nature.
  7. Attunement – This is the channeled Light from the Divine Spirit that purifies the inner vehicles of consciousness; promotes physical, etheric, and emotional healing; counsels and guides the attentional principle and spirit; awakens revelation and illumination; and bestows initiation to unfold the spiritual evolutionary potentials of the Soul.
  8. Samadhi – This is the direct, wordless experience of the Soul beyond thought. This confers Soul Realization and Gnosis.

Those that seek to put you into the state of enlightenment will typically ask you to attend to the upwelling of emergent thought in the wave of the present time (level 8). In this state of consciousness, it appears that thoughts arise without a self or a thinker—and that life is just unfolding on its own and the “mind” and its stories are just an overlay upon that perfect state of being.

We suggest it is important for you to become aware of each of the layers of thought and how they impact your life, or how they enable you to view your life from a detached, higher perspective. While it may be productive to do certain aspects of spiritual work from the wave of the present time on the Akashic Aether, we do not recommend that aspirants maintain that state of awareness beyond the time required to perform their process, inquiry, or contemplation; instead, they should ensure they return their attention to their fully grounded awareness again after their meditational inner work is completed.

Those of you who are interested in learning how to access these many layers of thought can acquire specific techniques that allow you to do so in our intermediate meditation programs: the in-person Mudrashram® Master Course in Meditation and the by-mail and online Accelerated Meditation Program.

How Do You Verify Where the Soul Is on the Path?

By George A. Boyd ©2018

Many aspirants and disciples try to figure out where they are on the Path. There are a variety of strategies to ascertain this. These strategies include:

  1. You see your Soul and the track it is on. You delineate the Plane, Subplane, and nodal point where it dwells.
  2. A spiritual being—a Guru, spiritual guide, angel, Ascended Master, or the Holy Spirit—tells you where you are on the Path, and you believe this being.
  3. Your Soul’s discerning intuition tells you where it is on the Path, and you believe what it tells you.
  4. You experience the phenomena associated with a particular Subplane—for example, we describe the content of each Subplane of the Superconscious mind in the Mudrashram® Correspondence Course. You have intuitive insights, or develop spiritual abilities or virtues that are appropriate to that level—this corroborates your intuition about where your Soul is on the Path.
  5. You study each vehicle of consciousness, each Subplane, and each nodal point methodically. As a result, you are able to exactly locate where your Soul is on the Continuum. [The Mudrashram® Correspondence Course gives information about each nodal point, vehicle of consciousness, Subplane, Plane, and Division of the Great Continuum of Consciousness.]
  6. You experience Samadhi, complete union with your Soul. Your Illumined Mind discerns your exact level on the Path.
  7. You use a series of correspondences. You trace the seed atoms of your vehicles of consciousness up to your Soul. You know contextually from these correspondences that you are on a particular location of the Path.

Type one is possible for those aspirants and disciples who have developed clear inner seeing. While it is perhaps the most direct method, if their facility with inner seeing does not permit it, this type is inaccessible to many meditators who have not developed this faculty.

Type two, listening to a spiritual being, potentially introduces some errors. Different spiritual teachers may identify a particular spiritual essence as the core of who you are, and will note the progress of that essence towards its origin. For example:

  • Yogi Preceptors will see you as cosmic consciousness, and will note its progress through the Cosmic Body, relative to Brahman in the brain chakra of this form. They will guide your attention to unite with your cosmic consciousness.
  • Supracosmic Gurus look to the seed atom on their Path, and notes your progress towards the origin of this essence. A Transcendental Path Sat Guru will view your spirit, and notice what portion of the Nadamic channels that you have purified.
  • In Mudrashram®, in contrast, we identify your ensouling entity that is at your cutting edge of spirituality and reveal to you where it is on the Great Continuum of Consciousness.

Type three, your Soul’s intuition, may misinterpret similar themes and phenomena, and wrongly place your location on the Path. For example, the theme of three mountains with a sun behind appears

  • At the top of the Lower Astral Subplane of the Subtle Realm
  • On the bridge between the golden sun at the top of the Wisdom Plane and the doorway to the First Planetary Initiation
  • In the Second Cosmic Initiation, as the veil over the presence of cosmic soul awareness
  • On the Second Transcendental Path, as the abode of the Lord of the Causal Plane
  • On the Seventh Transcendental Path, as one of the stages you encounter when remembering and reuniting attention with Satchitananda

So without contextual understanding of the Great Continuum of Consciousness, and recognition of your cutting edge ensouling entity, your intuition can lead you astray as to where you are on the Path.

Type four, having experiential phenomena characteristic to a particular stage on the Path, can give you clear indicators of where you are on the Path. But like type three, it is subject to the potential error of mistaking the phenomena, abilities, knowledge, or virtues of one Plane for another. For example, the power of levitation, appears:

  • As a special Grace for a Saint in the courts of the Lord in the First Mesoteric Initiation
  • As a power of the Ascended Master in the Second Initiation
  • As a power that the Soul encounters on the Fifth Initiation
  • As a power that is anchored in the Ideational Plane in the First Cosmic Initiation
  • As a power that is released upon attainment of a particular stage on selected Supracosmic or Transcendental Paths

Type five, study of each band of the mind and each vehicle of consciousness, can give you exact knowledge of where the Soul is, but most aspirants and disciples do not have access to the Mudrashram® Correspondence Course, where you perform this methodical vehicle-by-vehicle and level-by-level study.

Type six, entering into Samadhi, is well beyond the proficiency of most beginning meditators. We introduce you to the different levels of Samadhi in our Samadhi Week Program, which those who complete our advanced meditation program, the Mudrashram® Advanced Course in Meditation, are eligible to study.

Type seven, locating the Soul through its reflections on each Plane, requires that you be able to access the seed atom of each vehicle of consciousness your Soul animates and a recognition of where each of these seed atoms dwell in relation to the Soul. This implies that you have a perspective or model that reveals to you that when a seed atom appears in a certain way, it is at a certain level, which indicates your Soul has evolved to a certain stage.

For example, if your Moon Soul or Christ Child nucleus of identity is in the second ring in the Courts of the Lord in the First Mesoteric Initiation, it means your Soul is taking the Second Initiation. This same one-to-one correspondence appears at each vehicle of consciousness, and can be used as a bridge to unite your attention with the Soul, and to also identify where the Soul is on the Path.

We teach this method for identifying seed atoms of each vehicle of consciousness in the Mudrashram® Advanced Course in Meditation. Those without the contextual knowledge of the Great Continuum of Consciousness, however, may not be able to use this method to clearly target where the Soul dwells.

We recommend that you learn about each of these methods and identify one that enables you to track the progress of your Soul reliably. It is possible for you to know beyond a shadow of a doubt where your Soul dwells and the Rays that animate and express your Soul through your personality.