f the mind can become fully awake for short periods of time, as it does in Transcendental Consciousness, can it remain fully awake permanently? The answer is: it can. And with repeated transcending, it does.

Gradually, with regular experience of Transcendental Consciousness through the TM technique, the mind and body become accustomed to this style of functioning. One spontaneously maintains unbounded awareness, the fully expanded state of mind, at all times, along with waking, dreaming, and sleeping. The physiology becomes free of stress, and brain functioning remains integrated throughout the day.

The fourth state of consciousness, Transcendental Consciousness, which we experience during the TM technique, forms the gateway to higher states. With regular experience of the fourth state, the three higher states develop naturally. To the fifth, sixth, and seventh states of consciousness, Maharishi gave the names Cosmic Consciousness, Refined Cosmic Consciousness or God Consciousness, and Unity Consciousness.

Each state of consciousness is a progressive stage of awakening, of enlightenment. Each opens a distinctive new world of experience and knowledge, as different from the waking state as waking is from dreaming. And each has a corresponding style of physiological functioning, a unique physiological signature.

If the idea of higher states of consciousness seems abstract, the benefits are concrete and immensely practical. The Transcendental Meditation program has been utilized in schools and universities, boardrooms and factories, substance abuse clinics and prisons, as well as homes for the elderly and programs for veterans with post-traumatic stress. In all settings, the simple experience of daily transcending has produced breakthrough results.

But these results are merely byproducts of the technique’s ultimate purpose: to cultivate higher states of consciousness—enlightenment.

Scientific studies have detailed the cumulative effects of Transcendental Meditation practice. Regular transcending triggers a remarkable growth process encompassing every area of life. The benefits, including increased intelligence and creativity, improved health, balanced personality development, and improved relationships, are often unprecedented.

Human development levels off in adolescence, as shown in measures of intelligence, field independence, moral maturity, and ego development. But regular transcending through the TM program expands consciousness, integrates brain functioning, and promotes human development even after it has plateaued.

For example, intelligence (IQ) grows during childhood, then typically levels off in adolescence, around the same time physical growth plateaus, with a slow decline beginning around age 26. But with regular experience of transcending, intelligence resumes growing, regardless of age, indicating that the “freezing” of growth in adolescence can be “unfrozen” and that human development need not stop.

The same is true of moral maturity, field independence, and ego development, all of them profound measures of personal growth: All level off in adolescence, but all resume their growth with regular TM practice.

The TM technique is widely appreciated as an effective means of reducing stress, but what we are seeing here goes far beyond relaxation and stress release. We are looking at a fundamental activation of human growth, especially of our higher human capacities.

From the mid-1950s forward, as increasing numbers of people around the world started practicing the Transcendental Meditation technique and experiencing Transcendental Consciousness, they began describing exalted experiences outside of meditation as well.

In response to these experiences, Maharishi brought to light a clear, complete, and systematic understanding of human development. In hundreds of videotaped lectures and discussions, he described the nature and dynamics of higher states of consciousness. He also described higher states in a number of books, including the Science of Being and Art of Living and Maharishi Mahesh Yogi on the Bhagavad­ Gita: A Translation and Commentary, Chapters 1–6.

For most psychologists, the “endpoint” of mental growth, the highest level of cognitive development adults can reach, occurs in adolescence, when we gain the ability to think logically and abstractly—although as many as 60 percent of adults have not reached this stage. We may continue to change after adolescence, refining or extending capacities we have already developed, but no major growth beyond this final stage is commonly acknowledged.

But in the Vedic understanding of human potential that Maharishi brought to light, the common “adult” level of growth is only the starting point. Complete human development involves growth through a series of higher states of consciousness. Maharishi’s model comprises seven states of consciousness altogether, of which waking, dreaming, and deep sleep are but the first three.

When we sleep and when we dream, our bodies rest. But the apparent inertia is deceptive, as body and brain perform thousands of processes and adjustments, our biochemistry changes, our brain waves change according to whether we are asleep or asleep-and-dreaming, and the brain executes a kind of file management, sorting experiences into cognitive “file cabinets” of long- or short-term memory, or in some instances to be essentially deposited in the “trash” bin. Most of our sleep time (about 75 percent), is spent in deep, non-REM [rapid eye movement] sleep; the rest is dreamtime. [In sleep,] metabolism slows; temperature, blood pressure, and breathing rate decrease; muscles relax and become inactive. While dreaming, all these functions sometimes speed up again to correspond with what is happening in the dream, but the overall trend is for rest.

When we are awake, our senses are alive; we experience people and things that we knew before we went to sleep, and they “reappear” more or less the same. We have a baseline sense of who and what we are and of objects and unfolding events in our awareness. These objects can be the apparently solid, concrete items apprehended by the senses, or they can be thoughts, memories, plans, or entirely imaginary phenomena.

There is always something taking our attention. In the waking state of consciousness, we are always identifying our awareness with something: an object, a thought, a feeling, a process; and all of our Self is caught up in experiencing these phenomena. You look at a flower, and it’s the flower which captures your consciousness. . . .The Observer is lost in the experience of objects as if the observer is obliterated, overshadowed, or annihilated by the experience of an object . . . The eighteenth-century Scottish philosopher David Hume poignantly described this condition:

“When I enter most intimately into what I call myself, I always stumble on some particular perception or other, of heat or cold, light or shade, love or hatred, pain or pleasure. I never can catch myself at any time without a perception, and can never observe anything but the perception.” —David Hume

Because most people encounter exactly what Hume described when they look within themselves, the assumption has been made by most people that there is nothing else. This is a huge mistake. The mind is like an ocean, with thoughts as waves on its surface. The deeper you dive in the ocean of the mind, the quieter and more settled it becomes. The busy, object- and event-filled realm of the mind in the waking state is like swimming on the surface; far greater richness lies within. Nevertheless, what comments such as Hume’s effectively show us is that something different than just thinking needs to be done to experience Pure Consciousness.

Let’s start our exploration and analysis from the state of least consciousness, the inertia of deep sleep, and proceed through levels of increasing wakefulness to the fully awakened state of complete enlightenment.

We are all familiar with being awake, asleep, and dreaming. It’s about as fundamental an aspect of our lives as anything could be, and science has quite a thorough grasp of what goes on in our bodies and brains during these states.

Subjectively, when we are asleep, we have no experience of anything; there is no perception at all, no thinking, no sensory awareness—nothing. Physiologically, myriad processes of healing, refreshment, and rejuvenation are going on, but from the standpoint of Consciousness, there’s not much to talk about.

When we dream, we experience an often fantastical reality that could take us anywhere. Probably the most common term to describe the dream state is that it is “illusory”—from the perspective of physical reality, what happens in the dream state is simply unreal. Anything can happen. We may be exploring the surface of Mars, a tiger may be about to pounce, some thwarted waking-state desire may be getting fulfilled, but then we wake up and we say, “It was just a dream. It wasn’t real.” It had its own reality in the dream state, but that reality is different from the reality both of deep sleep, where nothing is happening, and the wakeful state. It is not transferable. That is, it takes a dream-state weapon to stop the pouncing dream-state tiger; a “real” rifle will not help, nor would a dream-state rifle avail for a real-world tiger.

Each state of consciousness is its own universe with its own rules. Or, as Maharishi used to emphasize, “Reality is different in different states of consciousness.”

A central pillar of Maharishi’s comprehensive system of thought, which he called Maharishi Vedic Science, is a framework that offers clear definitions of each of seven states of Consciousness, as well as the procedures and practices that promote growth from one higher state to another. We will examine each of the seven states over the course of the next several chapters, but they are listed here for clarity:

1.     Deep Sleep
2.     Dream
3.     Waking
4.     The Transcendental State
5.     Cosmic Consciousness
6.     Glorified Cosmic Consciousness or God Consciousness
7.     Unity Consciousness

One interesting way to think about the progressive unfoldment of Consciousness is in terms of the degree to which the object-value of awareness and attention predominates in a person’s experience, versus how much the subjective side—the observer—remains present and is not forgotten as one is experiencing a specific object. Keep this in mind as we discuss each of the seven states.

In everyday life, people routinely speak of a “career path” (or “career track”) typically starting with formal education and advancing through various jobs and training toward positions of greater responsibility, influence, and compensation. Others speak of being on a “spiritual path,” which also entails growth from an elementary level of insights and practices to ever richer apprehension of spiritual values. In truth, whatever we choose to call it, we are all on a path of living, a distinctly unique individual track on which we travel or make our way through the complex, sometimes enormously confusing and even confounding abundance of life in the world.

Admittedly, some tracks are narrow, with rigid boundaries of beliefs about what is possible, what is right and acceptable, what is healthy, and so on, while some other paths are more open, unrestricted, and inclusive. The process of individual human evolution takes a person from the limitations of largely egocentric thought and behavior to a more universal, generous, and generative connection with life as awareness expands to appreciate and incorporate what we are calling Singularity. This growth takes place in the stages known as higher states of Consciousness that I have been describing over the course of the last three chapters.

Most, if not all, genuine education produces this broadening, deepening effect. “Formal” education aims for it directly, but the education we gain through travel, relationships, work, and reflection on our experiences are often even more invaluable to our personal development and our capacity to understand the world as well as our fellow humankind. These factors may (and should) change our perceptions by expanding the wisdom that comes from the constant and steady intellectual and emotional growth that can (and should) evolve in us through age and experience.

Could we, as humans stay the same? No, today you are not the same as you were yesterday. Perhaps you learned something, encountered someone or something that has opened your eyes to new possibilities or uplifted your spirit, given you new information or renewed hope. . . . Your vision has changed. The color of your glasses has been, so to speak, modified, or cleared, or transformed in what we would consider a “positive” direction. Nor is the world ever the same, because you are here. The Greek philosopher Heraclitus is famous for saying that one may never step in the same river twice; yet by stepping in the stream, you yourself have actually changed it. Your existence and your thoughts and activity have altered the continuous currents and eddies of the river waters as they flow downstream.

Overall, it is within the range of possibility for any human being to rise to higher states of Consciousness. The journey of evolving into higher states is not strictly for certain “special” people—it is the birthright of every person born in a human body. Growth is natural to life. The fastest way to strengthen the ability to experience Singularity is by favoring experiences of greater and greater wholeness. By fathoming the field of Pure Consciousness or Singularity, Consciousness itself becomes more and more what we experience and know ourselves to be. That this results in growth towards higher states of Consciousness is not theoretical, but has been the experience of millions of people around the world.

Of course, it is another state of Consciousness, but not just another state of Consciousness in which we have just another perspective. Consistent with our theory that Consciousness is all there is, and as a necessary corollary of that theory, we’re going to say that Unity Consciousness, far from being just another way to see the self and the objects of perception, is the way to see allthings in existence. It is the only truth about existence or reality itself. All the other truths are relative, and they are valid in their own domains. They are belief systems, based on limited perception. You can have different limited perceptions of reality, one more expanded than another, and another more glorious than the first, and another so absolutely glorious that it is divine, and we call it God Consciousness. Yet each is relative, an incomplete state of Consciousness from which to view the world.

The one state of Consciousness that is absolutely true in terms of how things actually are is Unity Consciousness. You never know Reality as it truly is until you are in Unity Consciousness. All the other states of consciousness are kinds of perceptions, styles of functioning of your nervous system, modes of experiencing that do convey a more complete assessment of the full range of how things are at every step of growth. But you only come to the true, all-inclusive Reality in Unity Consciousness.

In the process of transcending, the ever-active mind settles, quiets down, and then slips beyond the boundaries of thought and perception, yet remains awake within itself. This pure wakefulness, awareness without an object other than itself, the unified state of Observer, Observed, and process of Observation, is our essential nature, our Self. It becomes accessible to us when we transcend, and we find that always-existent, unbounded, pure Being that is our Self, nonchanging, always equal to itself irrespective of time and space.

What is it like to experience Unity Consciousness? The following descriptions from practitioners of the TM program provide glimpses of this state of consciousness:

“Every day I have the experience of ‘I am Totality’ in my program. This is how I feel quite often during regular activity too. This ‘I am Totality’ isn’t just a program thing. It’s a walking-in-the-woods thing, an eating-lunch thing, and a driving-to-the-store thing. It is seeping into my daily life. This is so close to what I have always thought of as a Unity experience. I think my consciousness is changing—I feel it, I see it, and I know it.” —P.L.

“I see that I am everywhere, that my consciousness is everywhere and everything.” —I.G.

“Consistently at the end of the program, point and whole merge. I am aware of a specific object, but I see it as full, unbounded—even though filled with structure. The point does not disappear; it is only in the background. The attention can go into the boundary, but what predominates is wholeness. The specific object is as if a memory in the field of wholeness.” —F.T.

Throughout history, individuals have had experiences of this state of Unity. Here a few descriptions of this exalted state.“I found myself spreading everywhere and identical with a kind of ‘Space’ that embraced not merely the visible forms and worlds, but all modes and qualities of consciousness as well,” wrote the twentieth-century American mathematician and philosopher, Franklin Merrell-Wolff. “That totality was, and is, not other than myself.” Merrell-Wolff described his awakening to higher states of awareness in several books, including The Philosophy of Consciousness without an Object: Reflections on the Nature of Transcendental Consciousness, and Pathways through to Space, which lay out, albeit in his own terms, a process of unfoldment similar to the advanced stages of Consciousness described by Maharishi.