Process of Conductivity and the Stages of Ascent
October 11, 1983 Adi Da Samraj
unedited and unpublished notes
Adi Da Samraj: Another point I wanted to make, the other day I was talking to you about the process of conductivity and the stages of ascent and passing through the various lights and astral planes and so forth to nirvakalpa and then returning with the life current to the right side of the heart, the life current and attention. Discovering that which is beyond the knot in the heart.
I thought I should mention to you why in certain passages in the Teaching I have indicated that the third eye position is not really gone beyond until the seventh stage of life. There may be yogis in the fifth stage of life who move with attention and energy through and beyond the ajna center and attain nirvakalpa samadhi. It’s simply that the position of the third eye or the position of the individuated nervous system is not fully transcended until the atman or separate self-sense is transcended via the penetration of the knot in the right side of the heart.
So only passage beyond, apparently beyond the third eye, beyond the nervous system and so forth that may occur through the yogic exercise in fifth stage terms is not fully a passage beyond the conditional personality and the conditional nervous system. It is only so experientially and to some degree but it is not so really because the self-contraction, the root of attention has not itself been transcended.
So even though nirvakalpa may be attained in the fifth stage it is a conditional realization that is basically built upon the self contraction and is part of the strategy of the individuated self or the ego to achieve a state of sublimity. Ultimately, then, the current must return to the right side of the heart. Attention must return there and the origin, the root origin, the Transcendental Self, must be realized. And then in the seventh stage of life there also is this continued circulation of the Living Current and through the process of recognition it tends more and more to be magnified in its upward direction.
There is a stage of indifference in which the animation of this body-mind becomes relaxed and the beginnings of the translation stage begin. And so the seventh stage of life is associated with the ascent of the Life Current as well as its descent. And ultimately with the ascent of the life current in the stage of translation but it really is the perfect ascent of the life current because it’s not rooted in the self-contraction or the self knot. It is simply a motion of the life current that occurs in the demonstrations of enlightenment in the seventh stage of life free of the self knot or the ego. So is all that clear? (Yes.)
I also mentioned cases of nirvakalpa samadhi in my own case early in life. The evidence of nirvakalpa most primarily in my life prior to the incident in 1968 was in my very early childhood. Although there were experiences now and then that perhaps would qualify as a state of nirvakalpa. Primarily in the early stage of my life, my very early childhood I was naturally in a state of nirvakalpa samadhi and didn’t come down very much.
There was a moment in which I did come down as I’ve described to you when I was in Mrs. Far’s house. And that was a moment of coming down out of nirvakalpa, having been in that state, associated with the body much like I am exalted drinking chung with you all and forget everything or not moving my full attention into this body-mind. The very early years of my childhood were years of nirvakalpa, not of coming down. There’s not really any significant memory in those years and so on. But then about 2 1/2 years old, however old I was exactly, I did come down and very concretely was aware of coming down, being aware of the setting and so on. And from that point I also began to accept the limitations of being down, of being here or being in this condition. And so from that point I began to work with this body-mind and did the sadhana of the body-mind. So that’s what began the tour of my spiritual life culminating in the Vedanta Temple. And there was not a completely loss of realization. But realization, if you can have a feeling for it at all, was receded into the background of the body-mind itself. The commitment was to the body-mind, to awaken in the context of the body-mind.
There were many moments of breaking through long before I was associated with teachers. Full breaking through and therefore some of those experiences had the quality of nirvakalpa and certainly sahaj samadhi. Full realization. And there are satoris. So this breakthrough was also very frequent all throughout all of those years culminating in the Vedanta Temple. At which time there no longer was any impediment or from which time there never has been any impediment represented by this body-mind.
So this state presently is the state of sahaj or nirvakalpa. It is the same as nirvakalpa without the slightest noticing of conditional existence, but all these conditions are arising totally recognizable without the slightest loss of realization and without realization being presently merely in the background. It is present as the body-mind spontaneously and freely.