ENERGY STATE

 
To dwell in Nirvikalpa Samadhi is to experience the God state, in which the soul knows itself to be God because it has shed all the limiting factors that had hitherto contributed toward false self-knowledge. The God state of the Siddha stands out in clear contrast with the body state of the worldly.

The worldly individual takes himself to be the body and dwells in a state dominated by the body and its wants. His consciousness centers on the body. He is concerned with eating, drinking, sleeping, and the satisfaction of other bodily desires. It is for the body that he lives and seeks fulfillment. His consciousness cannot extend beyond the body; he thinks in terms of the body and cannot conceive of anything that has no body or form. The entire sphere of his existence is comprised of forms, and the theater in which he lives and moves and has his being consists of space.

The first step toward the God state of Nirvikalpa Samadhi is taken when the body state is transcended. Shedding the body state means entering the sphere of existence comprised of energy. The soul then dwells in a state that is no longer dominated by forms or bodies. It is lifted up to the domain of energy.

Body or form is a solidification of energy, and to rise from the world of forms to the sphere of energy amounts to an advance toward a more primary and purer state of being. The energy state is free from many of the limitations that obtain in the world of forms. In this state, consciousness is linked with energy and continuously vibrates in and through energy.

In the energy state, the eating and drinking of the body state are paralleled by the absorption and assimilation of energy. At this level the soul acquires full control over energy and seeks fulfillment through its use. But its actions are still within the domain of spiritual limitation. It can see, hear, and smell many things that are inaccessible in the body state, and can perform many feats (for example, producing light in the dark or living for innumerable years only on energy), which seem to be miracles for those who are in the body state. The entire sphere of the soul's existence is comprised of energy and is dominated by energy. All that it can conceive of or do is in terms of energy and is achieved by means of energy.

The energy state is the state of spiritually advanced souls; but it is far from being the state of Perfection, which expresses itself through the Nirvikalpa Samadhi of the Siddha.