An Examination of Three States of Consciousness (Avasthātraya): The Advaita Vedānta Method of Self-Realization

The paper seeks to give a textual exposition of the nature of Self as given in the Māṇḍūkyakārikā which is unraveled through a rigorous investigation/examination of the three states of consciousness universally experienced by all human beings, namely wakeful (jāgrat), dream (svapna), and deep sleep (suṣupti). The methodology exhibits that the Self is non-dual, continuous, the metaphysical substratum, and the pure witness of the cyclic manifestations, alternations, and displacements of three states of consciousness (avasthātraya). The seminal text unfolds the nature of the Self as unattached to the three states and remains unaffected by them. While the waking, dreaming, or sleeping jīva negotiates between the fluctuating continuum of the states, the Self, the Fourth that is the source, support, and resolution of jīvatva stands immutable. This is corroborated by the jīva’s innate ability to recall the experience of being asleep/dreaming spontaneously and its irrefutable experience of a particular jīvatva. The absolute certainty the “I” that woke up is the same “I” that was asleep/dreaming. The same ātman is present in all three states of awareness and is absolutely non-relational, even though it appears enmeshed with the perceived gross or subtle objects of the waking and dream states. The text emphasizes that the three states are imagined and projected in dualistic relationships to transmit knowledge of the non-dual Turīya. When the supreme Knowledge is realized and the jīva is “awakened” from profound ignorance, then the epistemic triad has no further purpose. At this moment, all the dualistic relationships as well as all the categories of dualisms and duality itself extemporaneously, instantaneously, and simultaneously cease to exist (jñāte dvaitam nā vidyate).