Understanding the Existence of and Interaction With the Higher Ranges of Consciousness Above the Mind

Just as all energy operates along a spectrum of vibration from shorter wavelength to longer wavelength, and this spectrum can be perceived within certain limited ranges based on the capacity of our sense instruments (or tools we develop to extend our range of perception), so also consciousness operates also along a spectrum with different and increasing powers of consciousness active starting from the most dense, inert material consciousness, extending up through the vital levels and into the emotional and mental levels. Consciousness however does not stop at the mental level. The spectrum continues beyond. The energy centers, called ‘chakras’ are areas where certain vibrational levels of energy and consciousness are interfaced to our human mind-life-body complex. The higher mental levels of cognition take place in what are called the fifth, sixth and seventh chakras governing expression, will, and the higher powers of the reasoning intelligence. It is clear that there must be a nexus where the yet higher levels of consciousness vibrate and can be collected and channeled, and thus, there are levels above the mind where these things occur. Under various states of awareness, the seeker is actually able to interface and experience these higher realms, either in their native state through a capacity to receive the higher vibrational force, or in their impact as they exert their pressure on the lower states that are within our normal range of perception.

Just as we can identify different levels and states of awareness within the human range, so also, in the higher ranges there are gradations and levels that successively bring into action ever more powerful levels of consciousness.

Sri Aurobindo notes: “…there is a superconscient (something above our present consciousness) above the head from which the higher consciousness comes down into the body….”

“The higher consciousness is that above the ordinary mind and different from it in its workings; it ranges from higher mind through illumined mind, intuition and overmind up to the border line of the supramental.”

“In this higher consciousness there are many degrees, of which the supramental is the summit or the source.”

“There are above us… successive states, levels or graded powers of being overtopping our normal mind, hidden in our own superconscient parts, higher ranges of Mind, degrees of spiritual consciousness and experience; without them there would be no links, no helpful intervening spaces to make the immense ascension possible. It is indeed from these higher sources that the secret spiritual Power acts upon the being and by its pressure brings about the psychic transformation or the spiritual change; but in the early stages of our growth this action is not apparent, it remains occult and unseizable.”

“… from the point of view of the ascent of consciousness from our mind upwards through a rising series of dynamic powers by which it can sublimate itself, the gradation can be resolved into a stairway of four main ascents, each with its high level of fulfilment. These gradations may be summarily described as a series of sublimations of the consciousness through Higher Mind, Illumined Mind and Intuition into Overmind and beyond it; there is a succession of self-transmutations at the summit of which lies the Supermind or Divine Gnosis.”

Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, Our Many Selves: Practical Yogic Psychology, Chapter 2, Planes and Parts of the Being, pp. 71-72