Page 210 - Complete Works of Dr. KCV Volume 1

to pass through four stages. These four stages are described by him in this way.
The first stage is when we feel that the Divine Force pervades all over in the body. The second stage is when we have constant remembrance of its pervading our entire body. The third stage is when we have neither the pervasion nor its remembrance, and the fourth stage is when we feel everything dropping. It is a stage of beyond negation. Now, these four stages we have to pass through at every point. I believe in another work called "Towards Infinity", he describes three states at each point - Saralatha or spontaneity or the free move of Energy of the Divine which is introduced into the heart through Pranahuti. The second stage is Sayujyatha, when we feel, oneness and the third stage is Laya when we are so merged in it that we are not aware of it. Even the awareness passes away and at that stage, we gather sufficient power to move towards the next centre. So, the fourth stage is when we feel that we are leaving the point which we have now experienced and move towards the next. The 'gone-ness-feeling' is due to this leaving the previous point and we can go to the next one. This is what he has now added in the latest volume. It was not mentioned so clearly in the work "Towards Infinity".
These four stages occur at each point. That is why the Abhyasis feel that they are progressing and suddenly everything seems to be lost. They feel, as it were, they are going backwards. Or, what they have got, has been lost. Now it is not so, if we understand these four stages, it only shows that we are moving towards the next point, and at the next point we find the same feeling or sensation of Divine Force entering and pervading as from that point. Each point has a particular and peculiar experience about it. We find gradually that we become lighter and lighter. Sometimes we do feel colours about the place. The first one like yellowish and second one as white, the third one as red, the fourth one as black or dark. Now Master says we feel a kind of shadowy darkness just before we go to the Ajna Chakra or when we pass from the world of Maya or the sphere of Maya to the world of Brahma or Brahmanda or Mind. The Mind Region then is called Brahmanda. Mind becomes wider at this stage. Mind which is particularized at the earlier stage becomes vaster at this stage. We become expanded. In other words, the sense of expansion only will be felt at the stage and many people think