There is only one mind. Each ego, each ‘I’ is itself an idea in soul /Ataman

Ultimately there is no death when one can look so on all the three states as being Ataman in their substance. It is thus that the seeker of truth conquers death, thus he sees the three states in Ataman, hence true self as Ataman/soul.

 The purpose of illness and suffering is the same as the purpose of death. They teach men that everything is in flux, vanishing and transient: in the past, one was strong and healthy; today he is weak, ill, and suffering. What became of his health? It is the same problem of as what became of the faded colour of a rose. The lesson of all three states is transiency, of all illness, is that the body is only an idea. 

What we find to be unreal and changing is still an idea and therefore Mind in the end. Thus converting the world into unreality is a necessary half-stage to converting it to Reality. However, it is only a stage and we should not stop there.

      How do you know that self is not the body?

 1. It is seen by the soul/self as an object.

2. It has all the characteristics of seen, i.e. it is changing gradually and self is seeing the changes.

All talk of illusion is only a tentative position. It is for those who cannot think of Mind by itself, who cannot detach Formless Witness from the seen. In truth, however, illusion is mere an idea, and ideas are only Mind. 

Instrument of knowledge means the sense organs, both external and internal which are only for the knowledge of the three states. Reason is an instrument on the other hand for applying negating the three states [unreal] from the formless witness [real] and getting the knowledge of Atman.

Constant change is everywhere in the three states. Waking/dream spring up and disappear. People who believe that by some effort in Yogic Samadhi one got freedom, trying to introduce a new thing which having a beginning must have an end.

Production and destruction go together. Therefore Yogic freedom   is not true liberation. Not by doing anything can lasting permanent liberation be realized. Similarly the endlessness of the soul in religion is illusory: only the formless witness of the three states is endless in the sense that we cannot truthfully speak of its appearing and disappearing. 

So long as one thinks at all, he has to think causally, temporally and spatially. It is the way in which intellect works. And it is so constituted as to produce the appearance of materiality. The waking/dream is like the deception of the movie show, passing before us with height, breadth, and motion etc. And the deep sleep is like intermission.  Hence one gets bound by

Ever-changing flux of pictures is a movie-show [three states] which must have a screen. Motion is illusory in the sense that it also is only part of mirage.  Seeker should not think that the forms within the mirage running from one place to another. 

Temporarily suppressing the ego, this is another aid which is derived from Yogic practice. With Such suppression it is impossible to acquire non dual wisdom. What the yogi does not understand is that while he talks of experiencing bliss in trance, he reveals the presence of an ego which is the experiencer.  Whatever based on the ego keeps one in the realm of duality.

To transcend bliss and to transcend trance, one must out of ego. Egocentricity is the common psychological state. There is only one mind. Each ego, each ‘I’ is itself an idea in soul /Ataman. This explains how personal separateness is an illusion. 

Illusion is that, when one knows the unreality of a thing only when it disappears.

One does not perceive an object as it really is in truth, but only as it appears through the screen of imagination.

 Illusion is  that, when  one knows the unreality of a thing only when it disappears. When one knows these three states are continuously appearing and disappearing, he may perceive its unreality. As one goes deeper inquiry he becomes aware the consciousness is in process of changing every moment, to moment. 

Death is but an idea within the waking or dream. It is connected with the body of the waking or dream. Waking or dream comes and goes. But that which sees the birth, life and death within the waking/dream is the Atman, the true self. The true self is immortal.

Knowledge does not destroy the world with in the waking; it only destroys its unreality—because everything is Atman.

 Knowledge of the dream world, which does not destroy the dream world; it shows that everything is mental or unreal.

Because of one’s attachment to the body, and his identification with it, he does not   feel this waking to be unreal. Not having inquired one is unaware of the fact that the body and the world are within the waking or dream and waking or dream are of constantly changing in their nature. One has to take the Witness-attitude to see the three states as fleeting appearance. 

Waking experience is continuously presenting with changing conditions. Whatever is within the waking experience may appear to be real and existent. It is a mistake to think that mental creations are seen to be unreal and non-existent. 

One knows most intimately and directly of his waking experience; whatever seen, known, believed, experienced of the world are within the waking experience. One is first aware of the existence of his body and the world in waking experience. 

People mistake and have impression that how can external world be illusion, when they are experiencing it.  They say they are born and living and they are going to die in it.  Suppose one is born, living and going to die in dream world, which is as real as the waking world, he will find it as reality until waking takes place.  Same way the waking world in which man exits is reality until wisdom dawns. One can call it illusion only when the non dual wisdom dawns. Until then he experiences the duality as reality.

 The world does exist as reality, but it exits within the waking or dream. But the existence of waking or dream is mental. The waking is illusion on the standpoint of its formless witness or soul. 

As nobody has ever seen the beginning of the three states, nobody can ever see its end, and hence it cannot be mortal. This does not refer to things in the waking or dream, those one does see have a beginning and an end; it refers to the waking or dream as a whole.

The idea of time is within the waking or dream; of seeing this at one time and that at another; time does not touch the perceiver. It is mirage. 

It is impossible to get to the knower, the formless witness, before it is understood that the three states are mere mirage.

The Atman itself is the Formless Witness: it can never be seen. One knows nothing of it directly.  The three states come and mind goes; they do not really exist. Nothing external to the formless witness exists. The three states come and goes are external to the Formless witness.  That which saw knows this is the real self: the Formless Witness; the rest is mirage. To perceive this requires a special sharpness and receptiveness. 

Non duality is of the nature of the essence of the self or soul. The ego or physical self dies daily in dream: because change identities there, as present, or billionaire and in deep sleep. The ego of childhood is dead too; thus ego changes constantly, and yet one mistake it for a reality, that which perceives the ego is the unborn, the unchanging reality. 

The three states is what the self knows, what it perceive; perceiver is distinct: three states  is an object; self is not an experience or state.

v  “What is self?"

 The self, the soul or  Atman, is  pure knowing.” When there is a duality, doubt comes. And so long as a man thinks there is a second thing to be obtained, he can never be happy because the duality is always there. The Gnani, on the other hand, regards nothing as different, i.e. as a second thing, and therefore escapes experiencing the duality as reality. 

The experience of the pain and pleasure are within the waking or dream, but the witness of the three states does not disappear, for that which is called soul or Atman, uncuttable, indestructible. It is infinite because one cannot say where it begins or ends. It is immortal, because one has never seen it die.

The earliest ancients used the word ‘I’ to the witness of the three states not to the ego as moderns use it and think the ‘I’ without the body is self. The seeker has to understand the fact that the fact that ‘i’ is not the self but the witness of the ‘I’ is the true self, which is eternal. 

People think that the ‘soul’ or ‘spirit’ is something different from the mind. They believe that the mind is really two. This is the confusion among religionists and intellectuals. If ‘Soul’ has any meaning, if ‘spirit’ has any meaning, so long as one thinks of them, they are merely ideas. No, Mind is the highest: it is consciousness, non dual wisdom.

The individual is a bundle of memories, desires within the waking or dream. The memories and desires are part of the duality. Therefore the individual self is entirely part and parcel of the mirage. Peoples ideas of that they will go to some world after death, some astral plane or religious heavens will disappear as nonsense with the disappearance of belief in the reality of the ‘I’. 

v  WHAT IS ‘I’?

 The ‘I’ disappears as deep sleep, so what is the use of being attached to it? It is illusory. 

Atman is that which knows the appearance and disappearance of the three states, that which sees. Atman alone remains after one gets rid of the experience of duality. Atman is the formless witness or seer, until it is realized. It becomes non dual only after inquiry and reasoning on the true base. 

That which becomes conscious of all the things contained in consciousness, is the seer, the Atman, the Knower. No one has ever seen the Atman, for it is never an object. Hence logic, inference, cannot be applied to it, because intellect, logic is for objective world and waking experience only, in the realm of truth effects from causes.

The greatest mistake is to think of the ego as soul , the innermost self, to confuse the object with the subject. There is no proof that the seer is confined to the individual and individual experiences, it is universal.  People wrongly think that the ego is the Witness, even though the ego vanishing every minute. 

What is meant by birth, appearance or arisal? It can only be applied to waking/dream. That to which such words cannot be applied is the Formless Witness. It is the only thing known that does not vanish. For this reason it is “the unborn.”

 Everything that is seen, everything that is known, is only the soul, because the formless substance and witness of the seen and known is the formless soul. Therefore all things are really unborn, uncreated.

 Once one understands the ego, he will have understood most of the non dual truth. One must learn that the ego is different from the soul, the innermost self.  Homogeneity is the natural condition of the soul. Through ignorance one creates disassociation within it. The first dissociation is the ‘I’. 

The true “self" or soul is different from “mind or ’I’, because when the mind or ’I’ is present then the experience of duality is there.  Absent of ‘I’ is absent of experience of duality.  Thus the duality is not the self, because the self is not an entity or identity within the experience of duality. The self is the formless substance and witness of the mind or ’I’.

Mind is in the form of  the waking or dream.  In waking or dream there is objective awareness; thus mind or ’I’ is objective awareness. One can say all the people are in each others waking or dream; the idea of is only in waking or dream. No idea is permanent, not even the God idea, because they are part of the impermanent state of waking or dream. There is no connection between the Witness and the Ego which appears and disappears, is pain and pleasure, which the Witness sees. The witnessing consciousness remains unconcerned. 

The multiplicity of individuals and things; are possible within the waking/dream: It would be mad to deny that they do not exist. But their existence is unreal their nature.  The illustration is the dream, the dream remains as reality until the waking takes place.   Same waking remains as reality till one overcomes the ignorance of the true self. 

What is meant by each existence? What has become of the vanished or changed individuality of each existence? What has become of the childhood and youth of an individual once was?" When one is superficial and fond of imagining, he can say what he likes, but when he goes deeper in inquiry, analysis and reasoning on the base of the soul as self, he sees that experience of diversity is not what it seems. 

How did ignorance come into the soul? It is difficult to grasp at the beginning. It is the incapacity, the dullness, of the mind to understand it. But when the seeking mind gets clear, then it "grasps" the Truth. Hence the inability to see is not in the perceiver, but there is something which comes and goes (three states), which hides and prevents one from "seeing." This "three states" is like a veil.

The path of religion, path of yoga and the path of wisdom were intended for different classes of people. The non dual wisdom is for the advanced seekers of truth. It deals with the nature of the ultimate Truth and Reality. It is meant for superior aspirants who have inner urge to know the truth, and it is not for those who are immersed in earthly desires. 

There is nothing else but Atman.’ Atman is the Absolute Existence. Atman is the Absolute Knowledge. Atman alone is real. The three states are not real. The Brahman and Atman are one. The ultimate and the Absolute Truth is the Self or soul, which is one though appearing as many in different individuals. The individual has no reality. Only the Self or soul is real; the rest, mental and physical are but passing appearances.

No one knows where the waking or dream comes from. No creator who put them in people’s minds is indicated or provable. We can only infer that they must have come from the Formless Witness, the Atman, itself. No other explanation is rational. But this explanation is only a preliminary stop and is dropped ultimately with the dropping of the Formless Witness, three states relation, when one becomes aware of the fact that, there is no non-causality, the question itself falls to the ground. 

It is not enough to know that the three states are mere mirage. They ought to also know that the ego also is part of the mirage; the physical body is also is a mirage. This is even more important which many have not been able to grasp. Thus the ‘ego’ is an idea within the waking or dream which is mere mirage. 

Seeker of truth should not make the mistake of thinking that because the three states are mere mirage, and he is apart from the mirage. He is included in the mirage. There is no ‘I’ where this is seen. Whoever tried to escape from this mistake but fall into error of ascribing world to God's mind, by not realizing the fact that, that God also is part of the mirage. Hence the three states are not man’s experience, but it is of the soul, which is the true self.

Nobody has ever seen God imagining the world-idea, thus bringing it into existence in one’s mind. Then who must be the imaginer of man’s objective ideas, when ideas are possible only within the waking or dream. Man and his imagination are individual experiences within the waking or dream. Thus the author of the waking/dream is the formless witness, which is the true self, because waking or dream appears and disappears to the true self or soul. Atman or soul generates, sees the waking or dream.

The ego, physical body and the world arise at the same time but within the waking/dream one feel they are independent. Since the whole waking or dream experiences created out of single substance, they are not independent in reality. However one cannot see the objects within the waking or dream as apart from each other unless the ego is present. Hence one thinks that ego rises first. In any case the world, physical body and ego-all are not independent each other.  But only on standpoint of ego as self, the diversity is felt and duality becomes reality. On the standpoint of Atman as self there is no diversity of any kind at all.

Yogi thinks, “He want to know Atman, he wants to attain Union.” So he has the ego and cannot attain. Whereas the first thing in pursuit of truth is to inquire the ‘I’, and discovering and realizing the fact that ‘I’ is not the self. Until its illusory nature is perceived and the seeker no longer says "he wants to attain Atman.

The seeker has to realize the fact that, it is impossible to get self-knowledge on the base of ‘I’, which is not the self. The ‘I’ which is mind, appears and disappears as waking or dream and becomes unreal on inquiry and reasoning on the true base.” 

Yoga lulls the ego to sleep but it will reappear when the practice is ended. The only way to overcome the ego is to inquire into it. When one realizes that the go is part of the illusory waking or dream is only waking or dream is mere mirage it will then lose its power over him.

 The knowledge of formless witness itself is non dual wisdom; it is quite erroneous to say it has wisdom. The distinction between objects and the knower is produced by the formless witness which is Atman or self. 

Every thought and form is an object within the object(waking or dream). Atman the true self cannot be cognized by any thought, which is beyond all doubt, because it is the ultimate consciousness of the waking or dream experiences that is Atman. 

Atman is the substratum of the three states: the waking or dream which one experiences in the Atman or soul has no real existence. It is only mirage. The next step is then only "What is the Atman ". It is also one’s imagination within the experience of duality. Duality is only a superimposition on the soul or self.

v  Who knows the three states?

The soul/self knows the three states. 

The duality can exist only in mind or ’I’. Unless the soul  is there, there  would not have been the three states.

What one can say is only that three states appear and disappear in the soul or self.

v  What is appearance and disappearance?

 These are mere mirage within the consciousness or soul.

v  What is Mind?

It is objective awareness.

v  Where do these three states stand? Can it stand in the void?

 No. There should be a substratum for the three states to stand on and this is the soul or self. Atman or soul cannot be indicated by words for words indicate ideas and it is only that in which the three states comes and goes. One can grasp the three states in the soul or self.

v  What is the relation between the three states and the Atman?

There is no relation.  The three states are object and the soul/self is the subject.

Anything can be contradicted in waking/dream, but not that which knows the three states. Hence that Formless Witness is the truth. This non-contradictability characteristic exists because all the other things pass away, but Formless Witness, Atman/soul/true self does not change and it is eternal.

Three states come and go; now the state arises and disappears: the states change and vanish in succession:

v  What has become of the states? What is state?

 State is that which has no independent existence; it can't stand alone.

v  Where does it go?

It goes back into soul or self.  Hence the first stage is to see the three states as illusion or mirage; the higher stage is to see it as essence of Mind and realize it to be the Atman or consciousness or spirit.

One must not fallaciously say soul is immortal merely because he cannot see it die. This is bad logic. Because a thing cannot be disproved, this does not prove it to be true. To prove immortality one has to rise higher he has to go to the more advanced state of understanding. 

What has become of the dream of last night? It was reality until waking took place it was only a passing experience. If dream was real where it is now, after it disappeared? If dream was a real and not mirage why one cannot locate it again? Hence the meaning of change is that it is only appearances. 

Man unconsciously superimpose the permanence of the Atman or soul upon the flux of the visible world, and thus deceive himself. This is illusion. The sense of reality and permanence which one ascribes to the appearance arises from within soul or self. It is a genuine sense but it is misapplied.

The first stage is to regard all three states as an object, and separate them from the self or soul which is the subject. But this is tentative and is for those who still labour under the ego-complex. The next and higher stage is to see all the three states as Atman because their substance and witness is Atman, or consciousness then one no longer turn away from them; all is then ‘soul or Atman’.

 If one analyzes the three states, he will find that ultimately there is only one substance, one thing which changes into all these different states. One then go further and say that this unitary substance can be traced to consciousness(soul).

Seeker of truth has to look for the formless substance of the three states. Formless Witness is the formless substance of the three states. The thinking faculty is present only in experience of diversity (waking or dream) and limited to the individuality, hence never towards the formless witness of the three states. Anything that one may say, any answer he may receive, it will be in the waking or dream: it will never approach their formless witness. Hence objectiveness implies duality. Ideation implies duality, and duality denies the real. 

Unless one grasp that the three worlds are mere mirage, there is no other way of proceeding to the higher truth of non duality.

All the past history of the world is now only a series of accumulated ideas. Thus what one consider so real now  is known a little later as idea. Everything in this waking is being converted into ideas constantly.  

The first stage is to know the three states are an object to the formless witness which is the subject; the higher stage is to inquire what they are and to know all ideas are only mirage.

Death means conversion of the three states considered real into its true substance.

 Death is the problem which faces every man; he cannot escape and therefore ought to study it. This study of what death means is pursuit of truth! But what is it that knows these things as dying, these three states as appearing and vanishing? That Witness is what we call the Atman or soul: that does not pass away and hence does not die. In this sense one can see all these three states which vanish, vanishes only back into Atman or soul and live perpetually therein.

The knower alone makes it possible for one to know anything at all.

Seeker of truth has to realize the fact that, when one cannot see into a man’s mind he can only say he cannot accept that there is a multiplicity of minds, he can only see his physical moments but not his mind moving. Hence one can neither accept nor deny the theory of multiple individual souls. It is unproven hypothesis. To say that each mind is different is unproved, because no one has ever seen the mind. One cannot say where it starts and stops; no one ever measured its thickness, no one is aware of its location. All is supposition, not proof. 

There are two factors--the experiencing capacity and that which is experience. The experiences are all passing away and are therefore unreal. Without the knowing capacity i.e. the experiencer in existence, there could have been no such thing experience. What is meant by word experience? Experiencing implies two factors, the experiencer or the experiencing capacity, or that which is aware; and the experience. Without these two factors one cannot use the word experience.  One finds the experience always passes away. 

Waking/dream are mere is only a seen/objects, no matter how exalted it be. Waking/dream never touches the formless witness, but formless witness remains always in the seen as its formless substance. It is erroneous to believe that the more one thinks, the more he will get. Thought remains as a thought and gives you back only a thought not truth. One has to become aware of the fact the thoughts arise only within the waking/dream. Thus one has to trace the source of the three states not the source of the thought   to unfold the mystery of the duality.  

One can only know an experience when one discriminate between it and the state of mind when it was nonexistent just as he knows a black by its contrast to white.

The only certain thing about the waking is that it is forever changing; it changes into deep sleep and deep sleep changes in to dream, no one can prevent this change it is happening on its own accord. In contrast to the three states the self/ witness of the three states is the only thing of whose unchanging character one can be certain. Through the self/ witness one becomes aware   about all the changes in consciousness, remaining itself relatively constant, as a standard of reference for them. 

The term witness, Seer, Self is used in a non-dual sense, without reference to the three states witnessed, absolute awareness, not relative. 

Experience is present in feeling. Mind is an experience. Feeling is a kind of experience. Experiences, feelings, will are all modifications, nothing more. Even if it is of God, it is still in the feeling. 

Birth, life and death and appearing and disappearing apply to waking/dream. Therefore birthlessness is the characteristic of the witness of the three states. 

If by consciousness one means awareness of the experience of duality, i.e. when waking/dream are present. Unconsciousness means the absence of duality, not the absence of the capacity to know; unconsciousness does not mean the nonexistence of that which disappears from consciousness, it merely means that mind has ceased its functioning.

Finally there must be a kind of awareness which one do not understand and which is still existent when the waking/dream experiences are absent.

Analyzing between the formless witness and the three states gives the seeker a key to analyzing all statements, all revelations, all assertions, and all gods even. It tells one that anything that can be made known by the formless witness is but an idea; or illusion, mirage never reality and helps him to bifurcate mentally and realize what is real, and what is unreal.

As long as a person clings to the belief in causality, he will find cause producing effect. But when this attachment to causality wears away, cause and effect become non-existent.

Consciousness usually means a duality, something to be conscious of is implied. Therefore it is an unsuitable word to indicate the pure objectless awareness which exists prior to thought. The ego, the individual self is not the self, which is the Witness because it often disappears even during waking as in reverie when one is lost in the art and music. 

 The three states which is an object to the formless witness [soul/self] is ever-changing but never the formless witness. The three states come and go, but that does not prove that one state produces /causes another. If the previous state of consciousness has really vanished, memory of it would be impossible. Its disappearance into source/soul is no real disappearance. One only remembers that it has gone and come; that which perceives these states can alone be said to exist: That is the soul/self. One only relies on the formless witness/soul, and none has seen the birth or change of formless witness/soul.

v  Does consciousness mean a duality; knowledge, knower and known? Does consciousness mean that which is capable of knowing, non dual wisdom? Is one conscious of anything in deep sleep?

 One is conscious of it only when he is in the waking experience. Consciousness there may be with or without waking/dream experiences.

The Idea of an object does not prove the object exists. Ego is only an Idea within the waking/dream. The ego/body/world exists together and disappears together along with waking/dream.  When one thinks of the "ego" alone he is in the grip of duality. The formless witness knows the appearance and disappearance of the waking/dream as a whole, not ego alone.

Trying to overcome the ego alone is impossible. One has to get rid of experience of duality, by mentally focusing the attention on the formless witness of the three states. The witnessed [three states] appears and disappears; the formless witness is never known to be appearing and disappearing. That which appears and disappears is not the permanent.

People think negating means negating the objects and they think that it is impossible to negate objects. “They are thinking negating the objects as a person within the waking experience. It is not so, it is the negating the three states, on the base of the formless witness/soul.

 Since the three states are made of the same essence, they are non-different, but appear to change. The three states are of the same essence as soul/consciousness, is non-different from it but appears to change and be different from it.

One cannot say how the waking /dream have appeared; only that they are and they are in the mind and are the mind. When mind is there they are present. Absent of mind, absent of waking/dream. 

True Self is not this body, nor this world; true self is the seer of both. The body may be moving within the world in waking/dream, but the true self/soul seeing the changes. The body is born and lives within the waking/dream but true self/soul remain the witness of these changes. True self/soul is the Witness, the Awareness.

Seeker of truth should not imprison himself in his own creation by imagining the mind/’I’ to be limited to the physical body. Just as space fills both inside and outside of bottle, so the true self /soul permeates the whole waking/dream.

One can't see the three states independently without the true self/soul. "Time, Space and Causation" are mental and present only in waking/dream. The essence of the three states themselves is Atman alone.

Mysticism encourages people to be lazy, to think the external objects are created by Iswara and internal objects created by Jiva. Both Iswara and Jiva are man’s creation. Seeker of truth should not waste his time in talks of Jiva and Iswara disputes; rather inquire into the nature of Ataman.

There is no such thing as knowing the knower. That knowledge implies two factors, and the knower [soul/self] not being something to be seen, can never be known as such.

When one speaks of relation, one deals only with the known world within the waking/dream. When the known [waking/dream] goes, he says that because he actually sees the known [waking/dream] going; but he can never see the knower go.  He can only say "he does not know" about it.  One cannot speak of the known [three states] without the formless knower. But when the known [three states] has vanished, there is nothing to be said about the knower.

The act of conceiving in thought demands two factors. One cannot conceive the Formless Witness, the seer or knower, because he can say nothing about it, without making it an object. It cannot be pulled down to the level of an object, the seen.

The duality of formless witness  and the seen[three states] is not the same as the duality of two things in the objective world within the waking/dream, for here both  are known and seen, whereas there one  is known; the formless witness  remaining unknown and all one can say of it is "he  cannot make any statement about it. It is incomprehensible.

“If formless witness disappears, as does the three states then one must posit another seer to replace it; but in fact no one has ever seen its disappearance. One never uses the word formless witness without the three states. It has no meaning apart from it.

Self is not a thing unknown to any one at any time. Let a man think. As soon as waking experience comes, there must be a knower there before in order to know that he is in waking experience.

The formless witness exists before the waking appears or the thing is seen; otherwise neither knowledge nor sensation could happen. The formless witness is always there. Even if one say it can be reached only at the end of a long path, it is impossible for it to be ever absent even while he says this.

 The knower alone makes it possible for one to know anything at all. “Though, thus quite self-evident, easily known, quite near, forming the self, Ataman appears, to the unenlightened mind as unknown, very remote, as though he were a separate thing. Those who do not look at the seer, the witness, and perceive it is the only thing that neither comes nor goes, are deluded, and turn outward towards things objective, which run away.

So long as one is ego bound  he only runs from one object to another, from one idea to another, impermanent and unreal, he  ignores the Atman and is  ignorant. There is no time for them to think about the formless witness, since they are engrossed in their god, belief and their own accepted truth or materialistic life.

Soul in illusion is called mind! When illusion ceases, it sinks back and is only itself/soul. The essence, the substance or material of the three states it is then called Atman/soul, the true Self, and the Seer.