How do you define awareness-or consciousness?

The Soul is Pure Consciousness!
The Soul is Absolute consciousness. However, the prevailing experience of, ‘I am John (please insert your name here), this body, mind, speech, etc. are mine’, is called body-consciousness. Body Consciousness is one phase and Body unconsciousness is another phase. And sleep also is one kind of phase, it is one kind of unconsciousness only for say 7-8 hours. But even when in an unconscious state, the pure Soul is inside the body only. When Soul leaves this body, it is a dead body, the body has no consciousness then.

Such Meditative Unconsciousness is not helpful for Spiritual progress…
When some people meditate, they go into layers of mind and in the layers of intellect; and they are lost in those layers. At that time, everyone else feels he is in total Samadhi, there is no sensation on the body. But this is not the real state of consciousness as one is lost in the layers of mind. For spiritual progress, one should be the knower and observer of each and every phase of mind, each and every phase of intellect, each and every phase of ego, each and every phase of the body. There is no unconsciousness at all; one is aware of all the phases of the physical body; he is full of awareness!
One is Unconscious of one’s Self (the real Self), that is why one has illusion
The scriptural experts can recite all the scriptures by heart that, ‘This is how the Soul is; it is exactly like this’; they know all that, but they cannot get the awareness of it as they have yet to attain their Self-awareness. One has not known one’s Self. In spite of being permanent, one says, ‘I am John.’ This is spiritual unconsciousness. Really speaking, you just have to have the awareness of your nature (of Soul).

From bad to good is one type of consciousness, it is Religious Consciousness
To move from bad towards good is religious consciousness. When we move from bad to something good, even then there is something better than good. So we have to move even further. Gradually we develop ourselves by leaving a bad thing and adopting some good thing better than that. Suppose you have to reach the 12th floor. And you are climbing the ladder, step-by-step. When you reach the eighth step, you are trying to reach the 9th step. And when you are at 9th step, you again leave the 9th step and adopt the 10th step. So at every step, you have to go further and further. That is called religion.

From ‘bad and good’ to ‘purity’ is the last consciousness; this is Spiritual Consciousness.
In spirituality, it is totally different. We are not changing any bad thing, we are not going for any good thing, but we know what the reality is, directly. Gnani Purush gives us direct reality. So this is the consciousness of spiritualism, where there are no rituals, no religion; everything is bypassed and directly you come to Pure Soul. That’s the big difference!

Yes, we are all that, but how did it arise?
When the fog appears, you cannot see. Similarly, the Soul is pure consciousness, but the karma (because of which the awareness is lost) have surrounded it. Everyone’s Soul (the Self) is pure, but because the external form has come about, it is in that form that your wrong belief of ‘I am John’ has arisen. The Soul has infinite veils of illusion over it in the form of karma. These veils are so grave, that they do not allow you to attain the awareness of your Self.

Is it independent and malleable?
The nature of Soul is sat chit anand swaroop (established in the blissful awareness of the eternal, the Self), but it is not independent, which is why one is in such a predicament. The Absolute Soul is bound with a non-metal chain i.e. the chain of the non-Self complex (John), by which it is bound. But if you want to become completely independent, there should be intense desire to experience the Self.

We want pure consciousness, but presently, our consciousness is impure.
Because our consciousness is impure, we get suffering, unhappiness, attachment, hatred, abhorrence, etc. Due to impure consciousness, all worldly relations and worldly problems are created. But after Self-Realization, our consciousness becomes pure. And when pure consciousness reaches its full stage, there will not be any new creation as there will be no charging of any new karma and it will lead to liberation.

Until one comes into awareness of the Self, it goes on picking up the rust, and the rust (karma) continues to form. Because you have lost awareness, and you have a false belief of, ‘I am John’, therefore the rust is constantly building up. Once this goes away and you enter your own nature, the rust will no longer form!

Gnani Purush Who Is Free From The Body-consciousness Can Give The Experience Of Soul
A person with the consciousness of ‘I am this body’ cannot free anyone from the same consciousness. Only the Gnani Purush, who is free from all body-consciousness, can liberate one!!! One transcends body- consciousness through Gnani, when He gives Self-Realization. After Self-realization, the experience of, ‘I am the body’ begins to leave, and the experience of the Soul begins to prevail.

Not Action, But the Awareness Needs to be Changed
How can people who are caught up in the responsibilities of worldly life attain the Soul?
John and the Soul are both completely separate, each displays one’s own qualities and functions. If one comes to understand this from the Gnani Purush, then all his responsibilities in the worldly life will be carried out nicely, and even this too will carry on well.

Even Gnanis, eat, drink, bathe, and do everything. They do the same kind of activities that we do; however, they have the awareness of, ‘I am not the doer’. Whereas, in the state of ignorance, the awareness that prevails within is, ‘I am the doer’. So the difference is only in the awareness.

Because of ignorance one says, ‘I did this’, when in reality the doer is the unfolding effects of past causes! Although the Gnani Purush does all the activity of worldly life, firmly embedded in his consciousness, there is always the awareness that, ‘I do not do anything’, and that is how he remains as the Soul. On the other hand, one without Self-awareness never steps out of the consciousness of ‘I am the doer’, not even for a moment!

Presently your awareness is, ‘I am John’, You should have the awareness of, ‘I am Absolute Soul’
How will the awareness come? The awareness will come when your deluding karma are completely destroyed. What Lord Krishna said was that the Gnani Purush completely destroys your deluding karma, and once these karma are destroyed, a constant awareness prevails. However, to remain constantly aware is the ultimate state. So the main thing is that one needs awareness.

The awareness of the Self happens through bhed vignan (the science that separates the Self from the non-Self), conducted by the Living Gnani Purush!!! When one meets a Gnani Purush, He turns him around and changes his vision in this direction that, ‘I am not this; I am the pure Soul, I am immortal, I do not want anything except the experience of the Soul.’ Then, one’s applied awareness automatically gets drawn in that direction.

When anger pride deceit greed attachment disappear, that is when the pure consciousness will manifest Once you experience your true Self, automatically your vision will be pure. You can also see Pure self in others pure. And you can see faults of ego, pride, anger, etc. When You can see your faults, that is the real Self. And When You can see your faults, automatically they go away and your consciousness becomes more and more pure. Until then the consciousness of, ‘I am this body’, will not leave!

To know more: https://www.dadabhagwan.org/path-to-happiness/spiritual-science/what-is-...