First stage: This is attained by those who study metaphysics alone or practise mysticism alone. It is the withdrawal from the senses and their objects. It is negative. It leads to a perception that the external world is unsatisfactory. It is the great turning away from things of sense. It is an ascetic stage; it is accompanied by thoughts; it is a recognition that matter is not ultimately real. It is marked by moral change. It is the discovery through a glimpse of his spiritual nature which is an ecstatic sense of union with a superior immaterial being. He feels on occasions that he is divine.
Second stage: It affirms the unique positive ultimate reality. It yields the vision of mystic light of the Logos; it is attained by mysticism alone. It is entry into the Void; it is the discovery of Spirit; it is trance. It is thought-free, delights in solitude. This realization of God in the heart marks the Witness-stage of ultramystic experience. The man feels utterly detached from his own or the world's activities, so much so that he is ascetically tempted to withdraw into a retreat from life. If, however, fate forces him to continue in the world he will feel all the time curiously like a spectator at a cinema show; but this cannot constitute an ultimate human goal.
Third stage: It is in the world, but not of it. It is the return to the external sense-world and the discovery that it too is God-born. It never loses sight of its unity with life, but insists on its connection with action. Instead of becoming a refuge for dreamers, talkers, and escapists, it becomes an inspiring dynamic. It is the realization of All in himself and himself in All. With this attainment he throws himself incessantly into the service of mankind.
-- Notebooks Category 1: Overview of the Quest > Chapter 5 : Self-Development > # 337
