SUPERCONSCIOUS STATE

Mysticism is the belief that direct knowledge of God can be attained, as it has been attained by the saints and mystics of all religions.

The end result of mystical experience is called nirvana or samadhi and is reached in the superconscious state.  This state, Buddhists and Vedantists believe, can be experienced on earth while living in a human body.

Nirvana is characterized in Vedanta as the extinction or absorption of the individual ephemeral ego in Brahman, which Buddhists call the "Uncaused" and the "Unconditioned."  Nirvana liberates a person from the cycle of birth, suffering, and death, and all other forms of bondage.  It is the supreme transcendental consciousness.

Samadhi is the identification of oneself with ultimate Reality.  It again is absorption.  Absorption is the eighth limb of raja yoga, in which the mind takes on the form of the object of meditation.  In this state, according to Patanjali, "the true nature of the object shines forth, not distorted by the mind of the perceiver."