2.1.2 The Cosmos

“The world exists only through perception. When perception ceases, the world dissolves.”
— Yogācāra aphorism

We now step back and look outward — not to become lost in celestial distractions, but to understand the very structure in which consciousness unfolds. This is no detour, but a setting of the stage. Our aim remains practical: we seek to liberate the mind, not to chart the heavens exhaustively. Yet to do so, it helps to have a working sense of how the mind projects its world, and how these projections manifest across different planes of existence.

There is great depth in texts like The Buddhist Cosmos by Ajahn Punnadhammo, which I encourage you to explore. But for now, let us stay close to what serves our immediate purpose: how consciousness arises, how it constructs the illusions of self and world, and how this relates to the realms through which we wander in saṃsāra.

Consciousness and the Habit of Objectification

In its ordinary function, consciousness arises through objectification — the habit of dividing seamless experience into objects and perceivers. This is not merely mental conditioning; it is the very engine of saṃsāric rebirth. The self is not a thing, but a process — a constant reassertion of separateness through mistaken identification with “things.”

We weave together strands of sensory and mental data into cohesive “objects”: a chair, a memory, a person, a world. Yet in truth, these are only appearances. Reality, as it is, has no divisions. It is undivided. The very act of perceiving creates the illusion of subject and object — and with it, the illusion of self.

This initial moment of identification — when knowing consciousness takes its own creations as real — is sometimes mythologised as the arising of the Demiurge: that first bright awareness becoming trapped in the mirror-world of its own projections. Once it identifies with body and form, it awakens into what we call life — with no recollection of how it arrived there.

Four Planes of Consciousness

Though reality is non-dual, the deluded mind functions in strata, traditionally called planes or realms (bhūmi, loka). Consciousness arises differently in each, yet all share the same underlying mechanics: objectification, identification, and the continuity produced by cause and effect.

1. The Sensory Realm (Kāmā-loka)

This is where most human and animal life unfolds. It is woven from continuous interactions with sensory data, patched by the mind into what seems a seamless reality. Yet between these bursts of perception, the mind settles into its resting state: bhavaṅga, or passive life-continuum. Active cognition happens only in short episodes — often lasting no more than seventeen mind-moments — during which perception and volition arise.

Of special importance is the javana stage within this sequence: this is where volition occurs, where karma is formed. When we speak of generating karma, we refer to the mental impulse of javana citta arising in this fleeting yet potent window.

Thus we learn: it is not the world itself that defines our experience, but how the mind perceives it. One person suffers in a palace; another finds peace in a prison. What we think about our world is our world.

2. The Fine Material Realm (Rūpa-loka)

This realm holds refined mental experiences, akin to dream or vivid imagination. We enter it briefly each time we close our eyes and visualise. Sustaining awareness here, however, requires training.

Ordinary imagination lasts only moments before the mind returns to sensory input. Through meditation, one stabilises this internal vision and abides in it longer. This is the essence of jhāna — sustained, unified attention on a single object, such as the breath or a visualised form. As the javana impulses become absorbed in wholesome objects, the mind grows still and luminous.

Rebirth in this plane occurs when the final citta at death is a stabilised, wholesome jhānic mind. These are the “heavenly” realms of radiant form.

3. The Formless Realms (Arūpa-loka)

Beyond form, awareness turns inward toward the very space that holds mental phenomena. Here, meditators refine their objects further and further — from form to space, from space to pure consciousness, then to nothingness, and ultimately to neither perception nor non-perception.

These formless states are reached not through ordinary imagination but deep jhāna. They appear abstract, even disorienting — not because they are supernatural, but because they no longer fit the logic of sensory perception. Only the first formless realm retains a sense of space. Beyond that, perception becomes so subtle it nearly ceases.

4. The Supramundane Plane (Lokuttara)

This plane does not signify a spatial realm, but a shift in paradigm. Here, dual perception collapses entirely, and nibbāna becomes the object of consciousness — though only for a fleeting moment. These are the path and fruit moments: singular cognitive events in which fetters are severed and the mind is released from the illusion of self.

Such moments arise only once per lifetime per stage of awakening. They occur in rapid cognitive sequences much like jhāna, but without repetition. After the path moment, one or more fruit moments may follow before the mind returns to bhavaṅga. However, with practice, it is possible to revisit fruit consciousness and rest in its peace.

In Closing

We examine the structure of the cosmos not to become lost in mystical fascination, but to understand the architecture of mind. These planes are not places — they are modes of perception. Their worth lies not in escape, but in insight.

As practitioners, our aim is not to explore every realm, but to transcend the very process of becoming. Vipassanā — insight — remains our principal tool. While tranquillity (samatha) practice is essential to sharpen the mind, we must not linger overly long. True freedom does not come from visiting finer realities, but from no longer needing any of them.

This text is excerpted from the upcoming book Albedo: A Course in Modern Alchemy. The complete volume will include additional study guides, glossaries, and extended teachings. Learn more about the book here.