The three states

[Chandran, Nanda (NBC)]

I would like to explain what I understand from the analysis of the three
states and if I'm missing something, I would be grateful if somebody points
them out to me.

When I first read on the three states, ie waking, dream and dreamless sleep,
it struck me that it was only to highlight the concept of Maya. Later on,
when trying to understand more about the Self, I was able to understand it
slightly better and felt that the argument of the three states was more
towards establishing a proof of the existence of the Self.

But then why is it that susupti, the state of dreamless sleep, is given more
importance than the other two? It struck me a couple of minutes back that,
in the other two states peace and happiness is transient. Ie For all the
pleasures and happiness one can experience in the waking state, it's not
lasting. In the case of dreams, we experience nightmares and sometimes less
pleasing ones.

But it's only in the state of susupti, though we don't have any recollection
of it (atleast I don't!),  and upon waking up we feel relaxed and say we've
had a peaceful sleep etc. So the fact that there exists a state, though we
weren't aware of it, when we were at total peace and that warrants
investigation. And that there was no awareness in that state, only proves
the subtlety of the state.

But that it's a state and not the shut down of the mind and body, I'm not
sure how it can be proved. Does it have something to do with the fact that,
we're atleast partially aware of what's happened in the waking in the dream
state and though we don't have an awareness in the dreamless state, when we
wake up, we're once more linked to the memories and events of the waking
state and sometimes even remember the events in our dreams. So this link and
continuity, does it serve to explain the dreamless sleep state better?

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