When the mind becomes a mirror for the pure soul, does the soul perceive itself through the mind or without it too?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

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Is that clear? So, question.
When the soul gets purified and the soul, the mind becomes a mirror, so does the soul perceive directly that I am soul different from the body? And why the soul perceives through the mirror of the mind? Answer. Both ways it applies. When the soul gets purified, when the soul has the material body and the soul is functioning through the material body, then when its consciousness is channeled through the body-mind mechanism, at that time the soul perceives through the mirror of the mind.
But when the soul is completely distinct from the body, that means the soul is fully liberated from bodily existence and the soul is directly conscious at the spiritual level, then the soul is capable of perceiving without the body-mind mechanism also. At that time soul perceives oneself as spiritual and oneself as different from the body. So it’s like, we have some pastimes of Lord Chaitanya where he gets transported to another level of reality where his body is active here in a state of faint, of swoon, and his consciousness has gone somewhere else.
So for the liberated soul, Drupada Goswami says that they can act externally, they can act externally in the mood of whatever service they are having, and internally they will act in the particular swaroopa they have in the spiritual world. So we could draw from that the point that the soul has the capacity for self-perception and spiritual reality perception independent of the body-mind mechanism also. And while it is functioning in the material world, naturally the soul will function through the body and at that time it will function through the body-mind mechanism.
So that time the mind will act as a mirror. But both ways the perception does work out.