III. The Supersensible Being of Man

The reason this state is radically different from the state of sleep is that in sleep we have no consciousness, but here we leave the body consciously in such a way that we are able to look at the latter as we would look at a table or any other object. Thus we withdraw consciously from our body and are fully aware that we are outside it because we are able to perceive it as an object outside ourselves, just as we normally see physical objects outside ourselves.