Consciousness states in cyclic existence (Buddhism)

States of consciousness vary in the three realms and nine levels of conscious existence. The cycle of existence spans the Desire Realm, the Form Realm and the Formless Realm, all within the samsara. Beyond is the unchanging.

Tibetan Gelugpa Buddhism provides a full analysis of all the states of consciousness in the samsara. Yogacara Buddhism, which considers that only the mind exists and that the phenomenal world is simply a projection of it, does not distinguish nirvana from samsara, but describes nirvana as awareness that only mind exists and that belief in phenomenal existence is confusion.