The Fourth Way describes man having four states of consciousness. Awakening begins in the third state.

From Ouspensky: “The third state of consciousness~ self-remembering, or self-consciousness, consciousness of one’s own being-constitutes the natural right of man as he is, and if a man does not possess it is only because of the wrong conditions of his life. In the fourth state of consciousness, objective consciousness, a man can see things as they are. Flashes of this state also occur in man…But the only right way to objective consciousness is through the development of self-consciousness.”

From Rodney Collin, on transfiguration: “The true work of a man with soul (an astral body) will be to reform physical men, to make them normal. He may help them develop the will, awareness, unity and conscience… but he will  not be able to  endow them with souls. Only a man who himself lives in the spirit will be able to form and fashion souls. He may conduct a ‘school of souls’.A candidate must already possess a mature soul. And the acquisition of spirit by such a man may be connected with the possibility of his endowing his own pupils with the soul he already possesses. This will be his test. He must put someone in  in his place.”

From Robert Burton: “To awaken, essentially  one  has to take everything before one as an opportunity for presence. Effort must become a way of life if one is to transform one’s level of being.”

“Transformation of suffering is still the principal way we escape. The aim is not to suffer; everyone suffers. The aim is to transform suffering into an astral body.”

“Some people awaken because then imagine it can be done. Others do not awaken because they imagine that it cannot.”

From Rumi: “There is none dwelling in the house but God. When a man is awakened he melts and perishes.”

From the Zen masters: “Deluded thoughts are originally quiet, and the outside world is originally empty. In the place where all dharmas are empty exists the marvelous knowing, which is not dark. This mind of marvelous knowing, which is empty and quiet, is your original face.”

From William Blake: “If the doors of perception were cleansed everything would appear to man as it is, Infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro’ narrow chinks of his cavern.”

From St. Paul, Letters to the Corinthians, New Testament:
“For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.” 

From Plato:
“In fact, there are very few people who would be able to reach the beautiful itself and see it by itself. Isn’t that so?”
“Certainly.”
“What about someone who believes in beautiful things, but doesn’t believe in the beautiful itself and isn’t able to follow anyone who could lead him to the knowledge of it? Don’t you think he is living in a dream rather than an awakened state? Isn’t this dreaming: whether asleep or awake, to think that a likeness is not a likeness but rather the thing itself that it is like?”
“I certainly think that someone who does that is dreaming.”
“But someone who, to take the opposite case, believes in the beautiful itself, can see both it and the things that participate in it and doesn’t believe that the participants are it or that it itself is the participants–is he living in a dream or is he awake?
“He’s very much awake.”