Sananda samadhi, also known as "supreme bliss", or "with ecstasy", is the third level of the four samadhis described in the Yoga Sutra 1:17 by Patanjali

Patañjali

Patañjali is the compiler of the Yoga Sūtras, an important collection of aphorisms on Yoga practice. According to tradition, the same Patañjali was also the author of the Mahābhāṣya, a commentary on Kātyāyana's vārttikas on Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī as well as an unspecified work of medicine .In...

. Sananda: sa means “with”, ananda means joy, bliss.

Historical descriptions

In Sutra 1:17 Patanjali tells us that samprajnata samadhi comprises four stages: "Complete high consciousness (samprajnata samadhi) is that which is accompanied by vitarka

Vitarka

वितर्कः Vitarka or Vitarkah in Buddhism, one of forty mind-associated saṃskārā. Vitarka or savitarka describes the nature of consciousness in the first stage of samprajnata-samadhi...

 (reasoning), vicara

Vicara

Vicara means the way mind maintains attention toward any object. It first referred to pre-Hindu yoga, later in Buddhist meditation. It has been translated as "consideration," "deliberation," "examination," and "investigation."-In Buddhism:...

 (reflection), sananda (ecstasy), and sasmita (a sense of 'I'-ness)." Sananda is free from vitarka and vicara.

This is joyous samadhi and it gives intense joy. In sananda the gross and the five elements are given up. There arises in the Yogi a peculiar perception in the form of intense joy. In this state the mind continues to function, but knowledge of any particular object slowly fades away and the yogi becomes aware of the inner consciousness only. He experiences supreme bliss. In sananda samadhi the yogi experiences a state of rapture or ecstasy, and the only thought in the mind is the wordless awareness of the feeling of "I am in pleasure, I am happy."

Modern descriptions

According to Dr. Sarasvati Buhrman PhD, "Babaji

Mahavatar Babaji

Mahavatar Babaji is the name given to an Indian saint by Lahiri Mahasaya and several of his disciples who met Mahavatar Babaji between 1861 and 1935. Some of these meetings were described by Paramhansa Yogananda in his book Autobiography of a Yogi , including a first hand telling of Yogananda’s own...

 once explained that when people feel blissful sensations during sadhana

Sadhana

Sādhanā literally "a means of accomplishing something" is ego-transcending spiritual practice. It includes a variety of disciplines in Hindu, Sikh , Buddhist and Muslim traditions that are followed in order to achieve various spiritual or ritual objectives.The historian N...

, on a gross level the breath is equal in both nostrils, and on the subtle level pranic

Prana

Prana is the Sanskrit word for "vital life" .It is one of the five organs of vitality or sensation, viz. prana "breath", vac "speech", chakshus "sight", shrotra "hearing", and manas "thought" Prana is the Sanskrit word for "vital life" (from the root "to fill", cognate to Latin plenus...

 flow in ida and pingala nadis is balanced. This is called the sushumna breath because the residual prana of the sushuma, the kundalini

Kundalini

Kundalini literally means coiled. In yoga, a "corporeal energy" - an unconscious, instinctive or libidinal force or Shakti, lies coiled at the base of the spine. It is envisioned either as a goddess or else as a sleeping serpent, hence a number of English renderings of the term such as 'serpent...

, flows in sushumna nadi, causing sattva

Sattva

In Hindu philosophy, sattva is the most rarefied of the three gunas in Samkhya, sāttvika "pure", rājasika "dim", and tāmasika "dark". Importantly, no value judgement is entailed as all guna are indivisible and mutually qualifying...

 guna

Guna

' means 'string' or 'a single thread or strand of a cord or twine'. In more abstract uses, it may mean 'a subdivision, species, kind, quality', or an operational principle or tendency....

 to dominate. "It creates a feeling of peace. That peace is ananda." In sananda samadhi the experience of that ananda, that sattvic flow, is untainted by any other vritti

Vritti

Vritti, in the context of Hinduism and yoga, is the name given to different tendencies, or psycho-physical propensities, which give scope for the mind to express a variety of feelings and emotions. Hindu texts describe vritties to be a result of past actions and experiences that have left an...

s, or thoughts, save the awareness of the pleasure of receiving that bliss."

According to John C Lilly

John C. Lilly

John Cunningham Lilly was an American physician, neuroscientist, psychoanalyst, psychonaut, philosopher and writer....

, sananda is the highest state of consciousness that can be experienced while staying in the body. In his book Center of the Cyclone he describes sananda as, "blissful state, making the Christ, the green qutub, realization of baraka

Barakah

In Islam, Barakah is the beneficent force from God that flows through the physical and spiritual spheres as prosperity, protection, and happiness. Baraka is the continuity of spiritual presence and revelation that begins with God and flows through that and those closest to God. Baraka can be found...

, the reception of divine grace

Divine grace

In Christian theology, grace is God’s gift of God’s self to humankind. It is understood by Christians to be a spontaneous gift from God to man - "generous, free and totally unexpected and undeserved" - that takes the form of divine favour, love and clemency. It is an attribute of God that is most...

, cosmic love, cosmic energy, heightened bodily awareness, highest function of bodily and planetside consciousness, being in love, being in a positive LSD energy state. In the Oth emotional center in the chest."