Shri Nathji defined this in a beautiful mathematical example:
“Look upon a point on a sheet of paper. It begins to move in a circle. As it moves outwards along the circumference it looks upon its goal and says: ‘I have to reach Him!’
“And the further ahead it moves, the closer it comes to its starting point. It then looks upon its starting point from a distance and says: ‘It is Thee’.
“Finally it reaches the starting point from where it had started and says: ‘It is I’.
These are the different stages of the seeker after truth, who first sees God outside of himself and seeks to reach Him, and in the end sees God within himself.