Like most words we use to define our spiritual and magical paths has become distorted in the pursuit of acceptance. Some magical people taking up the term, because it is more widely accepted than the term “witch” – yet not understanding the root of mysticism. Not just defining the actions, but the result, the experience of Divine, of Unity, of all the connection between everything. It is in the experience itself that is the mystical experience.
What is a Mystical Experience
Often when asking the question, you will hear the word ineffable – meaning indescribable in words. It is not that we can not describe the events we experienced, but that others will never be able to feel and experience the profoundness of it because that is what is indescribable. To you, the explanation may just seem like a story, a delusion, or a dream – to the one experiencing it though, it is so much more.
For those who have had deep mystical experiences, when they hear another talking about them, they understand it. It resonates. They understand their own experience, the power, the emotions, and the change – so they can see the profoundness in the story. It is one of those “Knowledge of and Experiencing of -are two different things.” Having knowledge of something and having personal experience of that knowledge are two completely different types of knowing.
A mystical experience itself is an experience of Divine beyond the mind. Not just the source of Divine but also the divine within the self – the divine in every piece of nature – the divine in each other. Every living thing is a part of this Divine and connected to this Divine and thus connected to each other. The mystical experience is seeing, knowing, feeling this. It is profound understandings of this through an experience with it. It is gaining knowledge and understanding of this in forms like visions, trance, dreams – through the experience of it. Again, ineffable, unless you have experienced it yourself, the deepest sense of it can not be put into words.
Everyone Has It
Everyone has the ability to have these deep mystical experiences, because we are all connected to, and a part of, Divine. Perhaps what happens most often is when gets a taste of that experience, they rationalize themselves out of it. So rooted in the physical, so focused on trying to survive in a world designed and created by humans (society), that they can not see beyond it.
Society calls it tricks of the mind, illusions, delusions, creative imagination – rationalizing away the feelings, emotions, and inner knowing of the experiencer. Another control mechanism, intentionally designed, to keep this idea of separation – differences, to keep everyone in their boxes. Boxes can be controlled, shaped by human hands for human gains.
Boxes though are not entirely bad. To move our minds, to gain understandings, knowledge, and skills – a foundation to start from if you will – boxes are necessary in the beginning. They help us to focus and show us a path to help us along the way. Every religion, magical tradition, is a box. Each having their own focuses, ways of understanding the world, understanding energy, and applying critical thinking. Each can give us the starting points to for our own spiritual growth.
The box isn’t the problem because it gives us a place to start from. The issue becomes when we do not reach higher – Where we do not climb out of the box and beyond it, to discover beyond the limited structure created by the box. To understand that the box was made from one person’s mystical experience, connection and experience of Divine – yet Divine is much bigger, much deeper, much more encompassing then our human mind can comprehend. We only know what we know – we only see what we see – we only understand in the way our brain can process it for understanding. The further you go outside the box, the more personal experience you gain, the more this will all make sense.
The Name and Face Do Not Matter
“What you call Divine does not matter – Only the connection.”
We have images, faces, names for our Divine. Some have multiple, some have one, some have none, and some have one that shifts and changes as they grow and expand the self. The face, the name, that we connect to is for our own mind to be able to comprehend. It again gives us a focus, where we can start building that connection. Where we can start opening ourselves up to the possibilities of it, and through that, start to experience it.
So much fighting about which way is the “right” way – which way is truth. People holding tight and clinging to their own box, and feeling their box is the only true box because it is what they experienced. This is the trap of the box. What keeps us divided, what keeps us controlled, and what serves certain people, but not humanity, not the soul. All the boxes hold truth, all the boxes hold tools and skills we can develop within ourselves to move beyond the box and live outside of it. The box is a face and name to get us focused in the right direction – where we go beyond that though is our own personal responsibility.
We are all searching in some way for something beyond ourselves, connection to ourselves, connection to the natural world, and connections to each other. What I have seen and experienced is that it really doesn’t matter what box you choose to start in. It doesn’t matter how many other boxes you decide to explore to find the right tools and skills you personally need in order to get there – the point in the end, I feel, is to climb out of all of them, taking the tools and skills you have learned, the things that given you results and works for you, and pursue your own experience of Divine in everything, including yourself. This is the Mystic Path.
My Boxes
In my last article All the Pieces of the Journey I was reflecting on some of the boxes I explored and experienced that has led me to where I am now. Parts that each one gave me, that helped me and gave me the tools and perspectives that impacted me. It was not all of the boxes I got something from, but some impactful ones for me.
All of this personal transmutation of the past year was about fully climbing out of all the boxes. Seeing them clearly for what they are. Giving gratitude to each one for what they gave. Then truly taking the stance within all I have learned and created throughout the whole process of living and exploring. There are no more boxes except mine, and mine is not a box but an endless spiral. Flowing inward and outward, growing and evolving with every experience.
Continuing to allow Divine to Guide me, to teach me, and to experience everything She gives me. The difference is that there is no more outside boxes. I do not need validation for something I personally experienced – I experienced it. I do not need you to agree with me, you will understand in your own way when you experience it. There are no more skills to learn for this journey, only diving deeper into the ones that I have.
I know some are having issues with that last paragraph. I know because it has been one of the most difficult struggles within myself. I love to explore and learn. I love to hear about other peoples experiences. The problem isn’t in the concept, the problem is in the perspective. I will still be doing all those things, I will just be doing them differently and from a different place within myself. We never stop learning – it is the mode by which we are being taught that changes.
A Personal Experience
I have had so many experiences with Divine, and all the aspects of that. Some that are small, some that made me laugh, some that made me cry, and all changed me forever. Each time, either a large or small change, yet every time changing me – my perspective – my thoughts and actions going forward. Through each I experienced and Death and a Rebirth because that is what transformation is.
There is one experience though, one that changed everything for me. The one where I truly experienced and saw Divine in a way where I experienced the totality of it and knew Divine to be real – not just in thought and emotion, but true knowing. I am going to share it with you, knowing you will not be able to understand the impact of it unless you have experienced it yourself. To you it may be a pretty story, but it is still my story.
Many years ago I decided to dedicate myself completely to my Divine. I spent weeks crafting this perfect ritual that I felt encompassed all the aspects of this step for me. I lit the candle. I said a prayer to Her. I spoke the intention and my desire to Her. I closed my eyes and started my chant… and within a breath my beautifully crafted, well thought out ritual went out the window and the true experience began.
Everything fell away – the external world faded away – and I floated in this state of trance. I started to see these beautiful blue/white glistening strings of light twisting and flowing between Her and I. Like a vine, joined by more vines, all intertwining and connecting us together. What looked like water, yet wasn’t, flowing the center of them, back and forth between us – the exchange between us – the connections and bonds between us. Then extending out beyond us, connecting and interlacing with others, creating this huge 3D type of web. All these patters, points of light, taking in and sending out all these vines/ tendrils.
This was my first true glimpse of The Web. How our connection was just one, and everything was all interconnected. Sharing between them. Experiencing the other through the energies passed along this water like energy. What is being done to one, is shaping another.
I would not understand the depth of this until later in my journey, and I feel there is even more depth to discover within it. It was the beginning though – the true beginning of my own journey and all the discoveries within it. I can explain the mechanics of it above but the experience is something that there are now words for, not to help you understand it. This is what is meant by ineffable.
It is All About the Soul
That experience was long ago, and many other have come since. It is why I have no doubts in my Divine, my Guide. Why I trust what She gives implicitly. Not blindly, not from a place of another’s box, but because of the experiences of Divine – and the evolutions it has given me personally.
I think this is the point – To experience. It is the point of our being here in this world, at this time, to experience this world, these senses, and add to the experience of the Soul. I think it is the point of all these religious boxes, Pagan traditions, Witchcraft, and all the esoteric paths, is to get to a point where we climb beyond the box and experience Divine in all its ways. To see Divine in everything around us, within each other, and within ourselves. To see, to feel, to know that Web that we are all a part of and shaping together.
When you experience this, when you understand this, you no longer need the laws and morality of religion and man to tell you how to be a good person – You will become that because you understand The Web and the Divine energy in everything. How what is done, ripples out through it, shaping and effecting the others on the Web. What I am doing to you, I am also doing to me – a part of that shaping me as well. Will we falter – yes, we are human and living in a human constructed society that divides us and pits us against each other. We can pick ourselves up though, try again, rise above it, and encourage/ help others to do the same.
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