Seeking this truth, beauty, goodness....the lasting and transcendent is the life of a mystic, the life of us all. So why be in the closet about it? Because that's where the cultural norm in this country puts you, when you are not following the path to materialism and influence and power.
Mysticism is not magic tricks and hocus pocus. It is the earnest yearning of the heart for the eternal in the moment; unconditional love in the face of the hatred and violence that besets the world in history. It is the beauty, the gorgeousness of living freely within a self, a soul that's contained in a body.
Being a mystic these days is a hard road to walk. It’s not sexy, doesn’t buy you a house and a big life and baubles. And it usually plants you smack dab in the middle of the trussed up psychiatric system, labeled, packaged, medicated and miserable! I know because that is what has happened to me. The official medical term for my particular brand of mysticism is bipolar. For those of you who don't know what that means, it's when you have amazing times of expansive awareness and understanding and connection....with everything, everyone....so beautiful....then, as the beauty and awareness and understanding and connection start to fade, and disconnection and longing and sorrow starts to take hold, you get depressed. This is a narrative I wrote about my experience:
Somewhere around age twelve, I was walking with my family on a warm spring afternoon, right after the rain had subsided. My sister and I were ahead of my parents, running and splashing around in the puddles, laughing and having so much fun. Suddenly the sun came out, streaming through the trees; I turned around to look at my parents and I was overcome by a penetrating sense of joy, even beyond joy; it was something like ecstasy. I felt beyond myself, as if I was looking at my family from a distance and seeing them as they were from the inside out. I felt full of love for them…they were beautiful; everything was beautiful and I felt connected to all that was around me, at one with the world that surrounded me, that was beside me, inside of me, part of me. Energy was coursing through my body and I felt truly alive – I was trembling with electricity; the light was brilliant and there were rainbow colors hovering around me. The feelings were real, more real than anything I had ever felt. I felt whole; I was connected to my self, my family, to nature, to all of my surroundings in a way I had never experienced before. I was free and full and deep and open and full of beauty and joy. That lasted for what seemed hours, but it was only minutes and then it dissipated and I felt bereft, as if I’d lost something precious, essential to my being.
You decide for yourself: Is this pathology or is this simply experiencing the depth and beauty of life, this world, our potential as human beings to be connected to our world, in all its wonder and awe and transparency....join me someday....
A VASE
I am always holding a priceless vase in my hands.
If you asked me about the deeper truths
of the path and I told you
the answers,
it would be like handing sacred relics to you.
But most have their hands tied
behind their
back;
that is, most are not free of events their eyes have seen
and their ears have heard
and their bodies have felt.
Most cannot focus their abilities
in the present, and
might drop what
I said.
So I’ll wait; I don’t mind waiting until
your love for all
makes luminous
the now.
- Hafiz
Your experience seems to align with the accounts of others who've had mystic/spiritual experience. That being said, I can't imagine how difficult it must be to have experienced true/pure being/consciousness at age 12, and than to be thrown back into the everyday world. I can see how/why this conscious jarring would lead to he bi-polar McLabel. I can also see how it can serve as a precious gift for oneself and others; albeit, at the same time, with some sense of aloneness, pain and grief. Thank you Catherine for sharing your experience.
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