MYSTICISM

No I am not sleeping in and was up at 5 this morning. Sometimes I put the picture on in the evenning amd write a bit if the hockey game is on and I am trying to stay awake.But yes morning is the best time for me to write. Dad is not feeling good at all, his legs very weak and now his throat is sore. He has his acupuncture this morning but it will depend on how he is when he wakes up. He is discouraged.

We are studying Relvelations in our Bible study group at Gracepoint. I am having a hard time. John, a pastor, is also a poet, fond of metaphor and symbol, image and illusion, passionate in his desire to bring us into the presence of Jesus. Revelations meaning that which was previously hidden or unknown. John the author seems to be having a mystical experience in which his first experience was one of fear. Now a days we may call this an delusional disorder with unusual thoughts and behaviors. I am reading about the scientific knowledge of mystical experiences.

Through the ages there have been many great mystics in all different religions but although they may first experience fear they then describe their experience as estatic and joyful. A mystic may long to experience this altered state because they feel closer to the presence of God.

"Karen Armstrong in her book A HISTORY OF GOD explains the goal of a Greek mystic was to gain freedom from distraction and multiplicity. By systematically weaninging their minds away from their passions__such as pride, greed, sadness or anger__hesychiasts would transcend themselves and become deified like Jesus, transfigured by divine energies."

Humans, us ordinary people, "are natural mystics blessed with an inborn genius for effortless self-transcendence. Beautiful music, awe inspiring mountain views, the wonder and awe as we gaze at a new-born baby fill us with joy that lifts us out of the everyday drugery.

We all like to soak in the bathtub, maybe with candle light and music and feel the tension in our body slowly leave; a state of calm and serenity. Reading a poem, being lost in a book or movie, rocking a baby or praying or even for long distance runners and crowds cheering on a sport; the fast or the slow has the ability to drive the brain to an altered state of consciousness. A new awareness of the beauty that surrounds us and the love that fills the emptiness. We can choose to enter into a deeper mystical state through meditation and prayer and worship. In our dreams at night we allow ourselves to go deeper into a world of fantasy.

"What we do suggest in our scientific research is that there is support for the possibility that a mind can exist without an ego. We have the ability to experience spirituality that awakens us to the reality of who we really are, children of heaven and earth, of spirit and matter,of imagination and rational thought. Instead we allow the rational mind to dominate us and govern our belief systems.

Behold Jesus says I stand at the door and knock and desire to taste the goodness of life with you.