Archives: Submitted Stories

Mystical Experiencer:  Female in early thirties
Current location:  U.S.A.
Age at time of experience:  32

I took LSD, wanted to crawl out of my skin for the first 30-45 minutes. I felt extremely uncomfortable; hot then cold, sweaty, heart racing, like I needed to have a bm/urinate/vomit. I just remember thinking like my body wanted to split in a million different ways. And then my trip started.

I remember closing my eyes only to see white, instead of the usual black/darkness. I remember being able to create/see whatever I desired in clouds passing by. I remember being able to control the colors of the leaves on the trees around me. And then, it happened.

I felt at peace, extremely calm, and safe. I felt as if I was no longer in my “vessel.” I felt as if my spirit was able to transcend through space and time. It felt as if my spirit danced through space to a place of total bliss and harmony. I remember experiencing something/somewhere unfamiliar, yet very familiar at the same time.

I honestly don’t have words to describe the journey or that destination. It felt as if I stepped into the spiritual dimension for a short time. I didn’t feel alive or dead, just as if the present moment was the only thing to exist.

I remember being able to feel the presence of family members that had passed. I remember saying, “I’ve wanted to sit with dad and talk to him since he passed.” My sister asked what I wanted to ask, but I couldn’t think of a thing. I just remember feeling love and comfort, as if he had never passed six years prior. I remember repeating a forgotten saying he used to say from time to time; “Life’s so simple. We’re the ones that complicate things.”

I remember that I kept saying “lucky us!”, in reference to being able to spiritually experience the trip that we were on. I felt an unconditional love for all, but especially my tribe of people.

I experienced the most beautiful adventure of me that day. Wherever my spirit went was breathtakingly beautiful in both sight and feeling. My mind and spirit are beautiful to me. I feel extremely lucky and blessed to have had such an amazing journey that day.

Mystical Experiencer:  Female in mid-thirties
Current location:  U.S.A.
Age at time of experience:  33

I was sleeping and woke up suddenly. When I woke up suddenly, I was not groggy. I leaned up on my arm and stayed like that for a moment. Something happened. I can only describe it as “my brain exploded.” When that happened, I saw everything.

It first started as a perception of what some call “the higher self”. When I looked at it, I saw it was connected to what felt like everything else in the world’s higher self. When it made that connection, what was perceived by me to be an image of all of our higher selves separately became one. It was everything. It felt like everything and everyone. Like all time and no time.

The only emotion that could describe what it felt like is pure and true love. Once I felt it, I immediately started crying because I understood the truth. That everything is everything and nothing at the same time. That all of this means everything and nothing and that we never end or are separate from each other.

Since that time, I feel peace with everything of this experience of life. I feel love and respect for everything. Though I have to continue to live this experience, I find I no longer feel bad about the things or experiences that happen. Things are what they are and there is no reason. There is nothing wrong with that.

Mystical Experiencer:  Female in late 30s
Current location:  U.S.A.
Age at time of experience:  29

Prior to my experience, I had been living a life of service in an intentional community. I was extremely depressed. I was walking in an alley near my home. I stopped to smell and admire some hollyhock growing on a fence. My head exploded and I became all things and no thing. (The wording of that is very important to me.)

I then walked home and took a nap. For a few months following, I could only tell you facts about me – such as my age or first car. I had dislodged something in my belly that’s primary interest was protecting itself. I was you. You were me. Everything was love, and all people were extremely beautiful.

Internally I felt like I could have easily touched death had the experience been more complete, and my suffering about how to define love and how to live it became all-consuming shortly after. I sought out psychiatric care.

Mystical Experiencer:  Female in late 40s
Current location:  U.S.A.
Age at time of experience:  17

I lit a candle in the church sanctuary and went to the back pew to kneel with my mother and other youth group members, not because I wanted to pray, but because it was what everyone else was doing.

I might’ve knelt for 2 minutes before I was enveloped by the brightest light ever possible. Everything but this light disappeared.

I was made to know that this was the Source of All Love, that this is all there is, and that no matter what I experienced in life, that this unconditional love was always available to me, and that “nothing could ever destroy” what I was, that I would always return to this Source.

I woke up crying ecstatically in my mother’s lap.

It took me several hours after that to even feel… Human. Everything was surreal.

Mystical Experiencer:  Male in early fifties
Current location:  Australia
Age at time of experience:  25

After sitting silently in meditation after a particularly spirited session of mantra-chanting (I’d been in the company of five other meditators, but they had left the building and I’d continued to ‘sit’ alone), there was a sudden separation from ordinary experience, as though the ground had opened up beneath me and I’d fallen in. Then, any sense of myself as an entity separate from everything else utterly disappeared. All that was left was a kind of primary or universal consciousness with no ‘me’ in it whatsoever. Time and space seemed not to apply: ‘Eternity’. A pure and profound bliss and love permeated this limitless expanse.

I must stress very strongly that words in no way do this justice. It was truly ineffable. After what seemed like a few seconds, there was a return to the ordinary state. I felt utterly humiliated and embarrassed by my belief in ego which had been so violently destroyed by this event, and I wept profusely for several minutes. This gave way to exhilaration and joy.

Everything I’d been learning about spiritual things made 100% sense. I knew I’d ‘experienced for myself’, albeit very briefly, the Enlightenment I’d been studying and contemplating. I must add that the experience had an uncanny familiarity. It was obvious to me that this is what happens to us when we die.

Though agnostic with regard to reincarnation, I regard it as a definite possibility – and this uncanny familiarity of the ‘after-death-state’ is consistent with it. I was so inspired by this event to continue Buddhist practice that I traveled to the U.K. to join a residential community of Buddhists and remained with them for four years.

Mystical Experiencer:  Male in early sixties
Current location:  Australia
Age at time of experience:  33

I have tried so many times to explain my experience, but can’t. I would need infinity/eternity to describe my experience. It is not possible to explain what I experienced in words.

Before the experience, I was searching for something but didn’t know what. After the experience, I realized.

From my experience, I learned that I am you and you are I.

Mystical Experiencer:  Male in late fifties
Current location:  Australia
Age at time of experience:  22

In the weeks/months leading up to the experience, l was doing 2-3 30-minute sessions of deep relaxation lying on my back per day. After practicing this for about a month, l could recall the full body feeling of deep relaxation at will during the day.

I also started doing mental exercises between my formal relaxation sessions that consisted of the following: if l was speaking to anyone l would silently and calmly repeat in my mind ” l love you” or “l forgive you”…

It may sound strange to do this and carry on a normal conversation but, in fact, it was very easy – in fact, it greatly centered me in the moment with the person.

A light bulb moment occurred when l realised that these mental exercises gave me an identical physical sensation as the deep relaxation. I reasoned that by continuing to do the two things my level of peace would increase and my previous depression would lessen. I was quite happy to just continue doing this because it felt so good.

One day l had finished a deep relaxation and heard a car pull up outside. I went out and met a middle-aged pest controller who had come to work on the house. At the same time, an old drunk who lived next door came staggering over to grace us with his inebriated presence lol…

I decided to treat both these people completely equally. As we spoke l continually ‘forgave’ and ‘loved’ both of them as blameless spiritual beings.

At the same time, l was feeling the deep relaxation in my body….l remember thinking that l was ‘listening to them with my whole body’ as strange as that sounds…

After a few minutes of this, their voices started to fade away and it felt like it was just meaningless sounds coming out of their mouths… l felt like l was sort of ‘watching’ the interaction unfold…

I then became aware of being completely surrounded by an indescribable energy that l can only describe as incredibly intense love… The conversation finished and the others left, but l stood there for how long l don’t know… just bathing in this nameless, formless, incredible ‘energy’…. thought seemed ridiculous and trivial and l was completely out of time…

A thought eventually came to me that l had to buy some paint but l didn’t want to interrupt the experience…. I moved slowly and the energy continued to wash over me so l slowly moved towards the side gate…

Everything sort of shimmered and looked amazing. The rusty old tin fence was the most awesome thing l had ever seen! As l slowly walked across the paddock, the dry grass beneath my feet sounded like beautiful song as it broke under my weight…

I also felt incredibly light – almost floating – of course, l wasn’t, but that was still a very strong sensation. I walked past a tree and reached out and touched it. I could feel this same energy in it and l knew that at our core we shared the same source.

I knew that this ‘love energy’ was what l was. It was where l had come from and where l would return to… I remember thinking ‘is this God?’ then laughing at my mind for attempting to label it!

After l bought the paint, l sat on the fence in front of the store and, as the cars drove past, l could feel this ‘love energy’ streaming from my chest to the people then returning to me. It was beyond words.

This state lasted about 4 or 5 days with many amazing encounters similar to the first. My depression completely lifted and l could not even imagine what it had been like…

The feelings gradually diminished and l discontinued my spiritual practices because l felt so wonderful. I often wonder where it would have taken me had l continued, but, being so young (22) and completely healed, l just drifted back into my life that depression had robbed me of …

Thanks for listening and for anyone else on a spiritual path, just calmly continue because the rewards can be unbelievable… 🙏

Mystical Experiencer:  Male in late sixties
Current location:  U.S.A.
Age at time of experience:  10

I was at home, and my grandmother, and parents were in their rooms. I had been playing. For some reason, I believe I had been in the kitchen/dining area. I was in a reflective mood and was praying. I felt a sudden sensation of peace, well-being, connectedness, and love welling up within me. Was overwhelming, brought me to tears.

I felt an overpowering desire to tell my parents that I loved them. Remember shouting that to them up the stairs. Don’t remember how long the sensation lasted, but believe it was a defining moment in my life. Had always felt a closeness to God and already had a desire to go into the ministry.

I pursued that desire and eventually went to seminary, was ordained, served in the parish for 10 years, then 31 years as an Army Chaplain. Currently retired, I’m now a contractor providing Religious programs and services to the US Navy.

Mystical Experiencer:  Female in late forties
Current location:  U.S.A.
Age at time of experience:  47

I was out of work after losing my job at a successful company. I had been dissatisfied with the job but was still slightly depressed. I had been reading books on Buddhism and meditation to help me make sense of my depressive thoughts. This particular day, I decided to go for a walk on a nearby walking trail that meanders near a river and is very peaceful. I thought I would try some of the meditation techniques I had read about.

Up to this point, I hadn’t felt like I made much progress with the meditation and actually felt silly for trying it, but I decided to keep at it. As I was walking along, I started using the breathing techniques and concentrating on the rhythm of my steps and a strange thing happened – I felt as if my feet weren’t touching the ground and I experienced a warm tingling throughout my head.  My head felt like it was slowly being inflated like a giant balloon and my body felt like it was as light as air.

All at once, all the colors seemed brighter and more beautiful and the sounds much crisper. I felt as if I was seeing the earth and everything in it for the very first time, and it was beautiful. I believed that love is everywhere, even where you have not been aware of it before. All my physical pain that I normally have when I walk a distance was gone and, in fact, I did not feel my body. Thinking and breathing and being seemed effortless.

Years ago, I had had a similar experience when experimenting with a hallucinogenic drug and was very shocked to have an even more intense experience while stone sober. After the feeling dissipated, the relaxed and peaceful feeling continued and in fact has happened again, but not as intensely as on my walk. I truly believe I was touched by an unknown life force or entity, and that it is of a higher calling than mere man. I am not a religious person, but am convinced I have experienced the divine.

Mystical Experiencer:  Female in late thirties
Current location:  U.S.A.
Age at time of experience:  33

I was in a dark place, feeling lost and hopeless. Praying for a way out of the darkness. In the months prior to my experience I started feeling a strong pull inside. I started feeling a current of energy that began at the crown of my head and traveled down my spine. It was coming in waves so intense and so loud. A buzzing.

My perspective began to shift and I could truly see what I had become and all I had lost. I started planning a move back to Arkansas to get away. One night, about a week before I was to leave, my experience began. I started seeing colors and patterns, everything became so clear. I knew I it was time to leave. I felt calm and peaceful. The current of energy continued.

I packed a few things and left the rest behind. Said goodbye to my mom who could feel the change in me. I was no longer afraid. I got on the highway and the experience intensified. I felt waves of love crashing over me. I understood everything so clearly. Realizing I had to let go of the past. I had to forgive and accept. Because we are all One Love, all connected.

I drove for 7 hours straight to my grandmother. I was so excited about all I had felt and remembered. I was awakened! She held me and cried out praise and thanks to God. She had been praying for me for a long time.

My father was not so happy to see me arrive early. We got into an argument yelling and cursing in that moment. It was like looking in the mirror and seeing how I had behaved too many times. I got into my car and was filled with anger. I sat there and screamed as loud as I could. Sound was amplified. I could hear the pounding of the paper mill a few miles away. It sounded like it was right next to me.

The car began to vibrate, and the water in my cup holder was vibrating. It felt like the car was going to explode, so I reached for the key to turn of the engine and realized the car was not on. I went back to my grandmother and spent the night. The next day, my dad came to talk to me. He apologized and we cried.

I had planned on staying there, but my kids were in Oklahoma and I knew I had to get back to them. I was no longer afraid. I stayed for 3 days and came back to my kids with a whole new perspective. I felt loved and whole. During the next couple of weeks, I made a new life. Everything flowed so beautifully. The universe was helping me around every corner. That feeling of oneness and loved poured out of me.

For the next 6 months or so, I could summon the waves of warmth and love at any time. It’s been 5 years and I am so grateful for My Awakening. I most certainly would be dead if I had continued down the path I had been on. I feel blessed. I feel like I have been activated, the veil has been lifted, and I remember my purpose. To just Be Love!