Why Mysticism Matters So Much - Andrew Cohen

I had my first mystical experience when I was a 16-year-old secular atheist.  I was sitting up late one night having a conversation with my mother when suddenly the “doors of perception” swung wide open and I found myself in a dramatically altered state of consciousness. Even though I could see the four walls of the room, inwardly, my conscious experience was one of no boundaries whatsoever. I felt like I was swirling in an infinite ocean of my own and everyone else’s Being. The presence of ecstasy was overwhelming and even unbearable at times. In the profundity of this beginningless and endless state, it became apparent that death was an illusion and that everything that exists and does not exist—the seen and the unseen, the known and the unknown—is all inseparable from this one inconceivable mystery.

Mystical experiences can convey to us that no matter what happens to our bodies and personalities in the world of time and space, mysteriously, at some other level, in another dimension of our own being, beyond the mind, everything is always okay.

The lightness of being that flows from the heart and mind of the mystic is very different than the sometimes disconcerting absolute self-confidence of the religious believer. The believer is convinced beyond doubt of the incontrovertible nature of the apparently unique truth espoused by his particular mythic tradition—whether Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, or Buddhist. Of course, in all of these traditions, there are many extraordinary men and women who are transformed in important ways by the liberating power of their faith alone. But the mystic has seen beyond the truth of any particular tradition because he has directly experienced at least what seems like a depth-dimension of reality that transcends all personal, religious, political, and cultural differences. This is because she has access to a truly transcendent knowing of the substratum of reality that remains unseen and unfelt by most. Mystical certainty spontaneously arises from the lightness of being that is the emotional resonance of the deepest dimension of the self.

When the mind is transcended, awareness of the passing of time fades away. And when time disappears, awareness of the world also disappears. All mystics have made the same unexpected and liberating discovery: when awareness of the world and everything in it, including one’s own bodily shape and form, disappears, the most intimately felt sense of “I” still remains. Except now, “I” is all there is—beginningless, endless.

Before time and space, before the universe was born, you didn’t have any problems and the world was not in crisis. That is why lightness of being is the emotional resonance not only of the deepest dimension of the Self, but also of the deepest dimension of reality itself. If we can find access to that Unborn, Uncreated, timeless domain of our own being, then we can know here and now, just like the greatest mystics throughout the ages, that everything is always okay . . .

In an interconnected world where bad news dominates news space, knowing that deeply, everything’s always okay, is more important than ever. It doesn’t mean we are living in denial of the very real and complex problems we are facing. But the ever-new and always-liberating truth of mystical insight spiritually empowers us so that we won’t become discouraged, even on really bad days. Being awake to our own infinite depths empowers us to fight the good fight with courage.