What is one of the most profound spiritual experiences of your life? @ecoTrain - Question of the week

This is a very difficult question and having read the accounts that other ecotrain passengers have written, I feel so humbled and in awe that my own response feels inadequate. I can think of a few 'profound spiritual experiences', but I don't know if I want to write about them here, or if I'm even able. These things are very personal, a few of them drug induced, and mostly impossible to adquately describe.

When I think about profound spiritual experiences in my life, what is the unifying factor that they all have in common?

It is the feeling of wonder and awe. The realisation of the connectedness of everything and my part in it. The feeling of being tiny and insignificant, yet at the same time infinite and eternal...

What is a profound spiritual experience?

I'm sure everyone has had a few. You don't need to be a yogi or a priest to have one - although I expect those people may have them more often than the rest of us. But maybe not. I've had a few of my most profound spiritual experiences staggering home from the pub after a few too many pints, and that's a fact - although I'd be hard pressed to remember them in any great detail.

Probably the most profound spiritual experience of my life so far is the one I have absolutely no memory of.. being born.

It seems like a lot of people, maybe all of us, spend much time and energy trying to get back to that feeling. You often hear of people being 'born again' or 'reborn' as being their most profound spiritual experience - whether it comes from a discovery of religious truth, or from some kind of a new age, healing ceremony - or whether it comes from a profound and significant ending, marking a new beginning.

At the same time, it's worth preparing for the next equally profound spiritual experience at the other end of life - the one that will surely come to all of us at some point or other, whether we're ready or not - Death.

The time I was wandering in the woods and came across a patch of wild fly agaric mushrooms (the archetypal huge toadstools with the red cap with white spots) and decided to eat some, led to a profound spiritual experience for me - though not one I'd recommend as those mushrooms are reputedly poisonous if you eat the wrong part, even though they're very tasty.

I found myself lying face down, alone on the forest floor. I was myself, I knew that, but I was experiencing dying in the trenches of the first world war. Like I say, these kind of experiences are hard to describe. Maybe it was some kind of past life regression. Maybe it was just my active imagination. Either way, I think in that moment (maybe it was a moment, maybe a few hours) I experienced the pain, the loneliness, the tragedy of death, yet also the release and the wonder of returning to the 'one and all'. At first I was scared, then I was not scared...

Obviously I didn't actually die. I'm still here, but it left quite an impression on me.

There was another time - also after eating magic mushrooms, wandering around the forest at night - that I saw every path clearly illuminated before me. It was only up to me to choose which way to go. At the time an old old man was talking to me. His voice was deep and wise and with a strong Jamaican accent and we had a very long and interesting conversation. I can't remember about what exactly, but he was very lyrical. In reality, I was by myself and talking to myself - I knew it then and know it now - but it didn't make it any the less real. When we came to a castle, all dark with the windows all lit up in firelight, I knew we had arrived at the gates of Hades, the Underworld, Hell - whatever you might call it - (though I don't really go in for biblical imagery or really believe in heaven and hell) and I had to make the choice there and then - whether to go inside and get all the rewards the man was offering - fame, fortune, great earthly power, unlimited creative talent - of course, at the expense of my soul - that was the deal, as I understood it... or whether to keep walking. So we stood at the crossroads for a while - maybe a moment, maybe a few hours - before I made up my mind to say goodbye to my friend and carry on my way alone, following the illuminated path away from the castle and back towards my friends. What does it profit a man who gains the world only to lose his soul, after all...

I don't know if either of those count as spiritual experiences because they didn't actually happen, strictly speaking - but they left an impression on me.

One aspect of 'profound spiritual experiences' that springs to mind, for me, when I think about moments where I've really felt a oneness and contentedness - is the the feeling of deep peace, love, acceptance and gratitude that comes with them. These are by nature fleeting and transitory glimpses into the 'heavenly realm' - for want of a better description.

These can happen at any time any place - sometimes completely unexpectedly, sometimes with the intention of reaching a higher state.

Places I've had 'profound spiritual experiences' :

On the London Underground, both at off peak times and at rush hour. Also walking along Oxford Street, packed with people.

Sitting by a fire. Anywhere. Somehow it always brings me back to the same place.

Sitting by the sea. Likewise. It's always the same sea, though always changing.

Being in the sea. Especially underwater.

Being in a forest. Trees just do it for me.

Beneath the stars, when I can really see them beyond light pollution. Doesn't happen so often these days.

In the arms of a woman, I've known very deep peace. Not very often, or very lasting, but very deep nonetheless, so worth mentioning along with other 'profound spiritual experiences'.

In sickness, in pain, in a fever. Not the most pleasant way to reach a higher state, but I've had some profound moments, verging on out-of-body experiences while sick with a fever or in pain. Which leads me to consider another aspect of 'profound spiritual experiences' - that being that they are always life affirming.

One of the most 'profound spiritual experiences' I had came about from crashing the motorbike I was riding into the side of a car that pulled out in front of me. After I realised that I was still alive and wasn't paralysed, I was so profoundly relieved and grateful and also filled with wonder and awe, that I would count it as a 'profound spiritual experience'. I damaged one leg quite badly, so had to walk around slowly on crutches for a couple of months, but even that was a spiritual experience as it gave me a deeper insight and respect for old people who I started to notice more, now that I was moving at their pace.

Oddly enough, now that I think about it, the last places that spring to mind for any of my 'most profound spiritual experiences' are churches, synagogues, temples, or any kind of religious buildings. I always like wandering round old cathedrals when I get the chance, to marvel at the incredible craftsmanship of the building, but my actual memorable 'profound spiritual experiences' in such places are very few.

Saying that, on the hill where I live, there is a monastery nearby. It's basically a cave which was carved out by a solitary monk who lived alone up there for many years. You go down some narrow stone stairs to get into it and down there are a couple of rows of chairs - one or two pictures of Jesus and Mary and a cross or two. It is the most profoundly silent place I know, and I must admit I've spent a few moments (or maybe hours) down there in something quite close to a 'profound spiritual experience'.

At the opposite end of the spectrum from silence and stillness, there is music and movement - and of all the most profound spiritual experiences I may have had - I would say that at least half of them have involved music. I don't know what it is about music, but it has this power - to connect worlds, to take you directly to another, deeper, higher place. Sometimes it can happen with full intention, with participation of lots of people, combining energy to reach a higher state. Other times, it can happen quite by surprise. A song might start playing on the radio that will instantly transport you to another time and place, that you'd completely forgotten, but suddenly remember in perfect clarity.

Like music, I think 'profound spiritual experiences' are by nature fleeting. You can't hold on to them, but somehow they get deep inside, become part of who you are and you carry them with you.

---

Click on the picture at the top to hear Crossroad Blues by Robert Johnson.

Legend has it that Johnson sold his soul to the devil at a crossroads in Mississippi in exchange for supernatural guitar playing ability. He is still widely credited as being the father of Rock n Roll and died at the age of 27, reputedly after drinking poisoned whiskey the jealous husband of the woman Johnson was flirting with had given him. I don't know if it's significant that Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin and Jim Morrison also died at the age of 27 in circumstances not entirely different. This world is full of mystery and wonder.

---

Click this link to find out more about ecoTrain and read more great posts
https://steemit.com/spiritual/@eco-alex/see-what-s-trending-today-on-the-ecotrain-read-diverse-and-great-quality-posts-from-14-special-passengers