Poll: Have you had a mystical experience/out-of-body experience?

In My Humble Opinion
1

It seems to me that throughout history, across centuries, across continents and across cultures and religions, people have had mystical experiences, where they feel they leave their body and/or communicate with beings in another plane of existence and/or experience the ‘ultimate reality’, etc.

So many have experienced these things (I’m not one of them) that it seems that either
a) these experiences correspond to some ultimate reality that those who have not experienced them cannot comprehend or access, or

b) the human brain is uniquely capable of giving people the feeling that they are indeed having these experiences. Almost like an ‘easter egg’, to borrow a term from software.

What I find fascinating is that, despite the fact that all these people from different centuries, cultures and religions, have experienced this, this is not something most people readily share with their friends or colleagues, most likely because of the potential for ridicule.

(I think that if I had had this experience, I would not shut up about it to my friends “Did you know that …?”. In fact, a couple of times during a dream, when I realized I was dreaming, I turned to the “person” I was talking to in my dream and told him “You know, this is just a dream, and you don’t really exist”, at which point he looked very puzzled and the dream promptly ended)

Anyway, overall, I would expect people to be more willing to share these experiences, rather than have all sorts of secret societies/sects/rituals in which only those in the know know what is going on.

It would be enlightening to know how many of the people around us have had these experiences.

So, if you have had any sort of mystical experience (out-of-body experience, seeing other planes of existence, ‘ultimate reality’, God, etc), please let us know.

Let’s not sidetrack this into a discussion about what these experiences mean (whether they reveal the ‘truth’ or are the mind’s ‘easter eggs’). That can be the subject of another thread. For this thread, I’d like to get a count of how many people here on the SDMB have had them.

If you could also list the type of experience you had, that would be great.

2

I have had experiences that would qualify.

In my opinion they were purely physical (that is, not supernatural), having to do no doubt with brain chemistry or some neural happening. Nonetheless, to me they were quite powerful and I think have had a large influence on my approach to philosophy and religion.

I generally avoid discussing them (except among close friends or in the anonymity of an Internet message board), for the obvious reason that “having a mystic experience” is perilously close to things that most people do not wish to be associated with - insanity and charlitanism.

I am now almost 40 years old, and all of these experiences happened in my teens. My memory of them no doubt has faded, so that I am “remembering the remembering of them”, if you know what I mean. Nonetheless, I will attempt a description as best I can.

The one I remember best is the first, which happened at the family cottage. I was by myself in the woods on a summer day, just walking along, when I was suddenly and for no obvious reason overwhelmed with a terrible, inexplicable awe. More an emotion than anything else. It was as if I suddenly knew, beyond any doubt, in the same way you ‘know’ that you are you, that the world around me was sacred, and that the world was “I” - that is, that I was merely a part of the world observing itself, a mere fragment of a glorious and wonderous whole; that love for the world and worship of all things in it is as simple and natural as self-love, because that is really what it is.

It sounds complicated when written, but really it was not - it was just an inherent emotional reaction, an overwelming one. I think I fell to my knees, sobbing with happiness. For that moment death held no terrors - a fingernail doesn’t mourn its passing.

I did not see any hallucinations or commune with any beings or anything of that sort. However, it is quite impossible to tell in words the sheer power of that episode. It was like a blind man suddenly seeing, only to be blinded again as it passed - only more so. Or like falling in love.

Once I recovered, I had two reactions - the first was a desire for more of the same; the second, a concern that it might be a symptom of some sort of illness or insanity. I soon read up on the subject of mystic experiences generally, and found much of what I recognized.

3

never, outside of dreams.

let me add that your responses here may be a bit skewed towards the affirmative, because people will probably be less likely to answer if their experience is an uninteresting “no”.

4

I had the same thought, so I’ll add my own answer: “No, not really”.

5

I have never had an out of body experience.

Mystical is harder. I guess it depends on what we mean by that.

I have had several experiences where I felt “connected” to God (whoever that is.) In fact, one of the things that I regret most about my first operation (things went very bad in that) was I lost all feeling of connection to God. I have sought it often since then, but have rarely experienced it in the last 4 years.

6

Do drug experiences count? Because back in my colorful youth, mescalin usually did the trick for me. Very mystically out-of-body.

Good times.

7

The hippie-surfer culture was in full swing in North San Diego County in the early 70’s and part of it was exploring Eastern religions.

I was about 20 years old and had just started experimenting with meditation. I suppose I had heard of “out of body” experiences, but I sure wasn’t thinking about them or trying to have one when I was doing my meditation.

I was alone in my room one evening meditating (eyes closed) and suddenly I found myself looking down at myself from a place just slightly higher than the ceiling. It was so weird because there I was sitting in the “Lotus” position in the corner, yet some how I was way up above myself looking down. It only lasted a second because it freaked me out so much that I opened my eyes and broke the meditation I was doing.

Never happened again, but I still have the image in my “memory bank”.

8

Another no.

9

Yes, I have. I was a teen, and meditating. More on it if I have time later, but I know it was just my own mind running away with me.

10

I had a really weird experience about 6 or 7 years ago, in a hotel room in Doha, Qatar. I was working as a flight attendant and we had a 24-hour layover in Doha, so we were holed in the “boutique” (read crappy) Al Bustan Hotel there. In the middle of the night, someone/something grabbed me by the ankles and pulled me out of my body and proceeded to drag me across the floor, through the closed door to my room and down the hotel corridor. I was screaming but no sound would come out, until I managed to form the thought, “God, help me!” Suddenly, I was back in my hotel bed, sitting bolt upright and panting like I had just run a record 100-metre sprint.

It happened to me a few more times in other hotels around the Middle East and Asia, until I bought a Mayan Bell from a Feng Shui shop.

Not an experience I would like to repeat.

11

I’ve had the odd “mystical” experience, including dissociative/extrasomatic sensations. This stuff happened to me when I was heavy into meditation and was actively trying a lot of other consciousness altering or “mystic” techniques. I never thought any of it was real, though. I just saw it as some interesting cognitive gymnastics. I gained some insights about myself but I never thought that anything supernatural was going on or that the experiences were anything but physiological. I think that some mystic techniques do “work” in that they can alter consciousness, and I think those altered states of consciousness allow for unusual depths of self-examination in that they kind of let you look at yourself from angles or perspectives you haven’t seen before. It can be illuminating, shaming, terrifying, exhilarating or all of the above, but it still never felt supernatural to me. I never thought God was talking to me. I think I probably touched on some aspects of what people mean when they talk about religious or spiritual experiences but my experiences lacked the sense of hyper-reality that a lot of people describe as well as the certitude that something theophanic or transcendent was going on.

12

The only thing that comes close for me was about 5 years ago. I was sleeping, and suddenly I could see everything. Everything in the universe. It only lasted a second and it woke me up. As I was waking up it felt like I was being kind of pulled through a tunnel, and all of these images (which had a second before just been one big “knowing”) just stacked on top of each other, like that was the only way my brain could process it coming into a concious state. I really can’t describe it or even remember it in a way that makes sense to me now, but when I woke up I just knew that I had seen everything. It was the weirdest feeilng of my life.

13

I’ve only had such experiences while dreaming. Back in my late teens and early twenties, I was into such things as yoga, tarot cards, I Ching, and various types of alternative religions. These activities seemed to stimulate some very unusual dreams, including some rather mystical ones.

I particularly remember a series of four dreams, which occurred over a period of about two weeks. In the first three, I am doing some mundane chore, then look upward; as I do, the sky opens and I realize I am viewing the whole universe. In the last one, a man who looks like the Magician in the Rider tarot deck introduces himself to me as a teacher. He tells me that all human beings have a column of multicolored light at their center; he then shows me a series of people in my life, relatives, neighbors, classmates, etc, including some people I really dislike. As I look at them, they become transparent, and I can see that column of light, where their backbone would be. “That’s their spiritual energy.” he tells me. “Everybody has that at the core of their being.”

All those dreams were intense, but particularly the last one. It was so real to me, that I spent the next day staring at people, expecting to see that column of light. And was very disappointed that I couldn’t! (And they probably thought I was pretty strange, staring like that.)

14

When I was in my teens I experimented with Marijuana.

One night when I was seventeen we went out to try to find some (this was during a ‘dry’ period where it was hard to find). With me was my cousin B (he had a car), my cousin K (B’s inseparable brother), and my friend A (who always seemed to know someone who was selling it). One of the places A led us to was an apartment complex. He went in to an apartment and came back out having found no good news. We were on our way out of the complex when A remembered that he knew someone else there who might have some. He went in and came out to tell us that they had no pot, but they had ‘angel dust’.

I knew nothing about ‘angel dust’ and was on the fence about trying something new. A asked if I wanted to buy some. I looked to my cousins. I’ve always remembered this moment with unusual clarity–as clearly as if it were yesterday. I was in the back seat. B was at the wheel turned to look at me. A was leaning into the car in the open front passenger door. K was sitting next to me. All of them were nodding and looking at me expectantly. It was up to me as it was my money.

Then we were driving out of the parking lot.

For years, every time someone mentioned ‘angel dust’, I recalled these events. In all those years I never noticed that there was something missing from my memory of it. It was like I had a mental block for those moments and had another mental block to keep me from noticing the other mental block.

Then, when I was thirty, I got home from work a little early one night (2:00 a.m.) and decided to see if anything was on TV. I grabbed a beer and sat in an easy-chair and flipped through the channels. I found nothing worth watching and muted the sound. I leaned back in the chair and B, A, and K were all nodding and looking at me expectantly. I said, “No.” A and K both started to talk at the same time, but I cut them off. Again, firmly, I said, “No!” Then A got in the car and B drove off and I sat up too quickly and spilled my beer.

I jumped up out of the chair like I had been given an electric shock.

I didn’t know what had just happened. I still don’t.

15

Yes.

LSD was involved, but I don’t think that disqualifies it.

16

That sounds exactly like a hypnogogic (also known as hypnagogic) and/or hypnopompic hallucination, and I think elements of sleep paralysis. (I just googled and I’m getting different names but you can look and find the “one” that describes your experience to a T.) I had them regularly for years and then they went away. Your description is spot-on - the being grabbed by ankles and going through the closed door and down the hall. It happens now about once every 3 or 4 years, and since I know what they are now they are not as scary, although I still have the exact same experience - cannot move, have no control, but now I think “okay this will be over soon.” Scared the living hell out of me for a long time, to the point where I was afraid to go to sleep.

17

I think I saw you there. You know, that joint with the pink top hats and that smelly guy who turned into a neanderthal?

18

I had a hypnagogic hallucination myself. I had a severe cold, so I took dayquil and feel asleep. I have studied a lot of psychology so I knew what it was while I was experiencing it. It felt so real even when I knew it wasn’t and it is one of the most interesting experiences I have ever had in my entire life. In mine, other entities came into my room and one of them touched me. It grabbed my ankles but then moved its way up my body while I desperately tried to wake up.

19

Okay - so there is a rational explanation for it. Maybe that also explains the occasional sensations I get in bed of someone sitting down next to me while I’m trying to fall asleep - nobody there, but a distinct sense of the mattress dipping like someone is there next to me. Weird!!!

20

Yup, it’s the same thing. I got it once, with a hallucination of a big shadowy man holding me down. Scared me witless.