Having accidently learned meditation as a kid I have had many such experiences. Imploring subjectivity to come about is quite a reward in itself.

I have at one point thought I witnessed jinn which made me explore Islam.
A reoccurring thing I am able to do is elevate my mood by sheer will power. I induced myself into a state where I feel weightless but I am fairly certain this has to do with blood flow or reduced heart rate, which I know for a fact I am reducing during meditation.

All of my experiences have been fairly mystical although they are by no means supernatural

Sejanus. I'm not sure what you mean when you say about thinking I have a 'personal deist' God. That seems a contradiction of terms to me. Could you perhaps talk a little more about how you see deism relating to a personal God, so I can better understand what you're saying?

As for why I call myself a Christian, it is simply because I put my trust in, and follow, Jesus Christ. Having explored Christianity further (as an adult; I had a childhood faith in Jesus), after that spiritual experience, I found the person of a Jesus compelling, and have put my trust in him. That doesn't mean I'm certain about anything, but rather it means that is where I have put my trust.

I think it was mostly all in my head, but it was very real at the time. And it felt...good.
I think it has a lot to do with being told how you will/should feel consistently over long periods of time and wanting to feel that way.
The best way to describe it will probably only make sense to Americans. As an adult I have learned that patriotism can be a joke and it makes no sense to think my country is the best and/or to be blindly loyal to my country. But I still get that feeling every time I say the pledge of allegiance or the national anthem.
I think it's kind of like that.

(August 20, 2014 at 1:25 am)Michael Wrote: Sejanus. I'm not sure what you mean when you say about thinking I have a 'personal deist' God. That seems a contradiction of terms to me. Could you perhaps talk a little more about how you see deism relating to a personal God, so I can better understand what you're saying?

As for why I call myself a Christian, it is simply because I put my trust in, and follow, Jesus Christ. Having explored Christianity further (as an adult; I had a childhood faith in Jesus), after that spiritual experience, I found the person of a Jesus compelling, and have put my trust in him. That doesn't mean I'm certain about anything, but rather it means that is where I have put my trust.

From your comment it sounded like you meant the worldly religions were just different interpretations of the one god, and you only got 'flavoured' with christianity because of where you were born. So the god would be personal, i.e has some care about humanity, your "loving numen", if you will, but deist, because it isn't associated with any religion. Or am I just crazy?

Ah, I see. I think that's a little unusual use of the term deism (which usually implies a Crewtor god who then takes no further interest in creation), but I see what you're saying now.

With regards different religions I think there are various ways of looking at it from a Christian perspective. Those have been summed up as:

1. Christianity is right. All others are wrong, and all others will be damned. We might call this 'fundamentalism'.
2. Christianity is right and other religions are true in as much as they align with Christianity (e.g. 'Do as you you would want done to you' and 'care for others'). We may assume that those seeki goodness in other Christians would, and will, embrace Jesus when they see Jesus for who he is. Sometimes such people in other faiths are known as 'anonymous Christians'.
3. All faiths are equally good paths up the same mountain.
4. Different faiths have different degrees of 'truth'. People of all faiths may catch glimpses of the fullness of truth, but no faith contains all truth, because 'Truth' is bigger than any faith. It is possible, however, to be led down bad paths, away from rather than towards the fullness of truth.

I would be somewhat of a mix of 2 and 4 and probably lean more one way one day, and lean the other on another day.

So I answered yes, I am quite certain that I have. It was spread out over many events. They were all very positive and I was appreciative to experience them. I experienced some of 4, 5 and 6 during these experiences.

Especially during physical activities I had the sense of merging with something greater, during dance and yoga especially. But I also had the insight (felt as a visceral truth at the time) that the wisdom of the body did not depend on the thoughts in my head. There was a sense of refraining from interfering with that wisdom. So I experienced the skateboarding, basketball, yoga, badminton, racketball, dancing and spelunking not as activities I was directing with my thoughts, but as activities I was willing to delegate to that in me which knew more. That led to experiences which included elements of items 4, 5 and 6.

The experiences I was having made sense to me at the time in terms of this general sense that there was more to me than my deliberative mind. I would have many insights or realizations about many things but to grab one and try to clarify required stepping outside the stream of insight. So, as with the physical activity, I decided there was no need to solidify these realizations into words or to even hold them in my conscious mind. I acquired confidence that the realizations I was having were showing themselves to me but then returning to abide where they had always been. I realized that I could attempt to capture and tag each one but that would take me outside the flow of actually experiencing what was relevant in the moment. To stay there I had to let everything pass, stay empty, and have faith that that in me which sees/knows more would continue to show me what was needed in each moment. I abandoned certainty for faith. I don't call the totality of myself "god" but I can see how someone raised in such a tradition might.

I voted for 13, that the experience has made a change in me more as a disposition of openness toward the totality of myself, which I have decided to abide with in gratitude rather than to subdue and control. (No regrets.) This gives me a lot of empathy for others and the complexity of finding our ways.

Not surprisingly, nothing.... voted 1.

3, 9, 11, and 17 are all valid descriptions of what happened to me.

At 7.5 years of age and thoroughly indoctrinated by the Church, I was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes. I felt calm about the whole thing, despite my parents freaking the fuck out. I even said to my dad "I know God has a plan for me." It felt pretty religious/spiritual/whatever to my half-formed brain at the time, and it fit in with my worldviews, like God was testing me or something.

Now, it fits in with my current world view like this: Shit happens, and people are going to rationalize or spin their situation to fit their beliefs. I certainly did that back then, and if it were to happen today, I'd take whole responsibility for the onset, because I feel that I must be self-reliant to the furthest plausible extent. Basically, it's just confirmation bias. When "life" happens, you'll find a way to force it to fit your view.

That was one specific event, and over 11 year span that contains both Diabetes and Christianity, I don't recall anything similar.

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On a different track, I've had "moments" where I'm on my skateboard or my bike, going down the street, and I've hit a rock or something, and nearly toppled, and I think to myself: "I could be injured right now, that was pretty lucky." And on occasion, when that happens, I'll start thinking about alternate realities and all the times that I could have been seriously injured or even killed by chance, and it throws me a little bit. I've never thought "God's looking out for me" or anything along those lines since I've de-converted, but it does throw me, and every now and then, I wonder if there might be something out there trying to keep my fool head on my shoulders.

I made a mess of voting because I meant to click on 9 and 11 but I think I did 10 and 11.

Quote:9. The experience I had made sense to me while it was happening within a frame of reference I already had. (Which one?)

11. The experience I had was one I've come to recognize as fitting a frame of reference I did not possess at that time. (Which one?)

I had a few experiences before I discovered Jungian psychology so I didn't have a frame of reference at the time. Some experiences after I'd discovered it made a lot more sense. Other experiences which don't fit the Jungian frame of reference are explained by neuroscience but it's difficult to classify them.

'Seeing ghosts' - if I believed in the Spiritualist religion, ghosts would be a sort of religious experience, I suppose.

A water spirit rising from a pond in Wales - I suppose it would be a sort of religious experience if I was a pagan who believed that water spirits are real.

(August 20, 2014 at 10:38 am)Confused Ape Wrote: I made a mess of voting because I meant to click on 9 and 11 but I think I did 10 and 11.

Well you ordinarily do not strike me as very confused at all, fellow simian. But did you realize that you could vote for as many as you like? Also you can go in and change any vote you like.

I also voted for both since I had a frame of reference at the time and that has been enlarged since.