(December 15, 2016 at 9:40 am)robvalue Wrote: So maybe it's a matter of losing yourself in the subject matter. Maybe when I play a game or watch a film and become fully immersed in it, it's a spiritual experience. I'm pretending that I am the character in the game, or that the characters in a film are "real".
I think both those activities COULD be spiritual ones, but I also think I have to give a caveat to my former definition. I'd say there has to be either a feeling of elevation beyond one's normal range or capacity, or at least an attempt to elevate oneself.
So for a game or movie to be a spiritual experience, I'd say (and this is just me moving goalposts slightly) that you'd have to feel those things connected you with a part of yourself you couldn't otherwise connect with, and that you felt dramatically elevated because of that.
But to be fair, I've been in "the zone" in sports a couple times and in music several times, and in the case of music I'd definitely say that was a spiritual experience to me. So was my viewing of certain movies.