I never had one of these but I wondered if anyone here had one.
With mystical experience I mean a sudden unexpected mindblowing feeling of unity. You can’t explain or describe in words what you feel, but you simply KNOW everything in this world is united and connected to each other. Most people have VERY intense emotions and their lives sometimes dramatically change after having this experience.
What’s your opinion about them? Are they real? Can they be explained by conventional science or are they much more than simply some neural interactions? And could there be a connection between mystical experiences and LDing or OBE? Share your thoughts 
Sages Saints and Avatars:
cosmicharmony.com/Av/AVmain.htm#SaintList
Christ & the Kundalini:
sol.com.au/kor/8_01.htm
Seems like its closely related to kundalini.
Even if science could measure you while you were in state of bliss, they would probably just see some hormones that cause euphoria rushing through you more than usually. I think more important is what it means to yourself than proving it to people that dont believe in spirituality. Science just cant measure consciousness and experiences like that really.
Dreams seem mystical to me in the way they give you chance for self realization and guiding with their symbolical irrational and often even chaotic messages. They reflect those deeply rooted mental aspects in you that affect how to perceive life but they are so integral in you that they might sometimes be sort of blind spot for waking life consciusness. So dreams allow you to build bridge between subconsciousness and waking consciousness and in that way make your mind overall more united. And lucid dreams are really good example of how much creative power we really have inside ourselves and they are great fun too. 
I don’t think thres any myctical in it, it’s completely a natural thing that everyone can experience thru some practise. It is one part of the so called “enlightenment”. Theres different levels of experiencing the unity and theres lots of more to understand than just the unity of all.
I think its real, but I don’t think it has anything to do with OBEs or lding.
I don’t think it can be proven, but I’ve heard it usually comes when the mind is ready for it so maybe theres some scientifical aspect in it.
Hmm, I experienced something similiar.Although, since I think that I know what you mean, I got to say that it wasn´t as strong.
Still, it was in skiing holiday.I lay on my bed and stared at the ceiling, thinking about some philosphical question.I lay there for some time, since I was relaxing after the ski-day.Then, all of a sudden, I realized how easy the answer is, it was like someone just told me the meaning of life.
Then my parents called for me to help them in the kitchen, I got up and walked over.My perception was changed while doing so (today I´d call it lucid living).And, sitting in the kitchen and cutting onions, it felt so strange to do so.Like it was ridiculous to just go on doing such normal things.
After some minutes it faded.
When I thought about the problem and my answer to it, it was to me like I just overlooked anything, and that I didn´t really find the answer (or that it isn´t possible to find the answer).
Now I forgot what it really was about, but I don´t think it deosn´t matter anyway.The only important thing was the feeling it triggered.
Again, I want to say that it was a cool experience, but not what I´d call enlightening or live-changing.Perhaps I just got tiny look on what enlightment is like
Traumgänger
Traumgänger: nice experience you had 
I had a few of those lucid living experiences too. Sometimes I kinda felt like a stranger in my own body. I saw everything very clear and it felt as if I was not a part of this world, I was only an observer. But these feeling were over in a few minutes.
Perhaps lucid living experiences are basically the same as mystical experiences, with the exception that the latter are much deeper and more profound. But that’s only my opinion
Traumgänger, you had a low satori, “a glimpse of enlightenment”. If you would have known a little more about it I think you would have continued thinking about it and finally got a long way with it…
I think the thing that you felt it was nonsense cutting onions was because you kinda realized (without you knowing, like you had a feeling, or something ) that nothing really matters, everything is under a constant change and we are all going to die anyway.
Mystic, that sounds like a near ego-death experience. Wicked.
And once again I say it: theres nothing mystical about them… bleh, you don’t listen anyway 
@Mystic
Mystic, also cool experience.Did something happen to you before the feeling started, or was it triggered by something?
I ask cause someone told me he felt once exactly the way you do.It was while choosing a tomb-stone for her dead father…
@Dead
Satori, I heared that name once before.Perhaps that´s really the right word for it, probably I should read a bit about it.I think you are also right about the feeling that nothing matters.
To your statement that it isn´t a mystic thing, and to your other post where you said that you don´t like all that esoteric stuff:
IMHO noone is able to explain or even describe reality.So, all we do is creating models that work for certain things.
Physics is a nice example.They explained and described how a stone is flying when you throw it away, and I think we all agree that they are right.But now they got quantum physics, and there the old models don´t work anymore, so they try to create new ones.Now they got two models, that both are right, but perhaps are contradictory.Another very good example are the different atom-models from chemistry.
Science is giving models, and “spiritul” people give other models.In many cases the scientific models are more useful than the spiritul ones.For example, if you want to know if your bridge will stand a storm or not.But that doesn´t mean that the scientific model is “more right” than the spiritul one.It is just more useful in that case, since it is better to cover that certain aspect of reality.
Anyway, for other things the spiritul models are better.
For example to deal with things like satoris.Of course, you could also explain it by special hormones that activate neurons in the brain or something.A spiritul model wouldn´t be “more right” than that scientific one, but to me it is just more useful dealing with the experience.
Sometimes it also can be helpfull to think about one thing in several models at once.I think in this case, the most important one to me would be a spiritul one.But at the same time, I´d also be interested to hear what happened in my brain, or what the modern psychologist say about it.
All three groups will probably tell me different things, and neither of them is right or wrong, but they (perhaps) all help me dealing with the experience.
Sorry, didn´t want to change topic, but it just happened that I found the right words to describe how I feel about that stuff.
Traumgänger
Traumgänger: as far as I remember nothing really triggered it. It just happened to me totally unexpected, when I was walking around, reading a novel or listening to some music. So nothing special caused the experience imo.
Only one time I could strengthen the feeling by concentrating and vividly imagine I really was a stranger in my own body. But then again, it was over in a few minutes… Perhaps there’s a way to induce these experiences?
Personally I don’t know what to think about all this, but I’ll definitely try to find something about satori and near-ego death experiences.
For now I consider them as spiritual experiences, because to me this is the way they felt. Everyone who has such an experience should be free to decide how to handle with them. Some people write spiritual novels or try to express their feelings in surrealistic paintings, while others try to discover how the brain creates them. You can’t say it has to be thís explanation while all the rest is wrong. Everyone makes up his own mind and believes in his own truth, which depends on your cultural background, religious or scientific beliefs, etc… No one else has to decide that in your place.
It all depends on how you define “mystical”.
Let me bring back my opinion i shared with you few times allready.
Would you call love “mystical feeling”?.I guess most of us who felt it really strong would agree it is.Everything looks different then,different colours,different people,…so on.People in love often feel mistical and theres not much to be proved here,almost everyone feels it the way hes found out something special,unreal,amazing and beautifull.
Now we have science minds who will tell us thats just hormones,chemical substances in the brain,they will even tell you its not “real”.
I say "so what?"Recently there was a lot of talk that this forum gets too spiritual ,you can also say mistical.It was said in the manner that its something lower,something not worth to think about cuz its just “unprovable” and similar to “wishfull thinking”.
Again "so what?"Is it really less important?less touching?less anything?
NO,it adds the depth,it adds the feelings…feelings many lack in modern world.
Mystical is important,and wheter its sciencifically provable or not it changes nothing.I feel sorry for people looking at averything from the angle of science-Love mentioned on the beginning- does sciencific definition satisfiy you?Once you have it written and thorn into pieces in science magazines- does that definition help you when you in love?why would you need it at all?
Maybe some people just feel better when they can say about themselves that they dont believe in things not proven or defiined by science…but do they really?
Take care
I was walking along a beach about 15 years ago and suddenly with out warning it felt like I was having an waking OBE type thing. Strange physical sensations, everything looked …not right, sounds were not right either. It suddenly occured to me …“your not real, nothing is real, I am not here, neither is this beach. I am everyone and everywhere, yet no one and no where”. There are just not words to explain this properly.
I honestly thought I was dying…and I must have looked really spaced out or something because the people I were with all started asking me what was wrong. One even said I looked like I was dying. It was so bizarre , it felt like slow motion. I was just looking at them blankly and thinking “your not real either”. I could not answer anyone I was too caught in the thought of all these “people” imagining these lives and none of them are real". I felt like I was just a peice of energy stuck in a dreamworld. I knew my concious was part of something bigger than all imagination.
Just to shake the ground a little with my generally unwelcome, black & white, 5-sense scientific view of all and everything, I’d like to provide my opinion of ‘enlightenment’, if I may.
In my definition, enlightenment is the appropriate name for a set of calculated opinions and related facts that can flawlessly support the world on top of them. There should be NO associated bodily sensations or ‘mystical’ feelings during the point of embracing enlightenment. Should there be, then you can be certain that a chemical reaction has occurred within your brain, and you might as well be intoxicated - as opposed to suddenly capable of comprehending every aspect of life and existence.
Enlightenment would provide a profound understanding of exactly what you are feeling through everyday life, though hard times, and though pleasurable experiences. Contrarily, the majority of so-called personal accounts of total or near enlightenment always seem to be accompanied by an intense flood of pleasure and uplifting spiritual embrace. Surely this is itself an oxymoron. How can you be enlightened if you can’t even explain what you are feeling?
For me, enlightenment followed a series of startling realizations about what is. I recently fell into a very depressing and somewhat careless daily schema, forever leading myself into a rhetorical pattern of thoughts that would end eventually by slamming my fist into a wall, or screaming until I could break the relentless nagging depression that tried to cover my eyes while I was driving. That’s what I get for shaking the autumn tree so hard that no more leaves were left to cover my view of life, and provide at least the opportunity to ‘hope’. But as it so easily could have, it didn’t end there. I took turns consulting friends and other acquaintances in the most unlikely places, and I worked out a lot of things.
To me, it’s utterly clumsy to mistake a chemical intoxication for a mystical or spiritual experience, and more accurately points the finger at the apparent combined effort of both existing ignorance, and unwillingness (read: fear) to make an effort to explain things yourself. If I didn’t already like my signature so much, I’d probably replace it with something like “Science does not exist to disprove religion - it’s just kinda happened along the way” to save me typing it out in each and every relative post.
You can look at things in one of two ways. You can take the information that you have, examine it, test it, and learn how it works. Or, you can create the information, change it as necessary to force it to work together, and blindly follow it. Guess which one actually allows you to be happy. Heh, I almost let out a chuckle just then. Probably would have shocked one of my inner components.
Ah damn, does this entire message sound morbid and terrible? I just wanted to point out that plausible physical evidence is available (as always) to explain these floods of emotion and feeling at these proclaimed moments of spiritual enlightenment.
Physical evidence? Do you mean things such as chemicals and endorphins?
I think our chemical balance that triggers emotions during things like ‘enlightment’ is an affect, and not the cause of our emotions.
I posted my own topic with this stuff, but I read this topic, and it’s somewhat related! I experienced something incredibly mystical and it was through the help of REM dreaming.
That’s right! I said lucid in waking AND dreaming state… To become lucid in waking state, is to realize that your powers are as equally infinite as your powers when you’re sleeping state.
Where to begin…
I’d like to start by introducing myself… I’m a first time poster here, but a long time reader! I’ll get to the main point though… Does anyone else believe that the dream and waking state are the same thing? Only difference being that in the waking state, you have other perceptions that hold a foundation… Let me start from my beginning… I believe that one can achieve enlightenment, understanding of life, evolve, and full potential of one’s mind has through breaking all the invisible limits and boundaries that hold a person back.
Growing up in society has really constructed many invisible boundaries on my infinite mind. As a young child, I always remembered my dreams, and had lucid dreams without even knowing there was a name for it. But sometime around when I started school, my lucidity levels dropped severely… Then dream recall also dropped severely… and then the only dreams that I recalled, were the nightmares that woke me, or forced me to awake in the middle of the night!
Also growing up in society (the planet’s dream), took me away from the true meaning of life… With the buffet of lies put in front of me, my perception of life became poisoned! I was striving to fit into this awkward mold in fear of rejection… Then I also fell into the consumer, passive observer state… Where I felt I couldn’t do anything to change the world… I could only accept the fate that was given to me…
But around 3 years ago, after Sophmore year in highschool… My friend pulled the blindfold off of my eyes! I realized that the feeling of being controlled, and confused were all in my mind. My friends and I started to have deep discussions about society, people, god (life), and dreams… For 2 years, there was much talk and I truly felt that I was gaining much progress on my path to enlightenment… But something was missing.
I had a large pool of theory to draw from by 1 year ago, through lots of devestating experiences in my life (much learned though), more discussions and experimenting with drugs. But there was still something missing! Once I truly understood the pattern of life, I realized that I was held back by laziness and fear… I was often finding excuses to squealch my dreams. I had begun to remember my dreams again during the last 3 years. I’m sure it had to do with my mind getting stronger and breaking more limits! I even had an occasional lucid dream here and there!
This is where it get’s very interesting… As my waking life was getting better (leaning towards true intentions and filtering out societies beliefs) I began to have more power in my sleeping state. Breaking myself away from the pointless stress of the planet’s dream, eased my sleep! It makes sense that having a more peaceful waking state will directly do the same for dreams. I then started to heal scars from the past that were holding me back in my waking state! I was learning more about myself and becoming more aware of what was restricting my potential! As I healed my scars and became more aware of the invisible walls, I began to break them in my waking life. I started taking stong actions and doing things that I was terrified to do! I opened up myself to a lot more people, putting my pride and ego down, making myself vulnerable, I stepped out of the comfort zone, and danced tigers and wolves! I persued my deep feelings for a girl… that was the biggest step!
My life has taken a turn for the better, I feel that I’m getting closer to enlightenment… I’m becoming less and less restrained by time and space… fear and laziness. It all reinforced and stablized with the realization and acceptance that I am always in a state of dreaming. With that one affirmation, I was able to become lucid in my waking state more frequently! My ability to connect with other people has grown and my mind has opened up doors to the spiritual side…
So I’m just wondering, did anyone else experience a similar path, or is on a similar path currently? I truly believe there is a direct corrolation between one’s waking quality of life, and sleeping quality of life. A balance if you will… Let’s hear some more theories and ideas! A lot of my progress came from people making a difference… A lot of my influence came from indulging myself in truth and life… Like Siddhartha, The Four Agreements, Waking Life, The Matrix, Fight Club, Truman Show, The Wheel of Time, Pink Floyd, Tool, Led Zeppelin, SuperTramp… and so much more!! One can learn the the secrets to life from anything and everything… from a book, to music, to movies, all the way even to a rock. Anyway, this was a long post I know… but hopefully we can get some great feedback! -DeyBwah
Sorry for copy pasting, but some people don’t read all the topics…