‘And I have felt
A presence that disturbs me with the joy
Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime
Of something far more deeply interfused,
Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,
And the round ocean and the living air,
And the blue sky, and in the mind of man:
A motion and a spirit, that impels
All thinking things, all objects of all thought,
And rolls through all things.’
William Wordsworth
The poet, William Wordsworth composed these lines while walking along the banks of the River Wye near Tintern Abbey. Such experiences are glimpses of what the philosopher, William James called 'the More'. Throughout history and in every culture across the world, ordinary people leading ordinary lives have described experiences that are essentially very similar. Furthermore, whether we are religious or not, most if not all of us will have one or more of such encounters during the course of our lifetime though we may not always recognise them as such.
They may be no more than what I call 'glimpse moments', moments when we suddenly catch sight of a dimension of reality that is more vibrant, more beautiful, more alive than we we have ever seen before. Psychologist, David Elkins calls them ‘poignant moments’. He speaks of them as moments when ‘our soul is gently stirred, when the sacred brushes against us’ and tells the story of one such experience he had when he was driving to work:
‘On my way to work, I stopped at a traffic light. On my right was a bed of brilliant, multi-colored flowers. The California sun was shining overhead and the intense colors of the flowers almost took my breath away. Suddenly, tears from some unknown place came to my eyes. When the light changed I drove on. But for a few seconds I had touched the beauty and wonder of life. I had experienced a poignant moment.’
Or they may be longer-lasting and more intense. These are joyful, even ecstatic experiences which are often accompanied by a deep sense of well-being and of being fully alive. Sometimes, we may have a strong sense that the world around us is not the inanimate place it appears to be, that everything in the universe is intensely real and alive and that far from being indifferent to us, the world is benevolent and in some way, ‘means well’ by us as psychologist, Steve Taylor puts it.
Anxieties, tensions, doubts and inhibitions give way to feelings of joy, peace, wonder, awe and reverence. We may become conscious of a profound sense of connectedness with all that is. We may feel enfolded in a stream of pure Love. Deep feelings of love and compassion for our fellow human beings and for the world may flow freely from the very core of our being. The philosopher, Henry Thoreau described one such experience in the following way:
‘In the midst of a gentle rain… I was suddenly sensible of such sweet and beneficent society in Nature, in the very patterning of the drops, and in every sound and sight around my house, an infinite and unaccountable friendliness all at once like an atmosphere sustaining me… Every little pine needle expanded and swelled with sympathy and befriended me. I was so distinctly made aware of the presence of something kindred to me…’
Such experiences are moments of mystery that warm the heart and touch the soul. They are ‘mountain top’ experiences that stop us in our tracks and take our breath away. They wake us up. They remind us that there is so much more than this, something far greater and more beautiful than this everyday, mundane reality in which we live out our lives. They are unforgettable. The memory of them takes root somewhere deep within and will not let us go. They are both a gift and an invitation.
Often, they come ‘out of the blue’. They burst into our awareness, sometimes at the most surprising times. And seconds or minutes later they are gone. We cannot make them happen. We cannot control them. We cannot hold onto them however much we may want to. And however hard we try, we will never quite find the words that would do them justice. For they are essentially beyond words.
In his allegory of the Cave in ‘The Republic’, the Greek philosopher, Plato argued that most of the time, we see the world as if we were prisoners chained to a wall in a dark cave and only able to see the shadows that are cast by what exists around us. And so we mistake the shadows for the reality. We fail to recognise that our normal reality is but a shadow world, a pale imitation of what really exists, filtered as it is through the lens of our ordinary consciousness. When we glimpse the More, however, we see the light for the first time. It is like the lifting of a thick mist. Suddenly everything becomes so clear and bright, so intense and alive. And we are filled to overflowing with a joy that cannot be contained. We have caught a glimpse of ‘the really, real world’, as David Elkins calls it, and nothing will ever be the same.
We call them mystical or peak experiences and they are written large in our sacred stories. They are sacred gifts that call for our full attention to that which they disclose. They ask to be heard and honoured as we share our journeys with each other for they have too much to teach us to remain untold. They enable us to perceive the mystery and the sacredness in all things, to see the inner beauty in the ordinary. They teach us to look at the world through the eyes of awe, wonder and reverence. They awaken within us an inner restlessness, an ache, an emptiness, a deep and almost painful longing which can neither be wholly ignored nor fully satisfied. We become seekers and seers, always yearning, always thirsting for another glimpse of the More that they reveal. The soul is the sacred centre deep within us that makes such experiences possible. It is the spiritual core of our being that awakens us to the reality of the spirit-filled world we live in. It enables us to sense and connect with the More, both around us and within us. It opens our hearts and minds to the More. And it is the source of our profound longing to find and follow our own path to the sacred mystery we have glimpsed. It calls us homeward to the very source and ground of our being.
Bibliography
David Elkins (1998) Beyond Religion: A personal program for building a spiritual life outside of the walls of traditional religion. Quest Books
William James (1985) The Varieties of Religious Experience. Penguin Classics
Plato (2007) The Republic. Penguin Classics
Steve Taylor (2010) Waking from Sleep: Why awakening experiences occur and how to make them permanent. Hay House Publishing
Henri David Thoreau (1995) Walden: Or, life in the woods. Dover Publications
©Copyright Kaitlyn Steele 2024
Kaitlyn Steele www.insearchofsoul.co.uk
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