Bob,
It's kinda of spooky reading your e-mail. I also have had a mystical
experience like you described. It was about 22 years ago, when I was just
twenty. I was a rather ignorant youth who's main preoccupation was partying
and girls. I had absolutely no education concerning philosophy or the like
and had little interest in anything that had to do with religion.
I was lying in bed, and started to browse through a book that my cousin had
given me - "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance." My cousin had
highlighted some of the sentences in the first two chapters with one of those
yellow felt pens. So, being lazy, I was only reading the highlighted
sentences.
Then the strangest thing started to happen. As I continued through the book,
past the two chapters my cousin had highlighted, the yellow highlighted
sentences continued. I could actually see the new yellow highlights occurring
as I turned the pages. Also, these new highlighted sentences seemed to hover
about a quarter of an inch off the page. It was the wierdest thing.
Now only two or three sentences were highlighted per page, but they made
sense putting them together. They like dove tailed each other. It was like I
was having a conversation with the book! I know this sounds ludicrous, but I
really did experience this
At first, I sensed that I was communicating with several "entities" or
"personalities". They would tell me things like, "Don't worry about learning
this all now, you have a photographic memory" and then would proceed to talk
about Arete, Dharma, and Virtue. At times, when I started to get a little
freaked out, the entities would chastise each other saying "You're confusing
him!" They would like bicker back and forth to each other. It was kind of
funny.
Throughout their lecture on greek sophists and Socrates, they'd say "We're
getting closer." Like they were communicating from a long distance, but
coming in my direction. It was quite unsettling. Like I said, I was just a
dumb kid with no background or experience with this sort of thing, but I was
fascinated.
When they said, "We're in Arcata now." I got really spooked. It sent a chill
right to my core. I was reading this book in my house in Eureka, CA, and
Arcata is about six miles away.
That's when the thought occured to me that I must be going mad.
Then I read, "No, you're not crazy!" This made me laugh, because they read my
thought and it broke the tension. Then it said, "HA-Ha" and I laughed harder.
It said, "Ha-Ha" again, and I really laughed hard. And I felt more at ease.
There was a sense of humor here.
Then, there was like this internal parting, like a curtain in my mind opening
up, the entities disappeared, and I realized, now, that I was talking to one
thing. God. It is so hard to explain this accurately, but it was like you
said. God's thoughts were coming from within me, but also from outside of me
at the same time. It was like every cell in my body was talking to me along
with every atom in the room. I was both exhilarated and terrified at the same
time. I was litterally awe struck.
He, and it was a "he", talked to me about a lot of things. A lot about
Quality and Dharma. He said he was a monism. He said forget about religion.
Much of what he said I keep to myself. Much of it was personal. In fact, the
only other person I've shared this with was Robert Pirsig in a letter I wrote
to him a few weeks ago. Maybe I'll tell you more about the conversation, if
you're interested.
I guess once I turned forty, I no longer cared what people thought about me,
whether I was some kind of nut or mentally impaired or worse. But, I thought
I'd share the experience with you, because it sounded so similar to your
experience. Especially that internal/external feeling.
Anyway, that's why I never really believe these "Born Again" fanatics who say
they've talked to God, because I know from this experience, you don't just
have a little chat with the guy and walk away unaffected.
The next morning, I couldn't speak. I'd stammer my words or lose my train of
thought in mid sentence. My whole structure of reality had been completely
turned upside down. My sense of reality was in constant flux. It changed
minute to minute. It took me a very long time to "recooperate" from this
whole experience.
It has never happened again, much to my chagrin. A one time deal. But it
influenced the rest of my life. I've since read "Zen..." many, many times.
"Lila" too. Trying to better understand what had happened to me that night.
But I do know, from that night, that Pirsig's metaphysics of quality best
describes the world in which we live.
I also know some good things are going to happen in the near future.
All of this really happened to me, and I remeber it like it was yesterday.
I know some will read this and not believe it, but that doesn't matter to me
anymore. I was there, I felt it, and it did happen. Quality is a mysterious
thing.
Interesting, eh?
Fred
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