I’m reading a book called The God Part of the Brain by Matthew Alper. Mostly, I think it’s a pretty interesting book. (there’s one thing that really bugs me about it, but otherwise it’s a good read). Anyway, he talks about how mystical experiences are found across cultures, which implies that there is a genetic component to them. In other words, every culture in recorded history talks about having mystical experiences so it must be something happening in the brain that is genetic. There must be genes associated with the way the brain works in certain circumstances that cause that phenomenon in people around the world.
Let’s define a mystical experience first. Dan Merkur, author of Gnosis: An Esoteric Tradition of Mystical Visions and Unions, lists the five most common symptoms of a mystical experience (from The God Part of the Brain, pg 134)
- a sense of unity or totality
- a sense of timelessness
- a sense of having encountered ultimate reality
- a sense of sacredness
- a sense that one can not adequately describe the richness of their experience
I was deeply religious as a child, from about age 4 to 12. I was so terrified of burning in hell that I was baptized 3 times in 3 different churches. I went to Sunday school, church, bible camp, I sang hymns, I prayed, I studied and read my bible, and had bible lessons for a short while. But in all those years, I never once had a mystical experience. I never felt god. I never felt the touch of the divine. Read the rest of this entry »
As a typical person trying to watch my weight, I count calories. Not obsessively, but I try to keep an eye on how much I eat. Like a lot of people, even though I watch what I eat, I’m still always fighting to not gain weight, and getting more frustrated all the time.
