[MD] Good Mystic, Bad Mystic

[MarshaV]

Greetings,

The "mystical" experience is given such abstruse connotations, but it is thoroughly empirical.   There are thousands of words devoted to explaining such experiences;  RMP devotes many words to his experience.  There are many different practices devoted to encouraging such experiences.  While talk of mystical experience might be out of the ordinary and difficult, there is no reason it should be a banned and discredited topic.  

"Before a man studies Zen, to him mountains are mountains and waters are waters; after he gets an insight into the truth of Zen through the instruction of a good master, mountains to him are not mountains and waters are not waters; but after this when he really attains to the abode of rest, mountains are once more mountains and waters are waters."

This talk of good mystic - bad mystic is just not very helpful; it only adds to the abstruseness of what is right before you and nothing special.  If you have not had even one such an experience, you will.  It is a matter of lifting the veil of separation.  Having such an experience changes the reference point of the intellect.  Maybe it does not change intellectual patterns, but it does change the way one thinks about things (the intellect).  Having such an experience changes the intellect in a way that a "theory of truth" never could.  Imho.  

"The purpose of mystic meditation is not to remove oneself from experience but to bring one's self closer to it by eliminating stale, confusing, static, intellectual attachments of the past. "
          (LILA, Chapter 9) 


Marsha