Religious/spiritual experiences. Tell me about them.

catefrances wrote:

well it was my logical side coming out to hassle me that had me in denial. these days i manage to ignore my logical side with more success.

Kenny Olav wrote:

when it passed thru you, did you feel paralyzed? because if so, i'm pretty sure you experienced is the "Old Hag Syndrome".

this is what I came to talk about, because I experienced it, and probably not coincidentally, it happened to me between 3am and 4am.

it started off as a dream, very calm and serene:

I think my dream goes back further than the point I can remember it from, but here is what I recall... I am riding in the back of a friend's car, looking out the window to the left. The two friends I am with are chatting with each other in the front of the car. We are driving in a mountanous area and approach a decent-sized lake on our left. the time of day is the twilight hour, just after sunset. In the corner of my eye, I notice a man wearing a black suit who is floating above the lake. He is looking away from me and slightly up towards the sky, where there is a glowing white aura above and about ten yards in front of him. I somehow float out of the car as it speeds away, and I move towards this man and this aura, who are both driftly slowly and in the same up and outwards direction. As I approach the man, I see he is not moving and appears dead. His suit looks like a suit that a man would be buried in. The aura in front of him begins to take the shape of an angel - a very classical looking female angel with a white dress, soft, almost translucent wings that flutter lazily, hair color that is brown or blonde - its hard to tell because of the light. I float past the man (or his body) on his left. I move up towards the angel. When I get within five feet of her, she turns around swiftly and her face was the most horrible vision I have ever seen, without a doubt. Hard to describe it perfectly, but imagine a combination of the librarian ghost in 'Ghostbusters' and the wraths that appear out of the Ark of the Covenent when the Nazis open it in 'Raiders of the Lost Ark'. I completely freeze, like in a metaphysical vice, and blood begins to ooze out of her eye sockets. At this point, I finally wake up, but I still feel paralyzed and there appears to be a fuzzy lightning-like glow in front of my chest. I fight it as if I'm fighting for my life. The struggle lasts probably about 10 seconds but it felt like it last for at least a whole minute. I shake it off (or maybe the 'sleep paralysis' wears off - as scientists may be correct about) and I can move and take a deep breath. I sit there emotionally stunned recalling every last detail I could of what just happened to me.

about a year or two later, when I found out that other men have had a very similar experience and that this phenomenon has been reported going back centuries, well... it was naturally a shocking revelation to me. why would so many different individuals see this same wrath... this 'old hag'??? and only men...??? i understand that sleep paralysis is a natural effect and that being startled out of a dream could probably leave you in the grip of this paralysis for a little while until you snap out of it. but i get woken out of dreams a lot, and this was the only time i felt paralyzed. also, the drawings I have seen of the "old hag" are exactly what I have seen... and the most common "sympton" of this "syndrome" is the feeling of being paralyzed... but moreso... it's the feeling of having your life force being sucked away. i'm not sure how simple science can explain that away.

well, that's the most profound spiritual experience I have had. I also do feel positive spiritual experiences thru good music and art... and rare communal experiences. so it's not all horrifying

chadwick wrote:

whem i was a young kid, im guessing around 8-10 yrs old, i had night terrors.
i don't know the science of it but i will explain in short what i used to do.
wake up from a sleep but not, eyes wide open but sleep walking like and screaming.it actually was painful for some reason.as in i felt very small and
sort of heavy in gravity like.i'd turn on every light in the house screamin like.
id go outside even.my dad and mom would walk with me, mostly my dad i remember walkin with me outside, im sleepin the whole time, eyes open and can see everything but kinda fogy/hazy or distorted like but not bad.
maybe even things were kinda slowed down.it was wild.done it alot, as in more than a few times.i was quite hyperactice/did poorly in school due to over active thoughts, couldnt focus on the task at hand, thinkin 2,ooo things at once.doc got me on ridilin.that stoped the night terrors.didnt help my schooling much tho.

baraka wrote:

I suffer from sleep paralysis myself. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep_paralysis It is quite unnerving. My first experience was when I was 10 or 11. We were on a road trip and I was asleep in the backseat. I also tend to sleep with my eyes open (creepy I know) when I'm under a lot of stress. Whenever I have had a sleep paralysis episode, I have had my eyes open. So, I usually see everything around me and I don't realize that I'm asleep. When I'm having the experience, I totally believe whatever is happening. I have had this 'old hag' float above me before! First time I saw her was in college. I thought my dorm was haunted until I woke up. Other times I just sense a presence in the room with me, or see a shadow of someone coming down the hall or hiding in the darkness. I'm totally paralyzed and I have trouble breathing.

I think the old-school stories about an incubus or succubus originated from sleep paralysis experiences. There is a painting on in that wiki link that shows an incubus sitting on a woman's chest. People thought this was the reason they could not breath. Also, I think some modern day alien abduction experiences might really be a sleep paralysis experience.

While we are on the subject, I wonder if anyone here has had a lucid dreaming experience? I've always been interested in hearing about those experiences.

baraka wrote:

I have only had 4 experiences (which is quite enough!). The first one I had when I was 10 or 11 and the last one was about 2 years ago. With the exception of the first experience, all the episodes occurred during stressful times. Two episodes occurred when I was in college. My second episode happened when I was 12.

So, no, they don't happen frequently.

Blanche wrote:

I haven't met any angels, perhaps angels in disguise or simply karma forcing me into situations that I choose to make the best of.

On a different level, I think feeling connected with your peers and being in tune with your surroundings are the sum of several elements, among them love and trust.

It's not something that just happens. You have to have an open heart and look around a lot.

Call it cosmic alchemy or fate, I've felt more fulfilled and happier on top of a mountain or lost in a foreign city or horsing around with friends than in the course of any ritual in a church or temple.

Maybe places of worship are too exclusive and try to standardise what can be a very personal experience.

I know that dream interpretation usually goes hand in hand with psychanalysis, but I like to think that some people who appear in my dreams do so to help me figure out what path to take in my waking life.

I do have an odd story. I guess it's my angel story.
My last boss is the kind of guy who will take a chance on someone. He's very talkative and friendly and can offer a cabdriver a new job or talk his way out of a speeding/no seatbelt/talking on the phone ticket. Anyway, I knew him indirectly because he was my brother's boss and gave lots of support to my family when my mom was ill.
Many moons later, he offered me a job. I worked for and with the guy for nearly 10 years. He was aggravating in an endearing way and we had our ups and downs because we're both hard-headed loudmouths, but we were always loyal to one another.
Anyway, last year the company went through a couple of upheavals. Budget cuts signified the end of my contract, which was OK because the atmosphere wasn't the same and as much as I love the people, I no longer loved the place. I felt it was time to move on and this was the right push. Two weeks after it was official that I was leaving, my boss was given notice, too.
It's like he was always around for my brother and then me, as if he was looking out for us when we were starting out and relatively green, and when we finally "grew up" and were ready to leave the nest, he left, too. So this guy occupies a big place in my life and not just because he gave me a job.

Sorry if the story doesn't make much sense.

deadnothingbetter wrote:

I don't know if I was under stress but I was sleeping facing upwards and I was taking a nap on one of these sleeps.
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