Spiritual Experience

The founders of every great religion had spiritual experiences.  They had direct, often frequent, personal experience of what they considered the divine.  Generally it is this direct personal experience with whatever the individual considers the divine that defines a spiritual experience.  The rest of us can only marvel at these experiences.

One can imagine a continuum of such experieces.  At the most positive end of the continuum would be people like Moses, Jesus, Buddha, Muhammed, and others lost to the historical record who changed the world as a result of their spiritual experiences.  Then there would be various notable, but lesser, saints and prophets.  Even within contemporary history there are people like Schweitzer, Ghandi, Mother Teresa, Martin Luther King, whose spiritual experience has changed the world.  In there somewhere is Bill Wilson and his spiritual experience.  The consequences of the spiritual experience of these individuals has been profound and positive.

The message from all of these highly spiritual individuals has been that beyond the conscious self there is power, or a power, or several powers, that we can access to help us move from destruction to construction, from egoism to concern for others, from dis-ease to peace, serenity and more permanent happiness.