Page 11 - SPRING 2024 News and Views

Synchronicity: Meaningful coincidences which can give guidance (as in oracles) and can help us to
see the less obvious workings of the world, which can generate awe and wonder. ‘There are more
things in heaven and Earth, Horatio than are dreamt of in your philosophy.’

Mystical: can include the Unity Experience and the dissolution of the ego. Similar to the Numinous?
Can include a changed perception of ‘reality,’ of time and space. The whole world is seen as an
integrated and unified whole.

Paranormal: Rarer examples include contact with ghosts, angels and spirits and more commonly
clairvoyance and telepathy. Perhaps healing (including ‘holding in the light’?) could come into this
category.

Aesthetic: prompted perhaps by nature, music, art or architecture. These experiences often produce
a sense of awe. Interestingly, awe is listed as one of ten positive emotions generally conducive to

desirable life outcomes, namely: awe, joy, gratitude, serenity, interest, hope, pride, amusement,
inspiration and love.

The authors talk of the transformative experience of the spiritual experience. Many spiritual experiences
last only a few minutes but their effects can last a lifetime. They can shift the experiencer to a different,
wider view of ‘reality.’

Spiritual experiences may lead to a journey of search and spiritual practices but in some cases are put
aside. Bertrand Russell had a profound spiritual experience which changed his perception of the world
and other people but he decided to call it ‘a delusion with benefits.’

The authors take the view that spiritual experiences in the main have positive outcomes and can be
studied and understood. It’s possible ‘to eff the ineffable’ they say.

On the other hand they quote William James, who wrote Varieties of Religious Experience in 1902, who

says, ‘There is some genius of reality that escapes from the pressure of the logical finger, that says
‘hands off’ and claims its privacy, and means to be left to its own life.’

Psychology has come a long way from its behaviourist roots in attempting to research spirituality and
consciousness even if its approach is still extremely agnostic about the metaphysical importance of
spiritual experiences. For example, does a Near Death Experience give us insight into the reality of life
after death or is it just an hallucination? Psychology sits on the fence on that one!

All in all, the book in my opinion is an interesting and ground-breaking read and I certainly recommend it
if the study of spirituality from the perspective of psychology interests you.

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