The Nature of a Mystic

There are five things to consider when one is trying to understand the nature of a mystic; his temperament, his dream, his outlook, his meditation, and his realization.

For a mystic time does not exist; it is only to be found on the clock. Life for him is eternal, and the time between birth and death is an illusion.

Every good and every bad experience he accepts as a lesson, and he thinks that all of them lead him onward. If it is a bad experience it is also a lesson; if it is a good experience, so much the better; but they are all leading him towards his purpose in life.

The quality of a mystic is the outgoing quality, the sympathetic, loving quality; and yet the mystic is detached and indifferent. Deep love on the one side, indifference on the other; together they make the balance of his life. In loving another he loves God, in serving another he serves God, in helping another he helps God: and in this way he worships.

In his worldly life, neither a rise nor a fall is very important to him, but at the same time he may experience all things.

It is the self-control of the mystic that balances his pleasure and displeasure, his joy and sorrow. It may be that others cannot realize it or feel it; nevertheless, if the mystic's feelings were not delicate, and if there were no subtlety in him, he could not be a mystic. On the one hand the mystic is most subtle; on the other hand he is most simple. 

He can be wise, and he can be quite innocent. Often people call the mystic an old soul, and yet he can be like a child.

Now we come to the dream of the mystic. It may be that other people have seen a mystic in trance, or meditating with closed eyes; but this is not necessary. With open eyes or with closed eyes: the mystic can dream either way. He may be in a crowd on in solitude, in both paces he can dream. To the mystic the dream is reality, although to another it might seem a dream. It is reality to the mystic because of his faith in what is written in the Scriptures, that when God said, ‘let there be light ‘and it became light and also in what the Vedanta say, that manifestation is the dream of Brahma the Creator. The mystic, who realizes the Creator within himself, thinks that his dream is the Creator's dream; if the Creator's dream is all this which we call reality, then the dream of the mystic is the same. If it is still in the mental sphere, that does not mean that it will never materialize; it will surely materialize one day.

Yet one often sees that the mystic lives above the world and many think that he is not conscious of the world. But they do not know that for that very reason that he lives above it, he is more conscious of it.

The mystic not only sees the reason of everything and anything; he sees the reason behind the reason, and behind that still another reason, until he touches the essence of reason, where what we call reason is transcended. As far as we can see, we see only a cause, but what the mystic sees is deeper than a cause; it is the cause of all causes. And by this his outlook changes from the ordinary outlook. Thus, it may happen that the language of the mystic seems like chatter; people cannot understand its wisdom because they only use their sense of reason.

The mystic is the friend of many, but for a mystic to find a friend is difficult. It is difficult enough for anyone to feel that there is even a single person in the world who understands him, so how much more difficult must it be for the mystic! He can only try to understand himself; but if he can do that it is quite sufficient. The mystic does not concern himself much with what will be the immediate result of anything; he concerns himself with what will be the final result. This makes his point of view different from the worldly point of view.

With regard to the meditation of the mystic, one should remember that it is part of his nature as an inner disposition, and every day, he has some way of meditating. The mystic never has to say that it is difficult for him to meditate; he is at home in it. It is his nature, his pleasure, his joy. Meditation is his life. And the meditation which lasts fifteen or twenty or twenty-five minutes is to the mystic only a kind of winding up. His meditation takes place every moment of the day; there is not one moment when he is not in a state of meditation, no matter what he is doing at the moment. In the crowd and while working, in all conditions the mystic continues his eternal meditation.

The mystic's realization

It is the mystic who realizes the latent power in every person, and he realize it even to such an extent that no one could believe it if it were to be put into words. He realizes the latent inspiration in man, an inspiration which culminates in revelation, when every object and every being begins to communicate with him, when he knows and sees and understands and realizes the essence of the whole of life. The mystic knows what perfection means, for it is in perfection that his joy and his happiness are to be found.

I invite you to ponder the mystical path and find out for yourself what it means to be a mystic, you may discover in it a wholesome way of being.