Perhaps no archetype is more coveted or more misunderstood than the Mystic. Many want to believe that they have mystical inclinations, yet underestimate how arduous the genuine mystical path is. When they find out, they’re usually happy to let someone else have this role. The lives of the world’s great mystics often included extraordinary states of consciousness such as prolonged ecstatic trance, and preternatural abilities of precognition or bilocation. Yet they also contained sometimes great physical as well as spiritual suffering, hard work, and mundane activities that made up much of their days. If you truly want to name this archetype as part of your sacred consortium, ask yourself if you are ready to pay the price in blood, sweat, and tears. If mystical consciousness is something you engage in once a day during meditation, or on a weekend retreat or a yoga workshop, you may be a spiritual seeker, but not a Mystic.
The single-minded dedication of the Mystic carries over to the Renunciate, who relinquishes material desires and ambitions to pursue spiritual practice; the Anchorite, who withdraws from the world almost entirely to follow a similar path; and the Hermit, who withdraws from others to pursue a solitary life, although not always for spiritual purposes. There is a radical difference between an Intuitive and a Mystic. An interest in intuition has grown as we have evolved into an energy culture, a psychic culture, a multi-sensory culture. The Intuitive or Psychic develops their skill for personal use in contrast to the Mystic who seeks a spiritual life to benefit others. Nobody is called to be an Intuitive—that is a choice, not a calling. The Mystic is called and there is a feeling of being pulled into an inner life that you may not even want. The great mystics did not grow up saying, “I’m going to be a Mystic.” It was a consequence of being called. The mystics who lived within the walls of monasteries changed the world because their spiritual lives moved grace through them into the world. A new type of Mystic is being born today through a calling to be a Mystic without a monastery. There is a craving to have intimacy with the sacred, perhaps because this is the missing ingredient in the pursuit of intuition.
Mystics are called to channel light, truth, wisdom, or some form of Divine revelation that feeds the human soul. A mystical experience is one of transcendence in which your spirit has a timeless encounter with a force greater than your physical life. A mystical experience has the power in one micro-second to lift you into a height of knowingness where you have a revelation about your life. The consequence of a mystical experience, however, is that you cannot go back to the life you had and find it as satisfying or as “real” as it was before. You can have a mystical experience without having the Mystic archetype but the Mystic archetype applies to someone whose whole life becomes that calling.
The shadow Mystic manifests as an egocentric concern for one’s own spiritual progress to the exclusion of others, and an attendant sense of self-importance at having achieved “higher” states of consciousness It may also emerge in behavior that takes advantage of admirers or students in base economic, emotional, or sexual ways. Since genuine enlightenment manifests as the desire to be of service, this is a pretty good indication that you haven’t arrived yet. The Mystic’s shadow can also manifest in states of madness, inner torment, inner suffering, schizophrenia, and spiritual schizophrenia where there is an absolute inability to manage the interior life.
Film Reference: Emily Watson in 'Breaking the Waves'
The single-minded dedication of the Mystic carries over to the Renunciate, who relinquishes material desires and ambitions to pursue spiritual practice; the Anchorite, who withdraws from the world almost entirely to follow a similar path; and the Hermit, who withdraws from others to pursue a solitary life, although not always for spiritual purposes. There is a radical difference between an Intuitive and a Mystic. An interest in intuition has grown as we have evolved into an energy culture, a psychic culture, a multi-sensory culture. The Intuitive or Psychic develops their skill for personal use in contrast to the Mystic who seeks a spiritual life to benefit others. Nobody is called to be an Intuitive—that is a choice, not a calling. The Mystic is called and there is a feeling of being pulled into an inner life that you may not even want. The great mystics did not grow up saying, “I’m going to be a Mystic.” It was a consequence of being called. The mystics who lived within the walls of monasteries changed the world because their spiritual lives moved grace through them into the world. A new type of Mystic is being born today through a calling to be a Mystic without a monastery. There is a craving to have intimacy with the sacred, perhaps because this is the missing ingredient in the pursuit of intuition.
Mystics are called to channel light, truth, wisdom, or some form of Divine revelation that feeds the human soul. A mystical experience is one of transcendence in which your spirit has a timeless encounter with a force greater than your physical life. A mystical experience has the power in one micro-second to lift you into a height of knowingness where you have a revelation about your life. The consequence of a mystical experience, however, is that you cannot go back to the life you had and find it as satisfying or as “real” as it was before. You can have a mystical experience without having the Mystic archetype but the Mystic archetype applies to someone whose whole life becomes that calling.
The shadow Mystic manifests as an egocentric concern for one’s own spiritual progress to the exclusion of others, and an attendant sense of self-importance at having achieved “higher” states of consciousness It may also emerge in behavior that takes advantage of admirers or students in base economic, emotional, or sexual ways. Since genuine enlightenment manifests as the desire to be of service, this is a pretty good indication that you haven’t arrived yet. The Mystic’s shadow can also manifest in states of madness, inner torment, inner suffering, schizophrenia, and spiritual schizophrenia where there is an absolute inability to manage the interior life.
Film Reference: Emily Watson in 'Breaking the Waves'