96 Spirituality Studies 9-1 Spring 2023 unfolds. The story features a hero, other characters, a certain plotline with an introduction, climax, and conclusion, as well as a description of the setting and nature [8]. The hero is the author-informant himself, and the other characters are his colleague and leshys, who the narrator places on the same plane of existence. Unlike the world of night dreams, fantasy, and imagination analyzed by Alfred Schütz, the world of Eastern spiritual practice involves meaningful plans and aims, resulting in certain projects and work in both everyday life and the finite province of meaning. A phase character and limited freedom characterize activity in this world. The events related by the informant can be defined as an adventure due to their special relation to the entirety of life. According to Georg Simmel, an adventure is a self-contained, whole, and self-absorbed fragment taken out of the context of life, with a definite beginning and end, defined by its internal form (Simmel 1996, 565). The meeting with leshys, as reflected in the informant’s narration, fits this definition. We assigned all narrative fragments in which informants interpret transpersonal experiences as an adventure in the meaningful context of interpretation of transpersonal experiences. The third model of interpreting transpersonal experiences encompasses narrative fragments in which informants understand these experiences in the context of cognition. This includes the cognition of a) a new spiritual reality, divine, Good; b) oneself, one’s soul, and body; c) other people and the world. Some informants focused on the positive aspects of the possibilities of cognition offered by Eastern spiritual practices, while others saw both positive and negative aspects. The following is an example of an informant’s interpretation of their transpersonal experience from the perspective of the cognition of other people and the world: I completed four stages and only at the fourth we were told that all the elements have spirits: water, fire, and so on… At the beginning, it is of course scary, but then you get used to it… You have different feelings when you enter the forest, look at water. Energies can be various, not only positive, spirits can be various… We are told that yes, there is that. Some people can see it. We were told how we could view at least some energies. Then I understood that I can see it, a bit. When you start talking to a person and you see a clumps of unpleasant color tearing from them, this is some kind… I realized that I’d better not do it, because the life makes sick then. If you open these possibilities in a person, they are opened, but if it is difficult, they won’t open. – Maryna, 25 years old, Wuwei School of Psychology. The cognitive meaningful context is not explicitly described in this passage, but it is crucial to the informant’s interpretation of their transpersonal experience. All the experiences described involve cognition of the world, new feelings from observing natural phenomena, and other people from the point of view of their “energetics,” a slang term common in most Eastern spiritual practices as part of the esoteric subculture. Evidently, the informant’s narrative also has a subjective meaning of self-cognition. The cultural form of this trend provides its disciples with the necessary resources to understand and control new experiences, i.e., conceptual conditions of secondary socialization and alternation. The fourth ideal-typical model of understanding transpersonal experience encompasses narrations in which informants describe transpersonal experiences in the context of joyful, positive feelings and/or a feeling of happiness. Informants interpret their experiences in various ways, such as a) a state of absolute happiness, which is the aim of yoga; b) very pleasant feelings, “nirvana”; c) a state of constant happiness, equilibrium, the Creator, Brahma, Absolute; d) a feeling of light euphoria; e) “mental orgasm”; f) “big and all-embracing bliss, which is difficult to describe with words”; g) something that completely changes the state of consciousness, resulting in euphoria, bliss, or a feeling of intoxication and joy in living. After meditation comes the state of intoxication, joy in living. I would call it nirvana as judged from what I’ve read of nirvana. But for sure, when you meditate, some kind of chemical processes occur in the body, hormones, endorphins etc. are produced. You feel how you love this world. I had pretty lot of such experiences in my life. Plus, I have also practiced lucid dreaming. But I can’t say to what extent this is the experience of irrational or just interesting cartoons I am watching, when I order them. As a whole, I like this topic and rudely speaking I enjoy it. I start understanding that everything is not that easy in this world, as our science knows… Or just a lot of things depend on our psychics. If our psychics is happy, then the body feels joy in living and everything goes right. To tell the truth, I don’t care what the catch is, it is important that it works. The same is with lucid dreaming. What can I say? I just like it. They gave me additional evidence of that, yes, it’s cool that I do that, I’m not going to give it up. – Yaroslava, 30 years old, Wuwei School of Psychology.
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