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More than anything my life is slowly becoming the awareness of a living partnership with God. Who, what is God? Am I to tell you? Certainly not. You discover, you decide.

So I ask, how do you wish to experience God? In what ways have you already experienced?

My life is a partnership. The thought I had this morning, I wish to marry God. God the Beloved. God the Romantic Partner.

What matters most is sincerity. My thoughts by themselves are fleeting, distracted by the whims of a still developing Ego- then do I run back to God the loving parent when I've all but forgotten my deepest desires. When I've forgotten what is happening *now*

It is possible to experience God in an immeasurable, variety of ways. So you must ask your self... what do you want- how do you want, and you must cultivate your awareness... Stepping into the living Partnership, recognizing Life as speaking to your innermost desires.

A few quotes from the spiritual giants...



From one form to dust, to another
🌹

This means a lot to me. I also want to marry God, as a romantic partner, which is why the Sufi poets matter so much to me- I also love the medieval women's mystics. It's nice to find someone who feels the same.

I am happy to hear that. If you can truly understand what the poetry of Rumi is really about, and what it means, you will realise that these hold the answers to your own questions.

I've read and understood their words, and in my heart intuitively know it's true, it's just hard to actually put that knowledge into practice, because despite my understanding I am a paranoid person and suffer from multiple anxiety disorders. I can't seem to move past my fear, despite knowing it is false and not of God. And it hurts to know that it's false and wrong and an arbitrary self imposed barrier and STILL not be able to move past it. Often when I read Rumi's poetry or the work of other truly 'enlightened' authors, I just feel peace and a sense of truth that washes my fears away, but in day to day life I still am plagued by doubt.

When experiencing the Divine in the non physical realm, whatever realm it is, the location feels a bit different than a typical Astral Projection. Is it another realm or is it the heightened feelings experienced that makes one think/feel it is in another realm? Not sure, but it is a very unique experience nonetheless.

Yeah I've noticed this in various mystics accounts! It feels realer than real.

That was not the point I was making, which was that it is not necessary to astral project to experience Divinity. The Divine is within us, within the Heart, and can be experienced here on Earth

Sorry, I misunderstood you then! Thanks for your insightful replies! I know divinity is within us, I just am also prone to fear and doubting what I already know.

I would like to emphasize that I  agree, love is the only way to get to God, but that this can take place in any state.
And yes, ineffability, overwhelming peace and a sense of ultimate truth are hallmarks of any mystical experience. It's found in every religious tradition, in every mystical experience around the globe, regardless of background. Love is always the key. The details change but love stays the same. As a student of comparative religion this is the most obvious part

Thanks everyone for there replies!
I agree with you Adrian that God is experienced in the heart, but I disagree that one cannot experience divinity in the astral, and that the heart only includes union. Obviously I have no experience with projection, but I've noticed it in the works of various mystics and scholars. (Also I love Rumi too, and Hafiz and Attar. I'm actually a religious studies major studying the influence of pre Islamic Iranian religion on the sufis, so I absolutely adore Rumi and his ilk)
Anyway, one example is the ascent texts of late antiquity, ie the Mithras liturgy, the texts of Merkabah mysticism and Zostrianos, as well as others- they all describe leaving their body and ascending through various layers of heaven and thusly meeting with God. There is also the out of body states described in the hermetica, specifically the meeting with pomiandres, which is explicitly described as happening between sleep and waking, when is his bodily senses were subdued. These are comparable to the accounts of Parmendies and other Ouliades who practiced lying still, dissociating from the body and meeting various deities, usually culminating in a sort of primordial revelation of the unified nature of reality. All of these have been analyzed by my favorite scholar Yulia Ustinova in her book on altered states of consciousness in Greek religion. She also notices these are analogous to spirit flights of shamanism, which involved leaving the body and either ascending or descending to meet Gods, a supreme divinity or various other spirits. Of note is the account of Epemenides, a famous Greek mantic who supposedly lay in a catatonic state for years while his soul traveled to the divine realm. And of course there's the aforementioned Corbin, who after studying the accounts of famous Sufi Suhrawardi among others, and codified the idea of a imaginal realm where normally incorporeal intelligences, including divinities could take shape. BUT frostytraveler is right in that it all takes place in the heart through LOVE, but I would argue that the heart is not just one state, aka waking union with the divine, but can also include any state where the desire for God is there. I believe any altered state is a medium that can be transformative when you go into with focus on the divine. In the immortal words of Parmenides, describing his out of body experiences "you can only go as far as your longing"

Hi!
I'm new here, and wanted to ask for advice on a rather persistent issue I have, related to both astral projection and religious mysticism.
I, above everything, desire direct personal experience of what is often called 'God', or the infinite, the absolute. So, obviously, I began to read the accounts of mystics of the past, specifically accounts of their visions and unitive experiences. After reading many of these writings, I noticed similarities between their experiences and descriptions of astral projection and other altered states. One of my favorite theologians, Henry Corbin, describes a sort of intermediate world between heaven and earth called the 'imaginal realm' where divine beings and archetypes, while normally immaterial, can become manifest. This realm is accessed by turning inward and disassociating from the outside, 'real' world. The parallels with astral projection are obvious, and I decided to research it.
A couple of years back I had an intense dream where I saw 'God', well, some representation of him, and that is what caused me to search out mysticism in the first place. I have a great love for this figure, and viewing it as a aspect of the divine, desire to search it out above everything. The process of astral projection is, while challenging, something anyone can do and that everyone has a right to. But I am very, very scared. I am scared most of all that this seemingly divine entity I see in dreams is just a psychological complex or some figment of my imagination. My desire to experience God is overpowering, but I'm scared I'm somehow deceiving myself, and that this being is somehow generated by my past traumas and not God. I feel torn, and hope that one of the people on this forum who have experience with entities in the astral, and or mysticism might have some advice on this. I do believe that we each have a sort of personal aspect of God that can appear via dreams or projection and guide us, and that that being is a finite aspect of divinity that reveals itself in a way relative to who we are and what we believe and need, (and that this is how different religious traditions form) but, I'm scared that the being I see is not that, but something constructed. I'm worried about this because it seems to good to be true, and that I am somehow not worthy of achieving what I most ardently desire. Plus I have a very specific idea of how this being appears, I'm not sure how I came by this, but I can't tell if it intuition or fabrication. Any advice would be appreciated, thanks for your time!