Previously, we have looked to personality type and human values. This series of articles will continue. In this discussion personality types and elements of spiritual intelligence are examined. We have given an overview on Spiritual Intelligence on this website (See here). Spirituality has been described by many. To experience ‘the spiritual’ means “to be in touch with some larger, deeper and richer whole that gives our present limited situation a new perspective.” We look to elements of practical spirituality.
Spirituality has been described by many. To experience ‘the spiritual’ means “to be in touch with some larger, deeper and richer whole that gives our present limited situation a new perspective.”
In defining Spiritual Intelligence, five domains of experience that added to the totality of a spiritual intelligence are proposed. These are capacity for transcendence, mysticism, sanctification, capacity to engage spiritual resources and virtuous behaviour. Here, we are examining Mysticism. Mysticism comes from the Greek mystikos which broadly means secrets or connected to religious mysteries. In the religions of the Western world, there are mystical traditions in Christianity, Islam and Judaism. In the Eastern religions, there is no defined tradition of mysticism, rather there are gurus and disciples, Buddhist monks who pursue a path to Nirvana, and Jains who practice non-violence as their asceticism. Here we consider Western mystical elements which are not exclusive to any one religion. We then move on to consider how personality types may encounter or experience elements of mysticism as part of spiritual intelligence.
Mystical experiences
Mystical experiences occur when one leaves behind the sense of bodily awareness and encounters divinity as it reveals itself within and without. One may see divinity all around. One may perceive spiritual states of being (in your own self – or in another person); there may be a sense of Oneness with all reality. These states are not limited to – meditation, chanting of prayers, mantras, use of rosary beads, japamala (mala beads) or other kinds of prayer wheels or sacred ‘counters’. There may arise an awareness of ultimate reality, and the benefits of the different forms of yoga may also be encountered as manifesting the mystical dimension of life. There may also be mental benefits: a sense of calm, a sense of satisfaction, and a new-found mental peace.
Mystical experiences are not open to debate, nor argument. They are perceived by the individual, and this is always respected.
Personality Type
Personality type is frequently derived from self-reporting tests that advise us of our preferences. For example, there is the 16 Personality test, one among many other scales of personality type. (We are not specifically referencing this scale in these articles.) The personality scales often lead to greater self-understanding, particularly handing us a grasp on the important relationships in our lives, the workplace, our sporting life, and our preferred relaxation. Our sources of energy, our preferences for gathering data and making decisions are revealed. This information allows us to play to our strengths, and developing the weaker, perhaps hidden parts of our personality. Leading with our strengths is highlighted, preferences for action and behaviour are indicated.
How do the different personality types experience mysticism? Mystical experiences and mysticism are everyday experiences of human beings. Mysticism is not limited to monastics, nor to peoples enclosed in an ashram, a cave in the desert or a monastery atop a mountain. Extraverts and Introverts have different experiences, and use different language to express that experience. We look to Extroverts with preferences for thinking, feeling, intuition and sensation. Thereafter, we look to Introverts and their mystical expressions via their thinking, feeling, intuition and sensation.
| Extraverted Thinking
Extraverted Thinking types are energetically action-oriented and enjoy setting direction and improving efficiency. They are task-oriented, enjoy results, are motivated by taking on a challenge, and place a high value on competence and responsibility. |
Mysticism
Extroverted thinking types are on an active-practical quest for authenticity. They take up everyday concerns to reach truth, fulfilment and enlightenment. Mystical experience is finding the Divine in everyday experience through commitment, activity in the family, at home, at work, and in other life commitments. Mysticism reveals as a greater attentiveness to life beyond the immediate. |
| Extraverted Feeling
Extraverted Feeling types enjoy doing things to help or please other people. They enjoy creating harmony and reaching consensus. They are motivated by values-led environments and place a high value on mutual support and genuine relationships. |
Mysticism
Extraverted Feeling types experience inner illumination derived from creating harmony and reaching consensus. Their experience is the discovery of a hidden meaning in creative community events. They place a high value on the interior, illuminative experience of mystery that accompanies mutual support and genuine relationships. |
| Extraverted Intuition
Extraverted Intuitive types scan the outer environment to inspire them to have new ideas and see possibilities. They enjoy exploring options and ideas, are enthusiastic and enjoy change. They prefer initiation to maintenance and value discussing future possibilities and their visions. |
Mysticism
The external environment supplies connections and meaning as experience reveals engagement with the Divine beyond the mundane appearances. Dilating these experiences, they possess capacity to create and explore depth, potential and hidden meaning. Encounter is a form of ongoing divine self-giving. |
| Extraverted Sensing
Extroverted Sensing types enjoy living for the moment and being action-oriented and adaptable. They relish direct experience of the external world, are fun loving and seek variety. They are responsive to immediate demands and place a high value on personal freedom. |
Mysticism
The mystical experience of Extroverted Sensing is akin to a lotus opening. While the lotus has its roots in the mud, below the water, the leaves – on the surface of the water – open to receive the life-giving sunlight. There is a deeper awareness, a flow in events and experience that is an immediate, illuminating disclosure of the Divine. This is not limited to one particular environment, for the mystical can be experienced everywhere. |
| Introverted Thinking
Introverted Thinking types enjoy problem solving and attempt to find perfect solutions and absolute truths. They are logical and thoughtful. They enjoy complexity and are motivated by intellectual pursuits. They place a high value on objective truth and logic. |
Mysticism
Interiority explores problems, questions and the mysteries of divinity which is both revealed and unfolding endlessly by way of exploration and reflection. This reflection and introspection may advance beyond reason to a prophetic discovery of the Divine self. |
| Introverted Feeling
Introverted Feeling types live life guided by their personal values. They are ideals-oriented, seek honesty, and are motivated by supporting and making at difference to others. They place a high value on living in congruence with their values and creating harmony. |
Mysticism
Devotion and contemplation lead to inspiration. When one lives Truth, inspiration becomes illumination. Personal values seek a creative community; this leads to knowing divinity-in-ordinary, that which is known in everyday meaning making. Divine revelation is meaning making via experience. |
| Introverted Intuition
Introverted lntuitive types quickly see the connections between things and use these to create new concepts. They enjoy theories, innovative ideas and making connections. They are motivated by implementing original ideas and value inspiration and originality. |
Mysticism
Connecting and exploring experiences and events in depth, divinity is found in the “how much more”, the “beyond” of everyday events, activity, feelings, the work-a-day world. This leads to paths of illumination and absorption into the Divine. This can be a prophetic experience – visioning where the pathways lead to – personally and for culture and society. |
| Introverted Sensing
Introverted Sensing types are reliable, dependable and stable individuals with a strong sense of wanting to do the right thing. They enjoy taking in and processing information, are capable of vivid recall of memories, and enjoy stable and structured environments. They value tradition and loyalty. |
Mysticism
Pathways to the mystical experience depend on steadiness, discipline and a lived inner experience of integrity. Mysticism is experienced via tradition, structure and boundaries. They have the experience, and then explore the meaning. Recall of past experiences is important, for one cultivates the deep presence of the Divine in life’s events. |
In this relay of information and dimensions of how the Divine is found in mystical encounter, none of this occurs without some form of spiritual discipline. This could be discipline of discernment – for we are all spiritual beings having a human, physical experience. This human experience can leave us open to influence of other spirits – and discernment is needful; there are those that lead to the Divine, and those that lead to multiplication of ego and senses, a magnification of the I consciousness, which has nothing to do with mysticism. True mysticism produces humility. Discernment of spirits is a sine-qua-non (which without not) of the mystical path.
Every person, every personality type has a different pathway into spiritual intelligence. Why? Because minds are different, minds are conditioned by family, education, society and culture. No one personality type is excluded from developing the elements of spiritual intelligence. All this human experience is the movement from separation (we are all separate individuals with no connection to one another or anything else) to the Oneness of Divinity, the discovery of the one Divine essence that is present in the heart of all that exists.
Image Credits: Pixabay/Julita, Pixabay/Joe
