It happened during prayer.
One moment going through motions. The next — everything shifted.
The room didn’t change.
But everything in it became more real.
And then you felt it.
The Presence.
Not a thought. Not an emotion. Not anything with a name.
Just presence.
Overwhelming. Undeniable.
Real in a way that made everything else feel like shadows.
This is what deep prayer reveals — the divine presence that exists beyond your thoughts, beyond your beliefs, beyond everything you think you know.
Thirty seconds. Maybe less.
Then it faded.
You’re just you again. Trembling.
That was weeks ago.
Haven’t told anyone.
How do you explain something that has no words?
Someone asks — did something happen?
Yes. Everything. Nothing. Something you can’t explain.
“Just felt peaceful.”
Truth but not truth.
Peace too small a word.
Like calling the ocean “damp.”
Try talking to someone.
“Have you ever felt something unusual during prayer?”
“Like what?”
“Like… not just belief. Actual presence.”
Long silence. “Once. Many years ago. Never forgotten it.”
“Did you tell anyone?”
“Who would understand? Even telling you now feels impossible. The words don’t exist.”
This is the strange isolation.
Not loneliness — the opposite.
You felt more connected than ever.
But now, back in ordinary consciousness, you’re alone with a memory you can’t share.
How do you describe the taste of water to someone who’s never drunk?
How do you explain light to someone born blind?
The experience is real.
But the words for it don’t exist.
This has a name: mystical experience.
People throughout history touching something beyond words.
Then spending their lives trying to explain the unexplainable.
This is the power of silent prayer — not in the words you say, but in the presence that arrives when words stop.
Mystics wrote poetry for forty years trying to describe one moment.
Every poem an attempt.
Every poem a failure.
Every poem beautiful because of that failure.
Others wrote thousands of pages about what they encountered.
None of it quite capturing it.
All of it pointing toward what cannot be captured.
Even prophets describing encounters with the Divine could only use metaphors.
“Like” and “as if” and “comparable to.”
The direct experience beyond language even for them.
Someone at your place of worship notices you come more often.
“You seem different.”
You want to tell them.
Want to say: something happened. During prayer. I felt… I don’t know what I felt. But it changed me.
But you don’t.
What if they think you’re making it up?
What if they think you’re claiming something you have no right to claim?
What if they want details you can’t provide?
So you say nothing.
Or say something meaningless.
The worst part is the doubt.
Did it really happen?
Or was it just your brain doing something strange?
A trick of consciousness?
Religious experience or psychological projection?
The memory feels real.
But memories are unreliable.
And the more time passes, the more uncertain you become.
Maybe you imagined the whole thing.
But no.
You know what you felt.
Even if you can’t prove it.
Even if you can’t explain it.
Even if it never happens again.
It was real.
Someone finds you crying after prayer.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Everything. I don’t know how to explain.”
“Try.”
So you try.
Stumbling over words that don’t fit.
Using metaphors that fall short.
Describing the indescribable as poorly as everyone who came before.
“Something happened. I felt… not just belief. Presence. Like breathing. Like existence itself. I can’t — there aren’t words. But it was real. And now it’s gone and I don’t know if it’ll ever come back and I can’t explain to anyone what I’m even talking about.”
They hold your hand. “I believe you.”
“You don’t think I’m crazy?”
“I think you experienced something beyond words. That doesn’t make you crazy. It makes you human.”
Ask someone who’s had this.
“Does it ever come back?”
“No. Never again. Not like that.”
“How do you live with that? Knowing what’s possible but not having it?”
“By being grateful it happened once. And by remembering that ordinary practice still matters. The breakthrough is grace. The practice is our part.”
Here’s the brutal truth.
The mystical experience and ordinary faith are both real. Both necessary.
The moment of overwhelming presence was gift.
But it doesn’t make the thousands of ordinary moments less valuable.
Maybe it makes them more valuable — because now you know what they’re reaching toward, even when they don’t reach it.
This is the power of silent prayer — it teaches you that spiritual silence holds more truth than a thousand spoken words.
Most spiritual life happens in the ordinary.
Getting up early when you’re tired.
Praying in the middle of a busy day.
Maintaining practice when you feel nothing special at all.
The breakthrough is grace.
The practice is our part.
A child asks — “What does the Divine feel like?”
And you realize: they’re asking what you’ve been trying to articulate.
“I don’t know if I can explain it properly.”
“Try.”
“Sometimes during prayer… if you’re really present… you might feel something. Not with your body or mind exactly. Something deeper. Like you’re not alone. Like everything makes sense, even if you can’t say how.”
This is contemplative prayer. This is wordless prayer. Where language ends and something else begins.
“Have you felt it?”
“Once. Recently.”
“Will I feel it?”
“Maybe. I don’t know. You can’t force it. But you can be open to it. And whether you feel it or not, the Divine is still there. Present even when we don’t sense the Presence.”
The presence of god doesn’t depend on your ability to feel it. It exists in inner stillness, in the space between your breaths, in the quiet you usually avoid.
Try explaining to a friend.
Someone you trust. Someone who practices regularly.
“Have you ever had a mystical experience during prayer?”
They look uncomfortable.
“Those kinds of claims make me nervous. Like people are saying they’re special, chosen, above others.”
“That’s not what I mean. I’m not claiming anything. I’m just trying to understand what happened.”
You tell them.
Watch them become more uncomfortable.
Not because they don’t believe you.
But because religious experience that exceeds normal boundaries makes institutional religion nervous.
We like our faith mediated. Controlled. Explained through familiar channels.
Direct encounter is dangerous. Uncontrollable. Outside the system.
But every wisdom tradition includes these impossible accounts.
Prophets on mountains, encountering what cannot be looked upon directly.
Mystics in caves, receiving what would change everything.
Saints throughout history touching something beyond words and spending their lives trying to find the words anyway.
The consistent pattern across time and culture suggests this is real.
Universal human capacity, not aberration.
We are built to encounter the Divine.
Even if we can’t explain the encounter.
Tonight you pray like you always do.
Standing. Bowing. Prostrating.
No overwhelming presence. No mystical breakthrough.
Just ordinary prayer.
Just you and the words and the movements you’ve done a thousand times.
And that’s okay.
The extraordinary moment was gift.
But the ordinary practice is the foundation.
Most spiritual life happens here.
In the daily discipline.
The faithful consistency.
The showing up even when nothing special happens.
You still can’t explain what you felt that night.
The words don’t exist.
The description falls short.
The experience remains beyond language.
But you know it was real.
And you know that whether it happens again or not, the practice continues.
The prayers still matter.
The ordinary moments of reaching toward the Divine still count.
Here’s the brutal truth about mystical experience.
It’s real. And it’s useless.
Useless because you can’t explain it.
Can’t prove it.
Can’t make it happen again.
Can’t give it to anyone else.
Can’t use it to convince skeptics.
Can’t even be sure it wasn’t a hallucination.
And yet.
It was the most real thing you’ve ever experienced.
More real than this text.
More real than your body.
More real than anything you can touch or see or prove.
This is the paradox.
The most real thing is also the most questionable.
The most true experience is also the most doubtable.
The most profound moment is also the most fragile.
And you carry it alone.
In the wordless place.
Where no one can follow.
Where no explanation reaches.
Some things are meant to be experienced, not explained.
Lived, not described.
Carried quietly in the heart where language cannot reach.
That’s where you keep it now.
In silence.
Where it belongs.
Where it’s safe from the poverty of words.
Because here’s the final brutal truth.
The moment you try to explain it, you lose it.
The moment you put it in words, it becomes less.
The moment you share it, it diminishes.
So you keep it.
Wordless.
Unspeakable.
Alive in the place beyond language.
And you return to ordinary prayer.
Ordinary days.
Ordinary practice.
Waiting.
Not for the experience to return.
But for the next ordinary moment to reveal itself as extraordinary.
Because that’s the secret.
The mystical isn’t separate from the ordinary.
It’s hidden inside it.
Always.
The Presence filled your prayer.
But you have no words for what cannot be spoken.
And maybe that’s the point.
Maybe the unspeakable is meant to stay unspeakable.
Maybe the mystery is meant to remain mystery.
Maybe the Divine is too large for language.
Too real for words.
Too present to be captured.
So you stop trying.
Stop explaining.
Stop seeking validation.
Because you’ve learned the power of silent prayer — that the deepest truths live in the wordless place, untouched by language, safe from explanation.
And you just carry it.
Quietly.
In the wordless place.
Where the Presence lives.
Always.
