William James provided a description of the mystical experience, in his famous collection of lectures published in 1902 as The Varieties of Religious Experience.[55] These criteria are as follows
- Passivity – a feeling of being grasped and held by a superior power not under your own control.
- Ineffability – no adequate way to use human language to describe the experience.
- Noetic – universal truths revealed that are unable to be acquired anywhere else.
- Transient – the mystical experience is only a temporary experience.
James's preference was to focus on human experience, leading to his research of the subconscious. This was the entryway for the awakening transformation of mystical states. Mystical states represent the peak of religious experience. This helped open James's inner process to self-discovery.
