Something happens that stays with you. Perhaps it is an image in meditation, an unexpected sense of presence, or a dream with an emotional weight you cannot easily explain. Where do you begin?
Give the experience room
The starting point at Inner Worlds is to describe the experience as faithfully as possible. There is no need to solve it before you are allowed to speak about it. Equally, the strength of a feeling does not oblige you to settle on an explanation immediately.
A moment can matter deeply to you while its meaning remains open. You can acknowledge the comfort, surprise or questions it brought without pretending that everything about it is understood. That is the space this work tries to protect.
Separate what happened from what you think it means
Consider an invented example: during a quiet sitting, someone notices warmth around their shoulders and feels comforted. They later wonder whether a loved one was close. The warmth and comfort belong in the experience record. The idea of a loved one belongs in the interpretation.
Writing those things separately does not dismiss the spiritual possibility. It simply makes the account more precise. ‘I felt warmth around my shoulders’ tells us something different from ‘a loved one placed their hands on me’. The second statement adds an explanation that the sensation alone cannot establish.
This is particularly helpful when returning to an experience much later. It lets you see what you actually noticed, and which parts of the story were conclusions you reached afterwards.
Keep the original account intact
Record the details you remember, including the uncertain ones. If you cannot tell whether an image came before or after a feeling, say so. If a word is only partly remembered, leave it partly remembered. An incomplete but honest account is useful.
When your understanding changes, add a dated reflection rather than quietly rewriting the original. You may notice a pattern across several sittings, encounter a similar account, or realise that an earlier interpretation was too definite. Those developments deserve their own place in the record.
Compare with care
Other people’s accounts, spiritual traditions, philosophy and research can offer useful questions and possible parallels. A resemblance is a place to begin exploring; it is not, on its own, proof that two experiences have the same cause.
Ask what genuinely matches. Is it the sensation, the sequence of events, the emotional quality, or just the label used afterwards? Also notice what does not match. A comparison becomes more valuable when it can accommodate differences.
A possible understanding
Andrew’s preferred wording is deliberately open: based on his own experiences, comparison over time and relevant research, one possible way of understanding an experience is… What follows is an interpretation, with room for revision.
You do not have to turn every meaningful moment into a final answer. Sometimes the most faithful conclusion is: this is what happened, this is what it meant to me at the time, and this is what I am still exploring.
TO TAKE WITH YOU
Choose one experience you remember clearly. Write two short paragraphs: ‘What I experienced’ and ‘What I think it might mean’. Notice where the second begins to add something the first did not establish.
Worlds beyond.