I consider myself a Taoist mystic though I do not practice any organized religion. I was raised Catholic, studied Judaism, studied Buddhism, tried to be an atheist, and finally found my spiritual home in reading and meditating on the ancient words of the Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu. I believe that before the universe was formed there existed something perfect, vast, deep, beautiful, and unfathomable. This was the Tao - our Great Mother from which all things come from, reside in, and return to. This vast unfathomable infinite being resides wholly and completely in us and once we realize that we are none other than the Tao ourselves then we are complete beings acting naturally freed from unnatural hindrances and fear. The Tao is like a creative well from which we can draw upon without fail and without end. My most life altering experience was an episode on schizopreniform disorder, a disorder where the symptoms of schizophrenia present themselves for a period of less than 6 months. During that time I become homeless and went to jail. I believed in crazy things like that I was some kind of chosen one that would lead the world into a new era as a world leader. I believed a movie was being made about me and that every little thing that I thought must be true. I thought that demons were following me and tempting me and trying to kill me. I could go on and on with the delusions I experienced. I finally made it back home to my family and gradually returned to normal and realized that all of that was a psychotic episode. It turned out to be a profoundly spiritual and life altering experience though. It was hell yet I now seem to know how to never return there.