<blockquote>
Many people who go through this kind of experience do find that it has spiritual elements to it. They may liken their experience to a Biblical passage, find themselves identifying with a spiritual individual (e.g. Jesus Christ, Buddha), or consider their experience to be a spiritual test , initiation, or awakening. Religious experiences are so common they're considered by many to be one of the telltale symptoms. Once more, I attribute this to the lack of ego boundaries, or rather, the collapse/fragmentation of one's sense of self-identity.
</font><blockquote><div id="quote"><font class="small">Quote:</font>
When the ego collapses, fragments, or disintegrates, shadow and archetypal contents flood in from the personal and collective unconscious. Those are Jungian terms and I use them because it's the best model I've found thus far for explaining this experience to others. During psychosis, what is experienced and what is seen by the people around you, are fragments of the collapsed ego (one's shattered sense of self), shadow material (which produces fear, terror, paranoia, shame, etc.), and archetypal material, such as the sense that one is Jesus Christ, or Buddha, or God... or has just seen one of those figures get into a cab on 49th street.
Yet, each of those religious icons are also symbols of center which is where the larger Self resides. If you make it all the way through the unconscious to the center -- for a little while at least -- you don't just
play God, you
are God, because there is nothing left at that point to separate the I-from-The-Thou. Within an Eastern framework, this might be called Self-realization or God-realization. In the West, it's called delusions of grandeur...
Source: How To Produce An Acute Schizophrenic Break
</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">
It's been my experience that there is always a triggering factor to this kind of experience. I spoke of some of those above (stress, trauma, loss, drug use) and whatever this trigger is, it produced a blow to the ego's stability. For this reason, it's often useful to examine what was going on in your life previous to this experience beginning. Often, that will provide a clue as to why the experience is occurring as well as some insight into specific areas you need to focus your attention in order to move into recovery.
I also recommend the work of
John Weir Perry for those who can identify religious or mythical elements within their experience.