Mysticism is...

Mysticism is man's long, loving look at reality to which he is united by love. It is the highest expression of man's intellectual and spiritual life. Its activity is its own end. Mysticism has no utilitarian purposes: just looking, loving, being utterly, magnificently, wildly useless. It is life itself fully awake and active and aware that it is alive. Mysticism is awe and wonder at the sacredness of life and of being and of the invisible, transcendent and infinite abundant source of being. It knows the source obscurely, inexplicably, but with a certitude beyond reason. It is a veritable vision of the Godhead - in the human, earthly context. This act by which man sees who he is - not in isolation, but against the background of eternity - and so simultaneously and experientially sees who God is - this is genuine mysticism.

William McNamara, Christian Mysticism, P. 8