Living in a Sacred Universe | Aliya B. Haeri on Sufism & Consciousness

What happens when extraordinary spiritual experiences stop being the destination? In this Integral Being conversation, psychologist, spiritual mentor, and author Aliya B. Haeri reflects on a lifelong search that moved through psychic research, extraordinary phenomena, psychology, and eventually into the contemplative path of Sufism. Aliya recounts working around figures such as Yuri Geller and Dr. Andrija Puharich, witnessing phenomena that challenged conventional ideas about reality. Yet over time, these experiences revealed their own limitation: extraordinary events may open a door, but they do not necessarily transform the person who walks through it. The conversation turns toward her experience of khalwa, or Sufi solitary retreat, including a profound encounter with the Void in which the ordinary sense of body and world disappeared while awareness remained. From there, Aliya and Mark explore the movement from seeking experiences toward cultivating stillness, witnessing, self-knowledge, and conscious response. They discuss the difference between observing and witnessing, the relationship between self and soul, silence as a receptive state, the limitations of spiritual techniques and forms, and what it means to recognize the sacred not as something separate from ordinary life but as the very ground of existence. Aliya also reflects on her relationship with Shaykh Fadhlalla Haeri, the meeting of psychology and Sufi wisdom, healing, timeless awareness, and the possibility of living in what she describes as a sacred universe. Ultimately, the conversation asks a distinctly Inner Life question: What happens when spiritual understanding stops being something we seek and begins becoming the way we live? The episode ranges from psychic phenomena and siddhis to witnessing, self and soul, timeless awareness, silence, love, and the sacred nature of reality. Aliya B. Haeri is a psychologist, life coach, spiritual mentor, and author of My Timeless Journey. A lifelong student of Shaykh Fadhlalla Haeri, she is the founder of the Academy of Self Knowledge (ASK) in South Africa and brings together psychological understanding, contemplative practice, and the wisdom of Islam and Sufism. Integral Being with Mark V. Wiley explores embodiment, contemplative practice, internal cultivation, wisdom traditions, consciousness, and the lived experience of human transformation.