There’s a lot of talk about the “veil thinning” right now in spiritual awakening, 5D consciousness and Ascension circles, and there are claims that the veil is becoming particularly thin in 2026.

But what exactly is this veil and what does it mean when people say it is thinning?

The idea is much older than the current spiritual awakening movement, and the expression describes three separate but related things.

What does ‘the veil is thinning’ mean?

In spiritual traditions, the veil generally refers to a perceived boundary between ordinary physical reality and a non-physical or spiritual reality. When the veil is said to “thin”, that boundary becomes more permeable, making spiritual experiences, heightened intuition or contact with the unseen easier.

But there are several ways people use the term today.

The veil between the living and the dead

This idea is closely associated with Samhain, the ancient Celtic festival (31 October – 1 November) marking the beginning of winter. In early Irish tradition this was a time when the natural and supernatural worlds were much closer than usual, making access to the Otherworld more possible. This “thinning veil” describes a time when contact with ancestors and the unseen was easier.

There’s an ancient Irish story The Adventure of Nera, in which Nera enters the Otherworld at Samhain in winter, spends three days and nights there, yet returns to the same moment he left carrying summer flowers as proof of where he has been. Time works differently in this alternative reality.

The veil between physical and multidimensional reality

In contemporary spiritual awakening, 5D and Ascension discussions, “the veil is thinning” has taken on a broader meaning. Instead of something happening at one time of year, it describes an ongoing shift in consciousness in which people become increasingly aware of realities beyond ordinary physical, 3D perception.

The veil of forgetting

This is slightly different again. In reincarnation and many contemporary spiritual teachings, the veil of forgetting refers to the idea that when we incarnate into a physical body, we forget where we came from, our purpose and our true cosmic / soul nature.

The common factor across all three ‘veils’ is consciousness. The layers of reality don’t suddenly appear or move closer, they have always been there, and what changes is our ability to perceive or access them.

There have always been people who traditionally can do this deliberately. Shamans, mediums, mystics and spiritual practitioners enter non-ordinary states of consciousness to communicate with ancestors, receive information or access realities beyond everyday perception.

Recent research investigating these states has found measurable changes in brain activity during trance, meditation and other non-ordinary states of consciousness. It’s evidence that we are capable of much more than we think.

Marjorie Woollacott, neuroscience professor and author of hundreds of academic papers, started out with the conventional neuroscientific view that the brain produces consciousness from physical matter. Her meditation practice and subsequent research into consciousness led her to propose instead that consciousness is out there, everywhere, and that our brain acts as a filter. This explains the otherwise inexplicable, near death experiences (NDEs) in which clinically dead people view events happening in their hospital room, or even make contact with loved ones gathered around their bed.

Physicists are also now proposing that there are dimensions beyond those immediately available to ordinary perception. Spiritual and scientific ideas are converging and it’s looking like everything we accepted as ‘reality’ was pretty limited. Reality is multidimensional, we just forgot.

This turns the usual picture around. Instead of looking out at the universe from inside your head, imagine that you are already inside a much larger field of consciousness but your brain filters most of it out.

In the ancient Taoist take on the ‘veil of forgetting’, the parameters of this filter are set by family, schooling, social expectations and other people’s opinions. This builds the ‘acquired self’, a limited version of you. Our greatest life journey is to find the ‘cosmic self’, to remember.

When is the veil thinnest?

The Taoist sages understood the cosmos as being in a state of constant transformation, and human life as inseparable from the larger cyclic patterns of nature and the universe.

There is a cycle of changing energetic conditions every twenty-four hours. Living in harmony with this brings you closer each day to remembering and ultimately to harnessing the powerful universal forces. This is the basis of my Chi Cycle lifestyle.

Thinning veil between physical and multidimensional reality at dawn

In this cycle ‘the veil’ is thinnest each day from 3am to 5am. Your soul has just returned from the astral realm, you’ve been free of the limited physical world and all its acquired beliefs. You are energetically closer to your cosmic self than at any other time in the twenty-four-hour cycle.

Cosmic chi is said to shower the earth at this time. When you do a practice early in the morning you can enter what the Taoists called the Mysterious Pass, said to be located in the mystical Kunlun mountains. It is the first of a series of destiny gateways that open throughout the day.

This is why what you do when you first wake up matters more than anything that follows. Reach for the phone and you instruct the universe that other people’s opinions, news feeds and gossip take priority over the evolution of your soul. The gateway closes before you ever knew it was open, and the day defaults to ordinary.

On the upside, the opportunity comes around again tomorrow.

If you want the full map — the five stages of the cosmic self, how the acquired self gets installed, and what to do about it — it is all in my Webinar Cosmic Self and Multidimensional Living from the Claim Your Cosmic Self series. The recording is available here.

Frequently asked questions

What does it mean spiritually when the veil is thinning?

The “veil” is a metaphor for the boundary between ordinary physical reality and what is described as the spiritual, non-physical or multidimensional world. A thinning veil means that boundary becomes more permeable, making intuition, spiritual experiences or awareness beyond normal waking consciousness easier to access.

Why is the veil said to be thin at Samhain?

Samhain was a winter festival in early Irish tradition and a time when the ordinary and supernatural worlds were believed to come unusually close. Stories such as The Adventure of Nera describe people crossing into the Otherworld at Samhain. The now-familiar phrase “the veil is thin” is a later way of describing this older idea.

Is the veil only thin at Halloween?

Not necessarily. Samhain gave us one of the best-known seasonal associations with a boundary between worlds, but many cultures have traditions involving particular times for honouring or contacting ancestors. In the Taoist framework I work with, there are opportunities to shift consciousness and connect with the cosmic realm every day.

What does the veil have to do with consciousness?

One way to understand the veil is as a filter on perception. Our normal waking consciousness gives us access to a particular experience of reality. Meditation, trance and other non-ordinary states can change that experience dramatically. From this perspective, “thinning the veil” may be less about another reality moving closer and more about changing what we are capable of perceiving.

What is the veil of forgetting?

The veil of forgetting is the spiritual idea that when we enter physical life, we lose conscious awareness of our larger identity, purpose and origin. In my work, this connects with the distinction between the acquired self — the identity shaped by family, society and conditioning — and the cosmic or true self underneath it.

What does 5D consciousness have to do with the thinning veil?

In contemporary spiritual and Ascension discussions, 5D consciousness describes a shift beyond an exclusively physical, separated experience of reality towards greater interconnectedness and multidimensional awareness. In this context, “the veil is thinning” describes our increasing ability to perceive beyond ordinary 3D consciousness.

Can meditation thin the veil?

Meditation can alter attention, perception and our ordinary state of consciousness, and research has documented measurable changes in brain activity associated with meditation and other non-ordinary states. Research can’t prove  spiritual or multidimensional realities, but explore these states directly and observe what changes in your own experience.

When is the veil thinnest?

In the Taoist framework I use for my Chi Cycle Lifestyle, the most important daily window begins in the early morning. The period from around 3am to 5am is associated with the Mysterious Pass, with the hours just after waking providing an opportunity for meditation, breathing and chi practices before the ordinary takes over.

Does the veil thin in the Southern Hemisphere?

The Samhain association is seasonal and belongs to the Northern Hemisphere’s transition into winter, so simply transferring the Halloween date to the Southern Hemisphere misses that seasonal context. The daily Chi Cycle is different: it follows the twenty-four-hour cycle, giving you a recurring opportunity wherever you live.

Do I have to believe in any of this?

No. Treat it as a working hypothesis and test it through experience. Try changing what you do when you first wake up. Instead of immediately reaching for your phone, spend that time breathing, meditating or doing chi practice and observe what happens to your state of mind, intuition and experience of the day.