I'm confusing 'mystics' with Hindus.....

[Honza]

Here is the source of my misunderstanding about Hinduism. I was thinking that all Hindus are mystics, but they are not!

You get mystics of all religions, and they all claim one can reach God through self-realisation. Religions tend to avoid that belief. Not sure about Buddhists.

After all these years I have understood my mental confusion....

[Miss Hepburn]

Well, I'm happy you realized your mistake. This is great.
Religions do avoid this teaching. Why? People would realize they need no religion; meaning hierarchy of church elders,
rituals, rules, ceremony -punishments, ex-communications.
It is a survival technique of organizations that desire control, from my opinion.
And why people say they are not religious, but they are spiritual.

[Altair]

The way I see it, religion is ordered spirituality. It has (relatively) fixed norms, codes, ethics, teachers, and it stands with both its feet in society. It wants to dominate society if it has the chance.
Mysticism would be more the opposite of that, catering to the specific individual, setting. It is more chaotic and wild, on the edges. There may be norms but they are more likely depending on context. It does not fix itself around a certain culture or place.

They way society works I think it will always naturally develop religions out of mysticism, so the current trend towards individualized paths might be temporary until you get folks who seek to formalize and structure it again and create a new religion based on highly valued teachings of today, which may not be as popular in the mainstream right now.