Documentary: 'Wake Up'.

[Year2]

I just watched this last night on Netflix.  Somewhat different from what we've all been through but I found it relatable nonetheless.  It's about this guy whose best friend died in a motorcycle accident and afterwards he developed the ability to see ghosts, balls of colored light and auras of energy around people.  I've had hppd for 32 years now.  It's not something I think about a lot and I tend to discount the theories that suggest this is an advanced kind of vision.  However, I seperated from my wife over 2 years ago.  On one of the last nights in the house I was sitting greiving in the living room in the dark when a ball of green light appeared at the other end of the room.  It wasn't frightening.  I looked down then up after about a minute and it had gone.  My girlfriend practices yoga and says it was my heart chakra.  The guy in the doc saw a ball of light come out of his friend's chest a couple of days before he died.  He didn't specify the color.  I avoid new age things like the plague in general but I do wonder.

 

My 'bullshit detector' developed at an alarming rate after I got hppd too.  I thought I was paranoid about people for a long time but I'm almost always correct about sneaky, underhand people.  It's a curse.  I'm not a nut and I retain a healthy skepticism about this but...anyone else have similar experiences?

[disguyhere]

the one thing to consider about hppd as an advanced/altered form of vision... 

 

nothing in the brain that exists, does so outside of the the limitations of the brains ability to discern stimuli. whether the brain is functioning properly or improperly, everything it produces is the result of stimuli in one form or another.

 

the fact is we are not capable of discerning all of the stimuli our brains pick up subconsciously. if we could we would be overwhelmed and cower in a corner in fear. there are environmental signals and details that we are incapable of focusing on because we actually perceive such a narrow band of the universe (let alone the extremely narrow band we actually see in focus out of the wide angle view our eyes appear to focus on), but our subconsciousness relies on these things to perform the thousands of automated tasks that occur on a daily basis.

 

whether or not this means hppd=seeing ghosts or some crap like that isnt what I'm getting at, but we simply do not know enough about the brain or the universe in general to discount any of the things that occur in our brains as purely a product of a misfiring neuron. it's easy to point at a schizophrenic and say their brain chemistry is the cause of their split from "reality", but since we really cant explain reality past the limitations of our consciousness, how can we say for sure that at some level what that person is experiencing isnt reality for them. it's a tough pill for some people to swallow as an idea, yet at the same time evolution was a tough pill for the majority to swallow just an insignificant blink in cosmic timescale ago. say tomorrow a human developed the ability to "see" magnetic fields in the same way a pigeon can. wouldnt the majority of people probably say that person is crazy before neuro-sciences caught up with what was going on?

 

doesnt need to be anything new age about it when science is doing more to disprove reality then any faery dancing in the forest ever could

 

 

( to answer the last part of ur question though...I see shadow people and blakc masses of ....cloud.. all the time.. whether product of my mind or product of reality my mind is just now able to percieve can be debated 10 ways till sunday.. doesnt stop me from seeing them and doesnt stop the intense feeling of "otherness" I get when I do. I've had a black man sit at the corner of my bed crouching japanese ganster style stare at me for an hour once before I was physically able to move and mentally able to stop myself from giving it the attention it was clearly after )

[Year2]

I agree with you.  It gets very philosophical but I think hppd encourages this naturally.  You do start to question the validity of your senses.  My big mistake when I first got this was the yearning to get back to my 'real' self.  The fact is you've been reborn as a somewhat different individual and you have to work with that.  For me the worst was the panic and DP but that disappeared after a few years.  I'd like to explore the spiritual aspects of this condition more.  I'm sure there must be a hightened awareness of certain energies.

[disguyhere]

at the very least if not heightened then altered... but the truth is we all see the world differently regardless.. no 2 people see things the exact same way so everyones perception is altered in some way, it's just general consensus which marks something as real or not. 

 

the best we can ever hope to do towards learning where our senses take us is constant experimentation.. you look at everything possible with every angle possible, and eventually you gain a consensus. works the same for a large group of people as it would a single person. just comes down to time and experience.. 

 

but as you said. theres no "real self" to return to. we are who we are, regardless of what our brains are doing right or wrong.. everyone has highs and lows and no single person i know sees the world in a perfectly rosy light anymore. the sooner we all accept ourself for all our strengths and flaws the sooner we get on with living our lives

[Year2]

but as you said. theres no "real self" to return to. we are who we are, regardless of what our brains are doing right or wrong.. everyone has highs and lows and no single person i know sees the world in a perfectly rosy light anymore. the sooner we all accept ourself for all our strengths and flaws the sooner we get on with living our lives

 

Very true.  We used to go to my ex's sister's house every Christmas.  Her and her husband are very respectable, straight people living respectable, straight lives in a great big house in a nice neighborhood.  Her husband'd get back from his job, drink 2 huge tumblers of 15 year old malt and pass out from 8.00pm til around 3.00am.  She'd hit the wine. 

 

Difficult as hppd has been to live with at times, it did teach me that self medication and endless hedonism was not the answer.  I think it's important for us all to realize that much of the US drowns their anxiety in drink and prescription drugs.  And I'm not talking about the obvious druggie culprits.  I'm talking about the middle class who've gone through the mill and have found a total dead end waiting for them.

 

I saw Dr Abraham a few years ago.  As well as having the satisfaction of being able to name this weird thing I've had since 1981, I realized I am at times an anxious person.  So are millions of others.  Excercise, nutrition and knowing what you need to do with your life are the answer.