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[aces only] Do you feel like your body is not part of your identity? (poll)


Do you see your body as part of your identity?  

129 members have voted

  1. 1. Are you on any psychiatric medication?

    • Yes
      19
    • No
      110
  2. 2. Do you feel that your physical body doesn't match how you see yourself psychologically and/or are you non-cis?

    • Yes
      56
    • No
      73
  3. 3. You experience your dreams mostly...

    • In the 3rd person (but my body is the same as my waking one)
      18
    • In the 3rd person (but my body is different from my waking one/ partially different)
      9
    • In the 1st person (but my body is different/ partially different)
      21
    • In the 1st person (but I can't see my body/ don't know if it's different of not)
      60
    • In the 1st person (but my body is the same as my waking one)
      21
  4. 4. Your sexual fantasies are...

    • In the 1st person
      17
    • In the 3rd person and I participate in them
      8
    • In the 3rd person but I don't participate in them
      33
    • I don't have sexual fantasies / N/a
      71
  5. 5. Do you have low self-esteem / body image issues?

    • Yes
      24
    • Moderately so
      63
    • No/ very few
      42
  6. 6. Do you have BDD and/or MPD?

    • Yes to BDD
      7
    • Yes to MPD
      1
    • Yes to both
      0
    • No to both
      121
  7. 7. Which of the following are accurate?

    • I self-harm
      16
    • I have a drug addiction
      0
    • My looks changed a lot over the years and/or I was an ugly duckling
      30
    • None
      76
    • Have trouble picturing myself/ parts of myself in my mind/ aphantasia-like symptoms
      23
  8. 8. Are you prone to dissociation and/ or depersonalization?

    • Yes to both
      31
    • Yes to dissociation
      14
    • Yes to depersonalization
      6
    • No to both
      78
  9. 9. Do you feel like you inhabit your body rather than see it as part of you? (from @Moon Spirit's thread)

    • Yes
      61
    • No
      68
  10. 10. Do you have depression?

    • Yes
      56
    • No
      73


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6 hours ago, mreid said:

Do you ever control your body in your dreams, including those where you are seeing things through another person's POV? Or do you feel like it moves by itself?

I do control the body, but... Ok, I definitely feel like I am making the choices, not like the body is moving on its own. But when I wake up, I can confirm that these choices are not choices that I, as myself, would make. For example, I am very much a coward. I’ve always been easily scared; I don’t even watch horror films that other people call cheesy because I will be paranoid for days. As a preteen, I was scared of the heffalumps and woozles scene from Winnie the Pooh. Like, serious coward here. When I’m myself in a dream, this behavior carries over; I will do whatever I can to avoid situations that may scare me and flee from any situations I end up in anyway (not that my dreams usually allow me to flee a nightmare, but I do try). But if I’m in the POV of someone who is not so easily scared, or more curious, I won’t even consider running away. Sometimes this even happens in the same dream; I’m myself and the plot takes place in a dark basement, which I choose not to enter because f that shit. Later in the dream, after I have switched to another perspective, I might return to this basement, have a slight sense of deja vu, and decide to explore it because the POV that I have taken on is that of someone who would make a different choice than I would. I’m not just watching this person walk down the stairs, I’m not just feeling my body move that way, I have actively chosen to explore. I don’t realize that this choice is out of character for me personally until I wake up and return to my own mindset. An example of how far wrapped up I am in this character: you know that half asleep state, where your eyes are open and you are awake, but you’re still half stuck in a dream? Like you were just chatting with a friend in a dream and when you wake up, you wonder where that friend went for a moment before you actually realize you were dreaming? Ok, so this one time (and this is by no means normal for me) I was dreaming from the perspective of one of my story characters and when I half woke up, I was super confused because for that moment of half asleep before I was entirely awake, I didn’t recognize my own bedroom and started to freak out because I didn’t know where I was or how I got there. My first coherent thought was, “Wait; I’m not Namya”; and then suddenly I woke up the rest of the way and reality hit me like a brick to the skull. I think I just burst out laughing because that was the most surreal experience I’ve ever had (and I felt like a total moron for literally thinking I was a fictional character, even if it was just for a second). So am *I* making the choices in my dream? Technically no; the character whose perspective I have taken on is making the choices, but I only know the difference because I am currently awake. Do I feel detached or like my body is moving on its own? Definitely not; I can’t distinguish myself from the character until I wake up, so it feels exactly the same as if I make a choice irl. I *am* the character and I take on the character’s emotions and world view.

 

And btw, if I am not myself in the dream, then I, as myself, do not exist. I never see myself from the perspective of someone else in my dreams. If I, Tunes, exist in the dream at all, then I am in my own POV. Sometimes I will switch from myself, Tunes, to another character, but at that point Tunes stops existing entirely. Honestly, I kind of always thought this was normal, because it’s normal for me and I never really questioned it, but this thread is making me start to second-guess that assumption...

 

7 hours ago, mreid said:

While what you said is true, there are symbols that are common to all humanity (this is called the collective unconscious).

Yes, but only in a general sense. For example, often a field of flowers will symbolize good things (I’m not familiar with specific symbolic meanings because I found that they limited my ability to interpret dreams accurately more than they helped - but since the symbolism was generally accepted on a conscious level, they were very useful for creating dreams in my stories!). But if someone associates a field of flowers with the yard behind the house where they were constantly abused, a field of flowers could suddenly be a forboding and unnerving symbol instead. So in this way, you can’t always know what a certain symbol means to a certain person. Symbols may have certain generalized meanings, but a person’s experiences and personal viewpoint could always change the meaning of any of these symbols in regards to what that symbol means for them personally. 

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34 minutes ago, mreid said:

@FictoCannibal. Do you find this relatable? I mean Tunes experience in not knowing she is not the character until she wakes up? And has it ever happened to you to see yourself from another person's POV, or in the mirror? If so, what did it look like?

I'm having this weird kidney thing so haven't had coffee in like, 4 days.. two people even offered me free coffee today from a new shop that's opened up and I had to turn them down Y_Y anyway what I'm getting at is that I'm having serious brain fog as a result of lack of coffee, so my response (and other responses I have made today) MAY not make a whole lot of sense.

 

I am always a watcher, but sometimes I directly experience what is happening even if I'm only watching it happen to someone else. Other times, it's happening directly to me. And other times I'm only an impartial observer watching something play out. However, I never have an awareness of my own 'physicalness'.. I can feel spatial awareness, pain, orgasm even.. but no body appears to be attached to me.

 

I experience fearlessness in my dreams, even if it's a dream that leaves me very, very disturbed upon awakening.

 

Often I am witnessing tortures I'd never even considered existing even though I'm someone who has studied torture extensively. For example, a recent dream I had I was seeing abducted people having nylon cords wrapped around their faces like spiderwebs, then the cords were lifted by this machine - the weight of the person's body would cause their face to slowly rip off as the machine pulled the nylon up. They were all tied down to chairs in a circle so had witness what was happening to everyone else while it was happening to them. I was watching this happening looking down on the scene, like an observer, and could also feel the sensations of the people in the chairs and see what was happening from their perspective at the same time. I wasn't their bodies, even though I could feel what was happening to them and had a type of awareness through their eyes. It was impartial and immersive at the same time.

 

Another example, there was a mad crowd in these dark tunnels, people were running and screaming and being cut and hurt. A man was screaming beside an acid fountain as parts of his body were melting off - I seemed to be part of the crowd, cutting and hacking and seeing the man screaming, but couldn't actually feel what he was feeling. I was just someone with a weapon fighting people who were trying to flee (I think?). They were fleeing, screaming, and I was hacking at them.

 

Sometimes my dreams are more like visions. When I was a kid I dreamed I was watching a scene of a dark skinned man in a garden slaughtering lambs, there was blood and guts everywhere and the lambs were screaming. The garden was beautiful and had this big wall all around it. My sister (who was maybe like 6 at the time) was sitting on the ground by the gate leading into the garden. She was crying, and eating bread which she was soaking in beer from this big mug she was holding. There were hornets crawling all over her neck and face. I was watching the scene, but not experiencing it as anyone in the scene.

 

Often I am fighting in my dreams, and will fight to the death. I have been killed in all sorts of ways when I lose fights, but always from a kind of spatial awareness as opposed to from a place of having an actual body. Sometimes when I become lucid I try to convince other people they are in a dream with me. Sometimes it works and I can communicate with them, other times they think I'm nuts. 

 

I'm not sure if this would interest you (and you may have stopped reading by this point, lol) but once in a dream I saw a girl I know in a very specific situation. She came to school the next day and told me she'd seen me in her dream, in the exact situation I'd seen her in (I hadn't told her about my dream). The situation was too specific and random for this to be coincidence. So we shared each others mind-space for a time that night, but she could definitely see my body (or else how could she have recognized me?) even if I couldn't 'feel' a sense of having a body.

 

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@FictoCannibal. your dreams are super interesting thank you for sharing them!!! I think I experience something similar where I can feel or experience what is happening in my dream but with no awareness of a physical body.

 

5 hours ago, FictoCannibal. said:

once in a dream I saw a girl I know in a very specific situation. She came to school the next day and told me she'd seen me in her dream, in the exact situation I'd seen her in

that's creepy o:::: i used to believe when I was little that all our dream worlds were connected, but I don't know where I got this idea from. 

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22 minutes ago, gaogao said:

i used to believe when I was little that all our dream worlds were connected, but I don't know where I got this idea from. 

The dream realm is one of the gateways to the Astral Realms and people often stumble across the Astral Realms by accident while dreaming (especially if they go lucid). In the Astral Realms you can meet beings from other dimensions as well as other Astral travelers from Earth, and spirits etc. You were probably subconsciously aware of these truths without consciously knowing of them, and may have even been using the dreamworld as a gateway to Astral often without remembering it when you awoke! In that case you'd have had a subtle underlying knowledge without knowing why. :3 

 

29 minutes ago, gaogao said:

that's creepy o::::

I find this kind of thing really fascinating (if you want to know about actual creepy, we can discuss hypnagogia/hypnopompia which are some of the most terrifying aspects of the dream/sleep world imaginable!)  

 

Myself and the girl from school weren't in the Astral Realms when we connected, but we had somehow slipped into each other's dream-space/mind-space. In the dream, I was in London very near to the Big Ben (me and the girl are both in NZ on the other side of the world from London), and (this is a bit embarrassing) some of the cast of the Harry Potter movies had been gathering for a media event. I was a consciousness floating in the crowd, but I saw this girl I know in a different part of the crowd. She's very distinctive because she has literally bright orange hair, like the kind most people need dye to achieve, that's the only reason I noticed her among all the people that were there. I've never met anyone else with hair as red/orange as hers! Anyway I waved to her and called out her name, but we were both a bit engrossed with what was happening so continued on our separate ways. The next morning when I got to school she came up to me and said 'I dreamed about you last night! I was near the Big Ben and some of the cast from the Harry Potter movies were there for a media thing, and you waved to me and called out my name!' ..I don't think she believed me when I told her I was in the same dream with her :P 

 

32 minutes ago, gaogao said:

your dreams are super interesting thank you for sharing them!!!

I love yabbering so always happy to share, I'm glad you enjoyed reading my super long post because probably no one else will!

 

32 minutes ago, gaogao said:

I think I experience something similar where I can feel or experience what is happening in my dream but with no awareness of a physical body.

Yes I'd be interested to know how common this is! @mreid has her own theories, but I believe it could possibly have something to do with how subconsciously attached we are to the physical body? I am sure some people will just naturally feel a lot more 'secure' if they can locate and feel the presence of their physical body, whereas others can detach from it a lot more easily and don't feel 'unsafe' or 'naked' without it. This doesn't happen on a conscious level at all, so someone who always dreams they have a solid physical body might say 'hey that's not true, I'd be fine to float around without my body!!' but we NEVER know what's happening deep in our subconscious, it can disagree with us in all sorts of subtle and strange ways, and when it comes to dreaming our subconscious has a LOT of say over what happens until we can learn to control our lucidity (meaning we can wake up in our dream. When that happens, people usually find the dream world is more 'real' than the waking world, but that's a completely different topic). Some people may have times when they need the security of the bodily garment and other times when they don't need it, hence why some people experience some dreams where they have a body and some dreams where they are just a floating entity. Just a theory though :3

 

Anyway I've rambled long enough now, I'm off to perv at a hottie in Black Mirror :P Apologies for this uber long response, dreams are generally a topic I avoid discussing publicly because many people outright dismiss the Astral Realms and even lucid dreams which gets very frustrating when you've actually consciously experienced both! But yeah I guess I got a little carried away with my rambling, oops! :cake: 

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22 minutes ago, FictoCannibal. said:

The dream realm is one of the gateways to the Astral Realms and people often stumble across the Astral Realms by accident while dreaming (especially if they go lucid).

Huh.... When I was little I used to lucid dream a lot. I was surprised when I heard that people usually don't know they are dreaming when they are dreaming. 

 

33 minutes ago, FictoCannibal. said:

dreams are generally a topic I avoid discussing publicly because many people outright dismiss the Astral Realms and even lucid dreams which gets very frustrating

Y'know.. I feel like I would normally dismiss the astral realm thing but I'd honestly be really interested in hearing you talk about dreams because what you say weirdly matches my experiences and I'm getting a little creeped out ..... Not only did I used to lucid dream a lot as a kid, but when I was like 12 and wanted to be a manga artist, I started writing a story about a kid who meets a being from another dimension in a dream! I sucked at writing so it started getting pretty dumb very quickly but the basis of the story was my childhood belief that dreams could all be connected to each other. I also believed that each person could have their own dream world and you could connect to it from another place which sounds weirdly like what happened to you and your friend????

 

Weird, Weird Weird???

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40 minutes ago, gaogao said:

dreams could all be connected to each other. I also believed that each person could have their own dream world and you could connect to it from another place

I also believed these things as a kid. And was also inspired to write a story about it, but I tried to write this story looking back on it in early college and it was going to be written, not drawn. But it also didn't go anywhere. 

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On 10/19/2018 at 4:20 AM, FictoCannibal. said:

Myself and the girl from school weren't in the Astral Realms when we connected, but we had somehow slipped into each other's dream-space/mind-space.

How do you know you weren't astral traveling?  Do you believe when you project it must always be into the Astral Realms?

 

I had to look up "sharing dream space" as I was unfamiliar.  The one site talked about mutual dreams, meshing dreams, and meeting dreams.  I've termed meeting dreams as visitation dreams - different than regular dreams in that they are more vivid and necessarily lucid.  But I also think they are one result of astral travel.

 

I looked up Astral Realms too.  Different websites say different things.  One woman said the Astral Realms can represent fear, anxiety, sadness -or- a feeling of enlightenment with all the bright lights (egotistical).  Whatever the results, it's all illusory and based on the emotions of the individual.  Other sites have described it as containing 7 planes with higher and higher vibrational levels.

 

But from my experience, one can travel to different places here on Earth or to what I refer to as outside the atmosphere.

 

I'm trying to make this brief ... ugh.  The reason I am trying to differentiate sharing a dream space and astral projection is because I have never differentiated it before.  And it is because of a question I have asked others and even made a post on this board several years ago:  Have you ever met dream people?  Have you ever had more than one dream about someone, talked with them also, and then actually met them in real life?

 

Most answers then and even now by doing a search say that it is impossible.  The subconscious cannot make up faces.  I must have passed this person on the street, or seen them in a crowd, but didn't consciously remember the time although my subconscious must have stored the memory.

 

But that could not possibly be the case.  We never lived or visited any cities at the same time the other was there ... until we actually met in person and recognized each other and were quite happy to see each other.

 

Lucinda

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@mreid Most people that have Aphantasia can dream with pictures, sound etc. I still get none of this when dreaming. My dreaming time is just the same as my waking time,  blind, no sound etc

 

On this Reddit thread some  that are like me are sharing about this

 

 

As I have mentioned elsewhere my ability to fantasize is limited to concepts and spatial awareness. I cannot see, hear, touch etc in my mind. All I can do is know what I am thinking about get feelings about that

 

I cannot project and cannot easily become attracted

 

When I look at a person I can see their face, I can see their body too but my focus is always on the face. Once the person is out of sight I cannot see them at all. I can recall a few facts about their face, but usually next to nothing about their clothing, size or shape. When I see them again I might recognise them, but their is far less chance of me recognising them as a person that can visualise could

 

I think I experience myself and my wife as a whole, both body and face together in my mind but for most other people it is just the face.

 

If I do recall a persons body it is usually separate from the face

 

For instance, when I think of Elvis, it is his face I think of (I can't see it of course). But I can think of his body in a white outfit, but when I switch to this thought it is just the outfit and I struggle to remember the face

 

I am thinking this remembering folk in pieces is part of why I don't become attracted. In regards to my wife I new her for a very long time and really really got to know her so well, I could experience her as a whole, like I do myself, but most other folk I do recall them in pieces

 

I hope this is making some sense 

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3 hours ago, Lucinda said:

How do you know you weren't astral traveling?  Do you believe when you project it must always be into the Astral Realms?

 I have stopped my oneironautics practice since finding out I was pregnant for the first time and don't wish to start again until my kids have grown and left home, so can't further test certain theories until such a time as I can begin my practice again. However, the two of us were more in an unconscious dreaming state than the astral state, it wasn't even a lucid dream. It was exactly like a 'regular' dream, an expression of my subconscious, and she (as far as I know) was also in a regular dreaming state. Somehow our dream states seem to have connected for a time. In the Astral (and when in a lucid dream) things work differently for me than they do in the normal dream state. In that 'dream' that we both had, I was experiencing 'regular' dream state.  I had not yet began to actively practice oneironautics at that point - it was that 'dream' that led me to further study and practice in the field of dream exploration, lucid dreaming, and Astral projection.  We must remember though that some levels of the Astral realms coincide closely with mental space we exist in while dreaming, which is why dreams can be a gateway to the Astral. Because of this, certain beings and encounters in dreams could most definitely be things you're actually experiencing in the Astral without being consciously aware of it, if that makes sense. This could have been what was happening.

 

3 hours ago, Lucinda said:

I had to look up "sharing dream space" as I was unfamiliar.  The one site talked about mutual dreams, meshing dreams, and meeting dreams.  I've termed meeting dreams as visitation dreams - different than regular dreams in that they are more vivid and necessarily lucid.  But I also think they are one result of astral travel.

Yes definitely. In my comment I was not going by terms others have used, just trying to explain things as they happened. It did not feel like being in lucid or Astral states, I have been in those (even became trapped a couple of times, in the lower realms), this was just an experience that was no different than your average dream, except that it was shared by the both of us for that brief time. We could have been in some Astral form without knowing it though of course.

 

3 hours ago, Lucinda said:

 Whatever the results, it's all illusory and based on the emotions of the individual. 

This is inaccurate and sounds like she was more interpreting different people's personal 'dream realms' (the types of things they see when they have 'biological' dreams; those resulting from the brain processing emotions/events/etc). The Astral realms have been explored by many, many people, and even someone who has never read of another's accounts in Astral will record seeing the types of things/landscapes/experiences/etc as many other travelers before them have seen. It's not until the individual then finds the accounts of other people that a sense of awe (sometimes shock, fear, wonder, all sorts of things) comes over them when they realize many people have been to this same place, it's not just something they created with their own mind. There is certainly a theory that the Astral realms have been created as a result of the entire history of collective human consciousness (I don't entirely agree but that's a different topic) however, these realms are still something specific that travelers can visit, not something that exists solely within the mind of the individual.

 

3 hours ago, Lucinda said:

Other sites have described it as containing 7 planes with higher and higher vibrational levels.

This is much closer to the truth, but unfortunately would take a small book's worth of text for me to explain thoroughly. I will say that this is one of those cases where the info you'll find online isn't as thorough or as accurate as some of the things you'll learn in books written by actual long-term oneironouts, HOWEVER we must also keep in mind that different individuals will interpret things differently depending on their own personal views. For example, when a very religious person accidentally stumbles upon some of the lower Astral realms (which are terrifying places to go), they often think they visited Purgatory, or even say things like ''I saw Hell but there wasn't fire, it was cold..''. This is because they are trying to make sense of what they saw based on their own pre-established beliefs. This can happen in all sorts of ways depending on how strongly the individual holds those certain pre-established beliefs. I was very fortunate when I started my study in that I had no pre-established beliefs about what I may find (and wasn't bought up religious or anything), I was just very curious to explore and learn. I believe this helps me have objectivity when studying and exploring.

 

3 hours ago, Lucinda said:

But from my experience, one can travel to different places here on Earth or to what I refer to as outside the atmosphere.

Oh yes, most definitely. The CIA experimented extensively with this form of Astral Travel in the 70s and some of those experiments have recently been declassified which makes for utterly incredible reading material. What you are referring to is travelling in Astral form within the Earth dimension. You can travel anywhere in this universe in this form, visit different planets and stars etc, within the same dimension Earth exists in. Most people stick to environments on Earth and places very close to Earth though.

 

3 hours ago, Lucinda said:

I'm trying to make this brief ... ugh.

Things take me a lot longer to write when I try to 'keep it brief' (because I have to cut and edit so much material, urgh) so I'm sorry, this is quite long. I'm just typing  quickly while I wait for my phone to charge enough that I can continue listening to my audiobook while I clean, but won't have enough time to try to edit this down so it's shorter sorry :c

 

3 hours ago, Lucinda said:

The reason I am trying to differentiate sharing a dream space and astral projection is because I have never differentiated it before.  And it is because of a question I have asked others and even made a post on this board several years ago:  Have you ever met dream people?  Have you ever had more than one dream about someone, talked with them also, and then actually met them in real life?

This is certainly possible, yes. I will explain further later in this post.

 

3 hours ago, Lucinda said:

Most answers then and even now by doing a search say that it is impossible.  The subconscious cannot make up faces.  I must have passed this person on the street, or seen them in a crowd, but didn't consciously remember the time although my subconscious must have stored the memory.

These people are answering based solely on the dreams that happen in our biological brains as a result of memories/events/emotions we are processing in our subconscious while we sleep.

 

3 hours ago, Lucinda said:

But that could not possibly be the case.  We never lived or visited any cities at the same time the other was there ... until we actually met in person and recognized each other and were quite happy to see each other.

It is 100% possible to meet other Earth beings in lucid dreams and in the Astral realms (as well as share a kind of dream telepathy like me and the red headed girl did). Many experienced oneironauts will even make meeting places where them and their friends (who also need to be advanced oneironauts of course) can meet in Astral form to hang out. After they wake, they'll compare their experiences of what they did together as way to 'prove' to themselves it was real (the experiences always coincide of course). Another form of this is, of course, meeting strangers who are either consciously Astral travelling, or who have slipped into the realm through a dream and are not aware they are 'in Astral'. The latter type of person may remember you as only a dream-figure if they remember you at all. Anyway, if you and a certain other person are drawn to each other energetically, and are both people who tend to lucid dream and/or visit the Astral realms regularly (even if that's unconscious on your part, you may well see each other regularly in what you believe are dreams. There's also the possibility of sharing a type of 'dream telepathy' like what me and the red haired girl experienced. Regardless, if you eventually bump into each other you will recognize each other if you're people who both tend to remember your dreams. If you don't remember your dreams, you may still feel an overwhelming sense of 'recognition' for that person, like you've always known them. This can of course sometimes be attributed to past life connections, but often it's those very connections that create the energetic 'draw' between the two of you which is why you kept bumping into each other in your 'dreams' in the first place. Please note this topic of meeting others in dreams isn't a 'theory', it's an actual thing that real people can do and have experienced, and almost anyone could even teach themselves to do it if they dedicated enough time to mastering the art of oneironautics and Astral travel.

 

I hope that helps answer your questions? :)

 

 

Oh and there is another question you asked me (about something relating to this topic) a few weeks ago in a thread started by @HayaH, it is a very heavy subject and I am waiting until I am in a clearer head-space to respond. I haven't forgotten though, and just wanted to let you know I am not ignoring your question :3

 

 

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On 10/19/2018 at 11:04 PM, gaogao said:

Y'know.. I feel like I would normally dismiss the astral realm thing but I'd honestly be really interested in hearing you talk about dreams because what you say weirdly matches my experiences and I'm getting a little creeped out ..... Not only did I used to lucid dream a lot as a kid, but when I was like 12 and wanted to be a manga artist, I started writing a story about a kid who meets a being from another dimension in a dream! I sucked at writing so it started getting pretty dumb very quickly but the basis of the story was my childhood belief that dreams could all be connected to each other. I also believed that each person could have their own dream world and you could connect to it from another place which sounds weirdly like what happened to you and your friend????

 

Weird, Weird Weird???

These are common reactions for someone who may have unknowingly been stumbling across Astral concepts in their dreams without entirely understanding what was happening. When they start hearing others verbalizing their own experiences, a person may become a bit weirded out by some of the similarities, even if they were never truly CONSCIOUSLY aware of what was happening to them in their dreams. They just have impressions, creative ideas, thoughts, etc which they don't really understand the origins of.. Then they feel a sense of familiarity when learning from others about the Astral realms (and dream telepathy etc). It's as possible to meet beings from other dimensions in the Astral realms as it is to meet people from the Earth realms, but regardless of whether you got the concept from Astral or solely from your own creative brain that still sounds like a great concept for a manga, haha! But yes it's 100% true that people have their own individual dream environments, through which they can interact with the Astral realms and sometimes stumble across the dream realms of others ^_^

 

@Tunes I will respond to your message when I get the chance, it's just been a super busy week. My landlord will be coming on Tuesday and then I'll be free to get back to you :):cake: 

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1 hour ago, FictoCannibal. said:

For example, when a very religious person accidentally stumbles upon some of the lower Astral realms (which are terrifying places to go), they often think they visited Purgatory, or even say things like ''I saw Hell but there wasn't fire, it was cold..''. This is because they are trying to make sense of what they saw based on their own pre-established beliefs. This can happen in all sorts of ways depending on how strongly the individual holds those certain pre-established beliefs.

Ficto, we wish to add something...you remember our topic, you mentioned it. There, we experienced parallel situation. One was a vision, other was when our body died. We were separated from our body by death in one case, and separated from the body in astral in other case. And that two sides met in same moment, even if separation in astral was 20 years ago.

 

When we died, we experienced enormous expansion of consciousness, and there was no will above ours. Then we went to Hell, to find who poisoned our body. And it came true, after return.

 

It is possible that we are talking about same things, calling them differently. If we use word hell, we can agree that some of those realms are cold, but we were in the worst realm of hell, realm of fire, and we were dead, not dreaming.

In that state of consciousness there were no pre-established beliefs, because we were completely disconnected with body by death, so our human brain was dead probably by hours. Because our bones never felt so cold, after return into life we were clearly aware of it. (if it was clinic death, our bones would not be cold).

There was something very different between our experience, and dreaming. We will publish now how some of our dreams look like.

 

There are two other visions which we will add:

Who is the woman from the desert, from our vision?

 

When we saw her in our vision about 20 years ago, what we remember, she looked like a hermit. Her body was wrapped completely in something black, there was no trace on her to cause any thought about her sexuality.
She drew the circles in the sand, explaining to us something about time (and times), what we thought it's a horoscope (but not as astrology, it was something very different).
She looked tremendous. Her personality was stronger than any personality of any male, any man we've ever met! Her eyes able for piercing right through our soul.
She was able to read our mind. We were scared of her, because she was what people call God. But in female body!
She gave us a task (drawing circles, showing us something what we did not understand in that time), and we can't define it by words.
And she did show us our future, opening with her hand the window of time right before our eyes, and she sealed that vision. We are aware that we saw the greatest happiness, and future world, but we don't know now how it looked like. It's a sealed vision, that we can't say to no one what we saw.
She explained to us what brings disaster and what brings salvation.

She spoke something about marriage. (now we think that she explained to us that we are two in one body, married through one body, but we did not get it in that time).

We said: But we don't have a Husband (we didn't know we are transgender, thinking we are girl, in time of this vision)
And she pierced us with her eyes to the core of our soul, and she said: "You will find Husband at the very end."
That made us sad, because we thought it means when we are old, or at the end of life. But she knew our thoughts, and then she opened the window of time in the air, with her hand, and we saw the greatest happiness, and it was not end of life, or when we grow old. We saw the future world!
We were so happy, and we wanted to share with person we loved what we see.
But she said: "One whom you love wishes you evil".
Then she sealed a vision, and we woke up immediately, remembering almost all except what we saw through the window of time.

We called the future world "the greatest happiness" in our vision, but it's obviously forbidden to share what we saw, since she sealed it.
And, she spoke the truth. We discovered later that person we loved secretly was making evil to us. She didn't lie.

 

Now we are waiting to see the Husband, at the very end . Since we discovered that two of us is in this body, we think finding Husband at the very end also means we will find our other, now invisible side, who is the Husband. "Two will be one flesh", we found it literally.

 

It's still mystery to us, who is the woman from the desert, and why she gave us some tasks connected with sealed vision.

It was like a promise, once the vision will be opened whole, and we will know what to do, about task...

 

 

 

 

Later we had another vision, about mentioned ending:

 

We saw in our dream, a vision of song. The song was spreading all around the world, touching hearts of people. We were watching it. Then we saw someone's hands accepted us and embraced us. We could not see the face, even we tried, just hands. And we cried,  cried from the depths of our soul, but from being deeply touched, as from repentance and relief, not from grief.
When We opened our eyes, We were still crying. Then came into our mind that song was the signal of the end (of this world, and future world will start)

 

We had so many other visions through dreams, connected with this sealed.

And, just to add, 20 years ago we didn't know nothing about Bible (to be influenced by pre-established beliefs).

Just adding these information, as some possible help for forming  clear picture about subject of dreaming, where dreams are stopping, and visions begin...and how consciousness behave.

We think, one consciousness is connected with a brain, other only with astral.

And there's not to much differences between visions and being dead, except total expansion of consciousness.

Those are our experiences and conclusions. If it can be helpful.

 

 

 

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1 hour ago, HayaH said:

It is possible that we are talking about same things, calling them differently. If we use word hell, we can agree that some of those realms are cold, but we were in the worst realm of hell, realm of fire, and we were dead, not dreaming.

I am sorry I don't have time to respond properly to everything you said, I'm in a bit of a mad rush right now! But I was going to say I still need to respond to lots of what you said in that other thread of yours as well as to Lucinda, I just haven't had the mental energy for such a heavy and in-depth topic recently I'm afraid. I was going to say that it sounds like what you experienced when you saw a vision of 'Hell' was different from the way I initially interpreted it in your thread, because you were referring to a type of Hell on Earth as opposed to a specifically 'Biblical' vision. I believe when you speak of the vision you had upon your death that you you are referring to something quite different than the place I speak of as the 'cold realms', they are a very specific place in the Astral realms where I have unfortunately become stuck a couple of times, but they have very distinctive qualities that anyone who has been there will recognize (I will expand on my experiences there when I am able to respond to Lucinda in your thread as she asked me to explain them further I believe). I later interpreted your use of the word Hell more as a symbolic word to name the state of what was happening on Earth in your vision, though I wouldn't be surprised if you'd also seen the cold realms in some visions too (they're very close to this dimension so many travelers stumble across them by accident). When I said in this thread that some people interpret the cold realms as Hell or Purgatory I was not referring to the things you had said in the thread the both of you made, sorry if it sounded like I was referring to the things you had said in your thread!!! I hope you didn't feel like you had to defend or explain yourself as a result of what I said about people interpreting the cold realms as Hell or Purgatory, but regardless everything you have said is very interesting, thank you so much for sharing! I wish I had more time to sit and chat properly, I am just so run off my feet right now it's very frustrating. Sometimes in these situations it is easier to talk in the voice so more can be said without having to sit down and type for so long!

 

Anyway there is something else I need to quickly say about a couple of things you said, even though I was initially trying to keep this brief and sadly can't respond to every single thing you have said :c

 

1 hour ago, HayaH said:

Who is the woman from the desert, from our vision?

It's very strange because reading about your vision, I was 'feeling' so strongly the presence of La Loba, a desert woman I have read of but not encountered myself personally.  I am not sure why I 'felt' her presence so strongly, but I will share with you a passage that speaks beautifully of who she is and what she represents:

 

 

Quote

 

La Loba – The Wolf Woman

Clarissa Pinkola Estés

 

Image result for Art

 

There is an old woman who lives in a hidden place that everyone knows but few have ever seen. As in the fairy tales of Eastern Europe, she seems to wait for lost or wandering people and seekers to come to her place.

 

They say she lives among the rotten granite slopes in Tarahumara Indian territory. They say she is buried outside Phoenix near a well. She is said to have been seen traveling south to Monte Alban in a burnt-out car with the back window shot out. She is said to stand by the highway near El Paso, or ride shotgun with truckers to Morelia, Mexico, or that she has been sighted walking to market above Oaxaca with strangely formed boughs of firewood on her back. She is called by many names: La Huesera, Bone Woman; La Trapera, The Gatherer; and La Loba, Wolf Woman.

 

The superstitious call her soul stealer, claiming she weaves a dream catcher to snatch up those who would cross over and cage them in the light of her fire.

 

The sole work of La Loba is the collecting of bones. She is known to collect and preserve especially that which is in danger of being lost to the world. Her cave is filled with the bones of all manner of desert creatures: the deer, the rattlesnake, the crow. But her specialty is said to be wolves.

 

She creeps and crawls and sifts through the montañas, mountains, and arroyos, dry river beds, looking for wolf bones, and when she has assembled an entire skeleton, when the last bone is in place and the beautiful white sculpture of the creature is laid out before her, she sits by the fire and thinks about what song she will sing.

 

And when she is sure, she stands over the criatura, raises her arms over it, and sings out. That is when the rib bones and leg bones of the wolf begin to flesh out and the creature becomes furred. La Loba sings some more, and more of the creature comes into being; its tail curls upward, shaggy and strong.

 

And La Loba sings more and the wolf creature begins to breathe.

 

And still La Loba sings so deeply that the floor of the desert shakes, and as she sings, the wolf opens its eyes, leaps up, and runs away down the canyon.

 

Somewhere in its running, whether by the speed of its running, or by splashing its way into a river, or by way of a ray of sunlight or moonlight hitting it right in the side, the wolf is suddenly transformed into a laughing woman who runs free toward the horizon.

 

So it is said that if you wander the desert, and it is near sundown, and you are perhaps a little bit lost, and certainly tired, that you are lucky, for La Loba may take a liking to you and show you something — something of the Soul.

 

 

Image result for women who run with wolves pdf

 

 

 

You reminded me of the wanderer, the seeker, who in your dream/vision was fortunate enough to stumble across the sacred desert woman, and she showed you something of your soul. Even if it is not the same woman at all, I was just reminded very strongly of her when I read your description of the vision you had. 

 

Part of the symbolism of La Loba is rebirth, she literally creates the rebirth of beings that have died, which is another reason your story reminded me of her (I am not saying she created your resurrection, but that rebirth is a strong aspect of who she is, and she is also a desert woman who speaks to wanderers of secrets and visions and of their souls - that's why I 'felt' her so strongly when I was reading of your vision!)

 

But that's enough rambling from me! Now I definitely need to get back to my cleaning!! :3 

 

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2 hours ago, FictoCannibal. said:

I hope you didn't feel like you had to defend or explain yourself as a result of what I said about people interpreting the cold realms as Hell or Purgatory, but regardless everything you have said is very interesting, thank you so much for sharing!

Don't worry, it was not defending, just wish to add more perspectives, to expand understanding what is happening with consciousness through dreams and beyond the dreams, when astral is completely disconnected with the body (death of the body). In that case, as in our vision of Baby Angel, he was ''the watcher''. Someone who gave direction to other part of our soul where to return (imagine, if you are disconnected with body, and soul left all earthly realms, there's no chance to return without guidance).

 It's interesting that whole experience has two perspectives, one from the dream in astral, other (completely expanded consciousness) is out of human mind (beyond human mind). That's the reason why we can't ''translate'' this experience in words, and explain what was hell and how it looked, or will look. It's impossible from the point of time. We were present in realms of eternity and it can't be told through words or physics so easy. 

 

What happened to us is the strangest thing ever, and trust us, we could not talk properly by months, appalled.

Then, death was terrible stress for our body. We could feel that body has the memory of it (physical memory), and every try to talk or write about it, we noticed it upsets our body. So we needed to calm her down (it was literally a promise that we will never leave her again, so we can talk now about it without problems)...

 

And, take your time, write when you feel strong for it, we understand you.

About La Loba, we admit that we hear about her for the first time. It is interesting info, thanks for sharing! We need to read it again, and if we have some ideas we will tell you. 

 

edit: actually, La Loba reminded us on our first anime-girl crush :  )

 

 

 

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Anthracite_Impreza

I know this is mostly about dreams but I'm curious what people think about deja vu, because I know I've seen things before they happen but I don't remember... how. It's irritating because scientifically they say you just misremembered seeing it before, but I know I didn't, I know I saw things before by what was also going on at the time (where I lived etc)! I don't like not knowing, I'm fairly scientific but deja vu doesn't make sense >.<

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8 hours ago, FictoCannibal. said:

 

24y624i.jpg

Nothing to add, I just wanted to say that this is a beautiful picture.

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@mreid This is an old post where I am trying to explain my body blindness

 

Body blindness has not been well studied. Generally the research looks at people that cannot see their own body. One person I read about was obese but she could not see that she was. I do not have this problem, I can see my own body, and I can see my wife's body. I can see other peoples bodies too, but a lot depends on how well I know them

 

What I mean is, given the short amount of time that I have to start building the concept in my mind that I am able to remember and recognise a person my mind has learned to really focus on the face. To improve upon this a trick I learned a long time ago was to think who the person I am looking at looks like on the TV. I have told other folk with Aphantasia, Aspergers and Prosopagnosia about this, but they say they struggle because they cant remember what folk on TV look like. It works for me but not my brother. He is trying to develop this skill, but forgets, and goes back to trying to remember the whole person. I His recall is nowhere as good as mine, he is trying to store and recall too much information.

 

I regularly remind him a lot that I improved my memory and recognition of people, firstly by focusing on the face and secondly by trying to remember who they look like. It works for me, but like I have said I will rarely remember the body and even if I do I am storing that information elsewhere. Usually when asked to recall a film star I can describe the face, I might or might not remember the body but the minute I think about the body I start to struggle to remember the face

 

I can remember me as a whole, and I can remember my wife's body as a whole, but please remember when I say I can remember things I cant SEE them in my mind!!!

 

As you know, I was born with Aphantasia and the Brain Hemhorrage is more recent. They did try to put me on an end of life pathway, but my wife said no. We are in therapy and are using the alternative therapies that I have mentioned in past posts

 

There is some suggestion that Autism, Aspergers, and other similar conditions begin with either Aphantasia, Prospognosia or other similar conditions. I am not claiming this for all cases, I am just highlighting the links and similarities with body blindness, face blindness,body language blindness, emotional blindness etc. All of these conditions could be playing a role in regards to peoples ability to become attracted to other people

 

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/my-life-aspergers/201303/how-much-aspergers-is-really-face-or-emotion-blindness

 

(I am sorry that my typing keeps changing size, I don't know why that is)

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4 hours ago, Anthraxite_Vampreza said:

I know this is mostly about dreams but I'm curious what people think about deja vu, because I know I've seen things before they happen but I don't remember... how. It's irritating because scientifically they say you just misremembered seeing it before, but I know I didn't, I know I saw things before by what was also going on at the time (where I lived etc)! I don't like not knowing, I'm fairly scientific but deja vu doesn't make sense >.<

I get deja vus often.

 

 

This thread is getting... quite interesting I must say.

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On 10/16/2018 at 10:39 AM, mreid said:

@ConfusedAboutMyself So you have premonitions? Interesting. My mother has those too (although they are normally not about bad things I think) and someone else from here also told me they too have that kind of dreams as well. Something else to look into...  do you get those often?

My grandma (she raised me after my parents divorced) said that when I was young, I would wake up knowing who I was going to see that day and whether they were visiting me or I was visiting them. She said that when my opinion differed from the plans, I was always right. But for my own memory, I only remember one dream premonition and it was very extremely symbolic. I had the dream 3 times, around times when something that the dream represented would happen within the next few months. The last part of that dream came true in freshman year of high school. And that’s it. Oh, unless we count mid high school when I dreamed that one of my favorite tv characters (not actor) was going to die and the very next episode, they did. I think I might have subconsciously picked up on a trope though, so I don’t think it counts. :P

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14 minutes ago, mreid said:

This thread is getting... quite interesting I must say.

Ikr? I am so behind. I need to find time to actually stop and read it. :P

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On 10/21/2018 at 6:30 AM, FictoCannibal. said:

These are common reactions for someone who may have unknowingly been stumbling across Astral concepts in their dreams without entirely understanding what was happening. 

Question... ( that you don't strictly speaking have to get to since you seem super busy :'D )  is it dangerous to have been meddling in these things without knowing what was going on? 

 

Maybe I'll do some googling :B but there's probably a lot of misinformation out there so being pointed in a specific direction might be good... 

 

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I had deja vu when I was younger, but it decreased in intensity as I got older and now it's only very rarely I experience it. When I had it I often tried very hard to rule out by logic if I could have experienced such a situation in the past or I am just thinking I experienced it. However I mostly couldn't tell and ended up with theoretically possible I experienced it in the past however highly unlikely. It's only now after reading this thread that I realized there is the name deja vu for this experience.

 

I also have aphantasia and only realized not too long ago by reading a post of @Marlow1. I think it has a great influence of how I am and how I think, but I'm only stating to understand all this now. I'm also sometimes having problems recognizing people, but I'm not sure if this a light form of prosopagnosia or just a side effect of my aphantasia.

 

I'm also having difficulties remembering things or experiences. It's not that I totally forget these things, but like they are hidden deep inside my brain and I need I need some external clues to be able to remember them again. For most important things I work around this by writing things down or leaving a reminder visibly on my desk. But I think there are lots of past experience hidden in my brain that require work to be actively remembered again by me. I guess I should start journaling to help me remember these things.

 

I currently only dream very rarely (or if I do more ofter I don't remember anything of it). When I dream there is only a very short time after waking up when I can still remember my dream if at all. I have to actively work on remembering it and quickly write it down, else it will just be gone. When I was younger I think I did dream more frequently. I'm not entirely sure but I think my dreams are first person and I can't see myself in my dreams.

 

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2 hours ago, mace_ said:

When I dream there is only a very short time after waking up when I can still remember my dream if at all. I have to actively work on remembering it and quickly write it down, else it will just be gone.

I think everyone is like that though. With me I will still remember fragments afterwards both I will forget most of it as time goes by.

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On 10/22/2018 at 4:18 PM, mreid said:

I think everyone is like that though. With me I will still remember fragments afterwards both I will forget most of it as time goes by.

Yes, you're right, probably everybody is somehow like this.

 

I was dreaming last night and when waking up I could remember the dream a bit. So I can now say that I dream in first person, but I can't see anything at all, so seems like I also have aphantasia in my dreams. The dream was very similar to how a book works. The scene and the plot are described and so I know where I am and what is happening around me but there is no picture or video.

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On 10/22/2018 at 12:48 PM, mace_ said:

I had deja vu when I was younger, but it decreased in intensity as I got older and now it's only very rarely I experience it. When I had it I often tried very hard to rule out by logic if I could have experienced such a situation in the past or I am just thinking I experienced it. However I mostly couldn't tell and ended up with theoretically possible I experienced it in the past however highly unlikely. It's only now after reading this thread that I realized there is the name deja vu for this experience.

 

I also have aphantasia and only realized not too long ago by reading a post of @Marlow1. I think it has a great influence of how I am and how I think, but I'm only stating to understand all this now. I'm also sometimes having problems recognizing people, but I'm not sure if this a light form of prosopagnosia or just a side effect of my aphantasia.

 

I'm also having difficulties remembering things or experiences. It's not that I totally forget these things, but like they are hidden deep inside my brain and I need I need some external clues to be able to remember them again. For most important things I work around this by writing things down or leaving a reminder visibly on my desk. But I think there are lots of past experience hidden in my brain that require work to be actively remembered again by me. I guess I should start journaling to help me remember these things.

 

I currently only dream very rarely (or if I do more ofter I don't remember anything of it). When I dream there is only a very short time after waking up when I can still remember my dream if at all. I have to actively work on remembering it and quickly write it down, else it will just be gone. When I was younger I think I did dream more frequently. I'm not entirely sure but I think my dreams are first person and I can't see myself in my dreams.

 

Hello Mace

 

I am always thrilled to bits to meet yet another Aphantasiac !!!!

 

There are indeed a lot of people at this site that have Aphantasia, I am guessing from what you have said so far that you have already seen the many older posts on this subject

 

You have mentioned how some of us forget things from our daily life and dreams so easily, there is a term for this SDAM and quit a lot of people believe we have this by default

 

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S002839321500158X

 

Myself, I recall only facts, mainly in terms of concepts, and how they relate, plus spatial awareness, and maybe some other things I do not know about as of yet

 

I do not relive feelings, instead as I think of past events I think about the feelings I had, and then I have feelings about that

 

I see nothing in my mind, not even black, it feels like there is not meant to be anything to see

 

I also do not hear anything, I don't even have the monologue voice that many other people that have Aphantasia claim to have

 

I re-experience no senses in my mind at all, no sight, no sound, no smell, no taste, no touch

 

Academically though, I did exceedingly well before my brain hemhorrage (Aphantasia from birth, brain hemhorrage later 50s). I used to be a member of Mensa and have always done exceedingly well with logical tasks. One area where I am incredibly weak is English Literature, but more recently even getting better with this. My wife has been showing me how to get more out of musicals and romantic movies. This has helped us a lot in regards to our relationship and communication

 

I dont think that I have true Prosopagnosia, I can see the full face on viewing. It is just that once the person has disappeared I see nothing. I suspect that at the time of viewing, I think that although I can see the face I can only truly absorb so much information. If I do not see the person again for a while I think a fair amount of information may be lost. If they change their look significantly, I probably will not recognise them if I do not know them well. I barely ever remember anything about peoples outfits or body shape. And if I do the information is usually stored elsewhere. I find that when thinking about a persons face, I cannot really recall the body. When asked to recall the body, I will struggle to remember the face

 

Body blindness is not well studied but this new article mentions it here

 

 

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/06/180625192851.htm

 

I am very limited in regards to how I can fantasize, not just sexually or romantically, I mean across the board, everything, I just dont really think much beyond the present moment and what is happening right now. Advertising and such does not work on me. I do not recall one single dream that I have ever had. We think I have dreams because I occasionally call out in my sleep. Also, my wife has awoken me, and on a few occasions I describe what sounds like a dream but from what we have gathered so far I do have any pictures when dreaming. We still do not know if I experience sound or feelings, if I experience dreams in first person or not, if I have awareness of my body or not etc, we are in the process of trying to figure this out

 

 

 

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On 10/25/2018 at 8:16 PM, mace_ said:

Yes, you're right, probably everybody is somehow like this.

 

I was dreaming last night and when waking up I could remember the dream a bit. So I can now say that I dream in first person, but I can't see anything at all, so seems like I also have aphantasia in my dreams. The dream was very similar to how a book works. The scene and the plot are described and so I know where I am and what is happening around me but there is no picture or video.

I have been looking into how blind people dream. It seems that most of them that were born blind experience emotions and verbal description, sound and maybe other senses, just not the visual, but those that became blind later on could still see pictures. One guy on youtube said that if he had seen a persons face before he became blind he would see their face but if he had met the person after he became blind he would have the dream but just not see that person

 

https://m.youtube.com/?hl=en-GB&amp;gl=GB#searching

 

I have not been able to find anybody saying whether or not they experience the dream in first person or not. 

 

It seems that some experience erotic dreams, but probably at the same rate as anybody else. But research is showing nightmares are more common amongst the blind

 

I still do not really know what happens when I dream. The evidence so far indicates I am not seeing pictures. We dont even know if I am experiencing feelings, touch or sound. There is weak evidence that I am experiencing spatial awareness

 

My wife has said that she will awaken me more often to see what I say. She has tried to do so the last few days but each time that she has done this I have said that I am not thinking about anything. In thepast when she woke me up,it was always after I had been shouting out in my sleep. I gave vague explanation such as there was a rat, I was worried about my grandson. She asked if I could see anything, I always said no

 

It is only in recent years that I have learned that other people visualise. I had heard folk dream in pictures but I thought that that was the exception not the norm. I do not remember any dream that I might have ever had

 

I had one hallucination when I was a kid. I saw a ghost with sheet over its head. This was in the room which is why I think this was an hallucination. The only experience that I have ever had that might be my minds eye was a few years ago. Several times I had the same picture of very pale faces where the features were vague, but the eyes were very beautiful. It was about five times that I saw this. I had to have my eyes closed to see it. At the time I really could not make sense of it. I did not know that other people see things in this way all of the time. It worried me quit a bit if I am honest

 

I now want to know if there is any real experience of feelings or senses in my dreams or if I just experience them exactly the same way as my TOTAL Aphantasia

 

Interestingly, I do definitely experience attraction much like a blind person. I literally cannot become attracted to a person just by looking at them, and even if I like a persons personality a lot, I still wont get attracted. It takes me years, and even then there is no guarentee. (It has only happened for me with one person in my entire life, I am now 63 years old) 

 

https://www.cosmopolitan.com/sex-love/advice/a5936/what-blind-people-find-sexy/

 

I am wondering if my dream state is similar to the way blind folk experience this too?

 

 

 

 

 

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In response to question 2, 2. Do you feel that your physical body doesn't match how you see yourself psychologically and/or are you non-cis?

 

I was conflicted on how to answer.o feel my body connects with how I see myself, but I don't see myself as cis. And the and/or doesn't help with the yes/no question because I don't feel that my being non-cis has anything to do with my connection to my body because I made my body specifically so I would connect to it. (Sorry if that doesn't make sense, it's late and I'm tied).

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Hi Marlow1,

 

On 10/26/2018 at 9:45 PM, Marlow1 said:

There are indeed a lot of people at this site that have Aphantasia, I am guessing from what you have said so far that you have already seen the many older posts on this subject 

Yes, I already saw and read a lot of post from you about aphantasia.

 

On 10/26/2018 at 9:45 PM, Marlow1 said:

You have mentioned how some of us forget things from our daily life and dreams so easily, there is a term for this SDAM and quit a lot of people believe we have this by default

 

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S002839321500158X

Ah, that's interesting to know. I didn't know there was a name for this.

 

On 10/26/2018 at 9:45 PM, Marlow1 said:

I see nothing in my mind, not even black, it feels like there is not meant to be anything to see

  

I also do not hear anything, I don't even have the monologue voice that many other people that have Aphantasia claim to have

I can experience an inner monologue, it's like taking but without the mouth and without making any external sounds. I use this a lot when I'm thinking about something.

 

I'm not yet sure if or what things there are that I can experience in my mind. I have some vague memories of the past where I probably saw an image, but it's from very long ago and I'm not really sure if I could see something at that time or not. I also sometimes have this strange thing that I think I can see something, but only for a fraction of a second and then it's gone. But I don't think it an real image because directly after it I can never remember any information I should get from a picture (like details of how certain things are draw).

 

On 10/26/2018 at 9:45 PM, Marlow1 said:

I dont think that I have true Prosopagnosia, I can see the full face on viewing. It is just that once the person has disappeared I see nothing. I suspect that at the time of viewing, I think that although I can see the face I can only truly absorb so much information. If I do not see the person again for a while I think a fair amount of information may be lost. If they change their look significantly, I probably will not recognise them if I do not know them well. I barely ever remember anything about peoples outfits or body shape. And if I do the information is usually stored elsewhere. I find that when thinking about a persons face, I cannot really recall the body. When asked to recall the body, I will struggle to remember the face

I also can see the face of people (I think), I just have the feeling that it's hard for me to recognize them again, especially when I'm not looking for them. It happens from time to time that other people recognize me and talk to me, but I wouldn't have recognized them on my own or even only very barely remember, after some help, having talked to them in the past. It seems like for me faces are not very important and thus I don't waste much time looking at them.

 

On 10/26/2018 at 9:45 PM, Marlow1 said:

I am very limited in regards to how I can fantasize, not just sexually or romantically, I mean across the board, everything, I just dont really think much beyond the present moment and what is happening right now. Advertising and such does not work on me.

That's very similar of how I am. I've always been wondering about advertising and how it's supposed to work, because it simply doesn't for me. That finally makes it much clearer.

 

On 10/26/2018 at 9:45 PM, Marlow1 said:

I do not recall one single dream that I have ever had. We think I have dreams because I occasionally call out in my sleep. Also, my wife has awoken me, and on a few occasions I describe what sounds like a dream but from what we have gathered so far I do have any pictures when dreaming. We still do not know if I experience sound or feelings, if I experience dreams in first person or not, if I have awareness of my body or not etc, we are in the process of trying to figure this out 

I recently read that while sleeping there are multiple phases of dreaming and every person goes through them while having non-dream phases in-between. It's just that often we can't remember anything of it later and so we think we are not dreaming at all. During these dream phases our body behaves different than during the non-dream phases, I remember they talked about eye movements (while the eyes stay closed) during the dream phases.

 

On 10/27/2018 at 3:34 PM, Marlow1 said:

Interestingly, I do definitely experience attraction much like a blind person. I literally cannot become attracted to a person just by looking at them, and even if I like a persons personality a lot, I still wont get attracted. It takes me years, and even then there is no guarentee.

I'm similar. I can look at people and find them looking good or interesting, but I'm not attracted by them. It only happened very rarely that I got attracted to someone and I always knew the person for many years before it happened.

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  • 2 weeks later...

HELLO @mace_

 

I am sorry that it has taken me so long to reply to your post. For the past week I have not had a device to get online

 

I actully read your post last week and intended to get back to you then, it is very enlightening to hear from other Aphantasia folk and great to hear how much we all have in common. I personally feel that not having a minds eye can be an advantage sometimes, but I must admit it can be difficult for other folk to comprehend, and there are times when I dont have a clue what other people are going on about, flirting being one example

 

I mentioned earlier that through this month we would try to discover how I dream. Upto the last time I shared on this all the evidence pointed to no pictures

 

It seems though, through the last week I have had at least two dreams with pictures. My wife woke me up and although quit a few times I said that I could not see anything, twice I said I could see her in the dream. And I remember both, and still belive this to be so

 

The only explanation I can give is that for months now I have been using image streaming and the ketogenic diet. My brother has said these help him dream and visualise

 

 

Sorry I have been trying to add links about image streaming and ketosis but I cant get either to embed. I will try again in the morning

 

Edited by Marlow1
to explain why there is no link
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And

 

 

@mace_ Here are the two links that I refered to

 

I know quit a few people using the image streaming. I struggle with it because my brain does not see black or anything, I see nothing and it feels like it is supposed to be like that

 

I am still truggling to understand how I was seeing my wife in my dreams. I now cannot recall anything else about the dreams other than I saw her. It now feels like on both occasions it was just stills I saw, I do not recall movement, no sound, nothing else other than I aw her. I can remember seeing her fac and clothing but absolutely nothing else. I cannot recall any context

 

Up until this point I cannot ever remember having any dreams with pictures. This is all very new to me

 

My brother, he has Aphantasia but has been having a limited amouof visuals, and dreams, for about 18 months, and for about two months he has had some sound. Very little, but some. He works really hard with the image streaming, and does well with the ketosis

 

I am up and down with the image streaming, sometimes I commit but when I feel like I am not getting anywhere I give up. It just so happens that I promised a friend that I would work harder with it this month, and I have done so, and now have had these two dreams, so I am thinking there is a connection

 

I love the ketogenic diet, it definately has helped me with the brain damage from my brain hemhorrage, but because I am so slim and cannot afford to loose any weight I have to eat some carbs, and am always on the border. My brother, he does not have this problem, so he can go even higher with the ketosis. I do think this is why he is having more success than me. Also, for him it is only the Aphantasia that he is trying to sort out. I have the brain hemhorrage too, so more damage to repair, and so according to the theory, it will take longer for me. But I am doing OK with this and I do plan to continue. I will let you know if anything further happens

 

Bye for now

 

Marlow1

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