Lots to say here... I'll start with psood0nym...
psood0nym said:
... the primacy of mood over explicit memory content. By "mood" I mean the same thing that people refer to as nostalgia or even, in some cases, what they mean when they refer to something like the "Christmas spirit". It's a feeling associated with specific images and experiences which that can be experienced, at least for a short while, in isolation of those specific recollections. What drug experiences have repeatedly shown me, and perhaps you, is that every moment of experience, even an experience which is repeated, has its own unique mood. This mood seems to be a gestalt sensation composed of the elements of a lived experience and the antecedent and consequent events that give it context in time. I've felt moods evoked from experiences as banal as looking at the corner of my bedroom where the door frame wall meets the ceiling, a spiral staircase in a dream, or of going out to my car on a work break to retrieve a bagged lunch I forgot to take in during the morning of a summer internship. Holiday nostalgia moods are just the most robust type of mood, which most of us are familiar with because they're repeated every year and associated with intense memories and wide cultural recognition. These facts make them salient and worthy of a unique name, "nostalgia," but every moment has its nostalgia, and re-intuiting those unique moods from similar moods
You're the first person I've met who shared this sensation, and the second who understood it. I don't actually think most people experience reality this way - or at least, if they do, it's not nearly to the extent we do. To me, the subtle mood of a place and time is like a meta-sense, an amalgamation of all other senses into scomething I call
Theme. The first hint I had that you have this to was that you used the same word.
Normally, I don't notice the 'theme' of a setting except in retrospect. For example, I took the theme of being 13 for granted, it felt normal. But when I play mainstream rock songs I listened to then, I instantly recall the subtle moods, the patterns of the thought, the adrenaline I felt then, and it takes on a distinctive, ineffable character. In 2009, while depressed, I would walk down alleys on the way to work and the concrete and traffic noise etc. pressed in on me and made everything feel grey, imposing, ugly, dysphoric. I was only consciously aware of this when I reflected on how I'd felt then. Now that I'm aware of this phenomenon, I have some awareness of it in the present too, though mainly, things still feel 'normal' until I compare them to other, earlier themes in my life. The further back I remember, the more amazing and different the contrast of these themes seems.
I postulate that this may be some bizarre, obscure form of
synesthesia. Notably, I may have had ordinal linguistic personification as a child - I remember automatically attributing personalities to numbers without even realising most people didn't do that. Another thing, possibly related, is something all children seem to have, but it was particularly strong for me: before I heard, say, the actual words spoken in a movie, I would hear the intonation, the cadence of the dialogue. I used to amuse my parents by reciting entire films with the precise timing and character of the dialogue, word for word. Sadly, this ability has faded with age. But, like other elements of 'theme', I recall the dialogue leaving a distinct imprint on my psyche whereby I was able to just recall it.
Anyway, this is something I'd definitely like to talk about in more detail, are you interested? Do you have MSN? I'd PM you, but I'm a greenlighter.
HeavilySedated said:
Disassociation is inherently impossible to counter with rational thinking, and trying to do so only gets you deeper into it. The dissociative thought chain essentially works as a loop - first you think that things you see might be an illusion, than you start thinking that you can't even know for sure that you yourself exist as an entity comparable but separate to other human beings around you. And since you might not be real - so are also all your gathered notions about the world. And since all you know about the universe is false, that means that the whole concept of life as you know it is untrue, yet you can't even communicate this fear to other people, because their responses will also be unreal.
It took me years to be able to voice this. I used to describe to friends that it felt like I'd actually died and had yet to realise it, like The Sixth Sense. To others I said, if life is a videogame, then I'm past the Game Over screen but for some reason I'm still playing. This is how I feel today, but when I was younger, the dissociation was simply feeling at home daydreaming in my head, and having an aversion and amotivation towards real life.
You seem to have it worse than me, and I'm sorry to hear that. We're on the same page, though.
Especially profound dissociation can apparently lead to multiple personality disorder. I hypothesize though that before it reaches this extreme, it can create an embryonic version of the same thing. I often find there's a latent side of my psyche, somewhat akin to Jung's 'shadow', that's far more reclusive and volatile than the self I show everyone. Perhaps if the trauma had been worse, it would have developed into an alter ego with its own name, thoughts and memories. Maybe you've experienced something similar?
Word to the wise though, the effects of slavia on your ego are irreversible. After smoking salvia once, I lost all my memories and personality. No, I still have them stored in my brain, but they don't and will never feel like mine again. I was reborn through salvia, and even though I don't regret having done it for a second, many people eventually do.
I've heard salvia can have extreme effects like that. It's a risk I'm willing to take, though that 'rebirth' you describe is an effect I'd rather avoid - I'm trying to reconnect with my past, not disconnect from it. Hm... at any rate, I'll most likely be trying other substances before salvia, because it's ridiculously hard to find here in Australia. There's even an Australian message board for others trying to find it. Apparently, I'm not the only one. Thanks for the warning, though.
construct said:
Also, the derealization of salvia typically takes me to some sort of strange fairy-tale realm that has strong ties to forgotten emotions I had when I was young. There is a strong feeling of nostalgia that is almost achingly beautiful. I mean, it's terrifying, but there is so much beauty present, too.
Often associated with the 'theme' I described to psood0nym is a sense of mystical places I've never been to, like forests, or mysterious temples. I wonder if this is the mind's way of making sense of things? It will be interesting to see what happens when I've taken psychadelics - maybe it will open those inner landscapes from vague pictures into something more full-blown.
D n A said:
.. somehow, going through my childhood helped me through my current situation even though the two didn't relate much.
The connections between your childhood and your present situation will almost always be subtle and unconscious. Ketamine probably opened your mind to what's otherwise dormant there.
I don't mean to presume at all, but I do have an idea. Possibly, those rough moments you experienced, you had to repress how you felt about them when you were young. Reliving them might have drawn out those suppressed feelings and allowed you to move past them. That's the first thought that comes to mind but, the mind is a strange thing, drugs stranger still... who knows? Hope it helps, though.
