[baddream13]

Hello all,
I just found this web site tonight in the midst of a panic attack set off by a couple days of severe "depression" followed of course by a fight with my boyfriend during which I told him to leave. Reading everyone's posts has been extraordinarily enlightening, and it has calmed down my anxiety considerably. I found so many of my symptoms in things that everyone else has written. I have not even heard of dp/dr until tonight, and I must say how relieved I am, because just tonight I was trying to explain to my boyfriend how I felt and thinking how crazy I sounded while I was explaining it. It's caused me to think of a fair few far fetched possibilities....

Like what if I'm not the only one, but what if everyone else on this site, with this similar problem are simply ghosts walking amongst the living? What if we are the cast of players in the dreams of those who live in reality? What if we are the cold-hearted observers in a tangible Valhalla, watching lives being played out with cold hearted detachment?

Of course, those are just silly flights of fancy, but I'm sure everyone on this site has similar flights of fancy, because I have found that I have a very rich imaginary life, perhaps to make up for my lack of a real one. Does anyone else agree?

Another thought that has popped into my poor, stressed brain is based on an observation that I have made while reading these posts. It seems to me that most of the people on here are very well spoken, seemingly well educated, and have a very clear and precise grasp on their problem and how it relates to their lives and reality. You all seem to be very deep thinkers. I suppose you have to be to deal with this sort of problem. But what if.....what if this all has something to do with evolution? Now, picture this; survival of the fittest USED to mean the strongest, toughest people survived, the weakest didn't. With the advent of the industrial, cultural, artistic, TECHNOLOGICAL revolutions, the definition of the fittest isn't what it used to be. NOW, the one's with the brains survive, THAT we know as fact. Well, of course evolution will have to take that into account now. We are, as a species, growing smarter, and we have been for years. Now it seems that with our growing intellects, our psychological disorders are becoming more complex, AND more common. Perhaps we are tapping into parts of our brains that we never needed to use before, and strange psychological side-effects are happening because of that. I think those of us with the weird psychoses are perhaps a little ahead on the evolutionary ladder. Now, if we can somehow master these psychoses, perhaps they may be beneficial to us in the long run.

BUT, dp/dr is a little scary as a sign of what's to come because it's telling us that perhaps emotional detachment will be necessary in the future. This is possibly a bad omen of things to occur.

Human beings, as a whole, in becoming more "connected" technologically, seem to actually be feeling far more DISconnected emotionally. In putting the world at our fingertips, we actually seem to be isolating ourselves.

Wow, looking back on what I've just wrote, I realized that none of this will actually help any of you, as it's so discomforting. But, I don't know, maybe if any of you have thought on this before, you may feel a little more sane knowing that someone else thinks it too.

As a semi-quick post script, I'd like to sum up my symptoms of dp/dr...

I am extremely cold. I have mastered the art of not caring. It is a curse.

I frequently feel like the human race is disgusting, and I feel disgusting for being a part of it, yet in a rather large way I feel like I'm not quite part of it.

I have watched my actions through a smoky mirror.

I get angry very easily at things I perceive to be social "faux pas", yet I can say cruel things to those closest to me because I feel somehow justified in it.

I feel detached from family members who I used to be very close to, because I feel like I don't understand where they're coming from anymore.

I feel like an alien trapped on an unfamiliar planet.

I frequently trip out on normal things about my identity. Like my name, for instance. My name doesn't sound like me, I often wonder why it's my name, I can't identify with it. It's a normal name, but it feels so foreign when I hear people say it. I can't understand how I am associated with it. Or my voice. My voice often sounds alien and unfamiliar. Or my family, my background. I often wonder, "who ARE these people, and how is it that I'm related to them?" (I know my family are good people, I just can't associated myself with them)

I frequently feel like I'm alone, and everyone secretly thinks I'm very very strange.

I know I probably didn't explain any of those things correctly, it's amazing how difficult it was to put those into words. I'm STILL confused, even after listing them off.

Well, sorry about this long-winded post. If anyone responds to it, I'll feel extremely surprised, first off....then grateful. I know I didn't help anyone, but if anyone has anything to add, that would be super.

Thanks for taking the time to read this.

 

[falling_free]

In terms of dp being realted to evoloution, perhaps in a way it is, but more of a mental evoloution or deevoloution perhaps (though as you metnioned many dps are very intellginet) . In that these days you don't need to be as active or as much a particpint of the outside world anymore and can have access to enternatinment such as televsion, games consoles computers etc etc that area more based on staying on your own or as sole activtites, kind of maybe in some situations causing a breakdown in communication...... Also there is so much knoweldge at ones fingertips these days it can be a bit overwheling and you can (Im speaking from my point of view) get confused and overwelmed by the amount of options of what there is to do with your life, so never get past the what defines me stage.

BUT, dp/dr is a little scary as a sign of what's to come because it's telling us that perhaps emotional detachment will be necessary in the future. This is possibly a bad omen of things to occur.

Perhaps, I mean if we were to increase in intellegnice more in future evoloutions, maybe we would adopt more of a collective intellgince (the internet is already a collective intelligence of sorts I spose) but as a result lose some of the 'ME' or the emotional factors of our esxistence. Kind of like the spock race from star trek (can't remeber the name) .... so very logical , extremelly intellignet but robot like in emotion, not being able to read emotions as well, being almsot complety logic based.

 

[falling_free]

mmmrr few random concepts just entered my head half formed.

What if in order to make or evolve mentally deatchment is neccerserry so that one can become an observer of Systems, systems being the rules that govern everything in the observable universe. That is if people really want to know everything or understand everything.....

But in order to gain integllience extra insight being has to observe and deatch from oneself or does as a kind of negative side effect.

Or in a bad case scenario we have a world where posthuman ideas have gone terrible wrong, creating cyborgs with no emotions but supercomputer brains. Lonley grey former human minds thinking purely in 0's and 1's. Thinking as everything as data.

Anyway a few rambling incoherent thoughts for you there :twisted:

 

[baddream13]

Thanks for the rambling, incoherent thoughts. It's sort of fun to think about this stuff, in a scary kind of way.
What you said about the emotional evolution kind of makes sense when you think about it. People as a whole becoming intellegent emotionless drones seems to be where we're heading. When you think about it, WHY do we have emotions anyway? What purpose do they actually serve? They seem to be simply leftover remnants of an evolutionary stage that we have long since left behind. Emotions may fire our passions which in turn fire our thirst for knowledge and enlightenment, but isn't pure enlightenment being able to abandon all emotions and desires and to be able to live in the moment, in pure symbiance with everything? Sometimes death seems so peaceful when you think of it as just a ceasing of all emotions. Emotions are SO wearying. Emotions are what make being human very very difficult. Some may argue that emotions are what make being human great, but emotions are the cause of all fighting and war. Without emotions, these things wouldn't exist. When you think about it in that light, maybe it's about time we become cold-hearted system observers. Our search and acquisition of the truth may not be nearly so exhilerating, but perhaps that will help us to find the truth sooner.

 

[Sojourner]

Have you ever experienced joy?

 

[baddream13]

Ah yes, Joy. Joy IS wonderful, but it's always so fleeting. It's like a drug, it doesn't feel real. You can be totally hyped up about something, totally stoked, and you can actually FEEL the effects of it wearing off after a time. That seems to be what human beings are constantly searching for, just a state of constant joy and bliss. Impossible? Yep. So then, what's the point of joy, if sooner or later it will wear off and then be replaced by anger, bitterness, irritation, sorrow, or the myriad other negative emotions. If you stop to think about it, the number of negative emotions far outweigh the positive ones. And even some positive ones are frowned upon in today's society, like pride, or sexual pleasure, or lust. How does one maintain joy? Even those who claim to be eternal optimists still have their demons that they are constantly trying to repress. Repression is also bad, as people who suffer from dp/dr know.....repression leads to psychological side-effects. So now we're in a big circle, back to the beginning.....all emotions can cause psychological side-effects. So then I must reiterate....what's the point?

 

[Sojourner]

I mean the kind of joy that comes with the peace that passes all understanding.

To bring this discussion out of the realm of being in the wrong forum, though, here's a few interesting links for you:

http://www.ideacenter.org
"The Intelligent Design and Evolution Awareness (IDEA) Center is a recently formed non-profit organization dedicated to promoting awareness of scientific evidence that supports intelligent design theory and fostering good - spirited discussion and a better understanding over intelligent design theory the creation - evolution issue among students, educators, churches, and anyone else interested. "

http://www.iscid.org/
"The International Society for Complexity, Information, and Design (ISCID) is a cross-disciplinary professional society that investigates complex systems apart from external programmatic constraints like materialism, naturalism, or reductionism. The society provides a forum for formulating, testing, and disseminating research on complex systems through critique, peer review, and publication. Its aim is to pursue the theoretical development, empirical application, and philosophical implications of information- and design-theoretic concepts for complex systems."

http://www.discovery.org/csc/

 

[Scattered]

The human brain is wired in such a way that joy is extremely fleeting. We all want love, pleasure, joy, happiness but these are all temporary pleasures designed for us to perform some very specific tasks so we can survive and procreate. Joy is a piece of cheese at the end of a rat maze. We can delude ourselves till the end of time. We can speak of lasting tanscendental joy. But all of those who seek joy, pleasure, etc have to come down at some period. We can't be high forever, and afterwards there is always a price to pay.

 

[Monkeydust]

Leave it out, Sojourner. Intelligent Design is not science and has about the same validity and credibility as the Holocaust Denial school of History.

 

[falling_free]

------->

 

[Imagine]

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[Guest]

this post is rediculous

 

[Sojourner]

Leave it out, Sojourner. Intelligent Design is not science and has about the same validity and credibility as the Holocaust Denial school of History.

Of course, I disagree, and so do many scientists. But I didn't really mean to start an argument, so I will not argue with you.

---

I think transcendental joy is available to us at all times, whether we are believers or not. There are plenty of nonbelievers throughout history who have attained an awareness of the beauty and truth that underlies creation and that animates their own inner life.

There is transcendental joy everywhere. But we are blind. We cannot see anything but our own misery. That -- our misery -- is what we really love. No transcendent joy can compete with our true love.

 

[Lilymoonchild]

As far as emotion goes, I get the impression, at least it's true for me, that we actually are hyper-emotional, and shut down as a self-defense mechanism, simply because it hurts to be so emotional all the time. I suspect that dp actually is something like autism, or at least asperger's syndrome (which is basically mild autism). Autistics think in an entirely different manner than "normal" people, and can't relate to the world at all in the same fashion. But they generally are highly intelligent people with mental abilities that "normal" people just don't have. I think we're kind of like that, except maybe more emotionally than intelectually. But hey, I could be totally wrong.

 

[Imagine]

After posting that picture of the Straight Jacket... last night I dreampt I was in one in this crowded setting like a city shop or something.

Crazy stuff.