Altered perception of reality

Over the past month I have (as a result of frequent panic attacks and a strong fear of death) experienced something that is driving me nuts. I can't really describe it in words, but there are moments, they can last for hours, where it feels as if my grip of reality just slips away. Such a moment occurred on the bus this morning. It completely changed the way I thought about people and the universe. It felt as if I could finally objectively see the world for what it was (almost as some kind of strong religious insight, but without the element of a god). It felt as if I could finally see the "truth" of reality (a truth that I cannot explain in words). It was a really weird state of mind, pretty much devoid of any feelings (just "neutral" I guess).

Most of these thoughts are gone now (hours later), but I fear it might occur tomorrow morning again. Has anyone else experienced anything like this?

I experience weird moments where I get thoughts like that. Also, half of me "lives" in some kind of unreality. I am followed by things that don't really exist (I am aware they don't exist but I still "see"/"hear" them or feel their presence) I also feel myself unreal and the world around me feels unreal at times. It have always been like this since I can remember. I'm weird.

yes, it aint enlightenment though. i have very bad spatial perception. don't laugh! but i used to run into stuff all the time, like miss the doorway and run into the frame. first i had to cope by touching everything. like touching the door frame, wall, fence, whatever to make sure i know where it is. im pretty sure i was born with my brains scrambled like eggs. now i compensate by thinking too hard on it and it makes things not seem real. it gets better with age i think, because you adapt
on a side note, its been proven that brain damage to a particular part of the brain will make you feel at one with the universe, because it ruins your ability to distinguish where your body stops and the rest of the world begins, in other words, reduced ability to understand movement through space.

I highly doubt that enlightenment is the correct term. I believe disassociation may be a bit closer to the mark.

I don't know what it is but I believe I experience the same thing. Ever since I was a child I can remember this happening. Usually I am sitting there doing nothing, for example, a passenger in a car, when all of a sudden rather than feeling like a person thinking about random things, it's as though I am outside of reality and I feel like the world is fake. It's as though all the 5 senses that make us believe in our lives have been disconnected in some way and they are being analyzed for what they are rather then uniformly at once by the brain. It's a strange feeling that always makes me ask in my head "Is this real? Is this really happening? Am I really sitting in this car and moving? Is this really my life?" And it passes within a minute. It is absolutely a strange phenomenon and I have always wondered if others experienced it.

Sometimes I don't feel like I'm here at all. Everything is strange.
I have had experiences where my perception is altered, particularly when I was younger. Familiar things seemed unfamiliar/my existence was suddenly strange.
Truth is, a lot of people, nearly everyone is walking around with a twisted idea of reality. What you think is 'reality'? It's a f***ing lie. Everyone is off living in their own little worlds, making excuses for anything that is strange to them. I don't blame them though. Ignorance is bliss... until you die.

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I remember being a kid.. and thinking weirdly.. now I know it wasn;t questioning the world, how can as a kid.. but an altered perception of the world, like what is this..I didn;t think of it as something bad..maybe it made me even feel special, as weird as that sounds. but now I don;t think it';s healthy.. it doens;t happen that often..

Hey, it seems other people are just as weird as me! Well, I guess these are things nobody ever talks about (but which may lay there in the back of the mind to surface whenever one least expects it). Mostly because these experiences just cannot be communicated in words. They are feelings, states of mind.

PJS said:

I don't know what it is but I believe I experience the same thing. Ever since I was a child I can remember this happening. Usually I am sitting there doing nothing, for example, a passenger in a car, when all of a sudden rather than feeling like a person thinking about random things, it's as though I am outside of reality and I feel like the world is fake. It's as though all the 5 senses that make us believe in our lives have been disconnected in some way and they are being analyzed for what they are rather then uniformly at once by the brain. It's a strange feeling that always makes me ask in my head "Is this real? Is this really happening? Am I really sitting in this car and moving? Is this really my life?" And it passes within a minute. It is absolutely a strange phenomenon and I have always wondered if others experienced it.

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That sounds somewhat like it, but perhaps more powerful in my case. "Disconnected" seems to be the one word that describes it best. I felt like I was "outside the illusion", my perception of time changed and I saw everything passing by. It lasted for quite a while and I got some insights out of it. I realized I have to act now if I want something out of life.

Silvox Black said:

I believe disassociation may be a bit closer to the mark.

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Thanks for pointing this term out. I'd heard the term before but never knew what it was. I was looking it up and it seems to be exactly what I've experienced in the past, and probably will again in the future. I suppose it is more common than I thought.

TheStatue said:

Hey, it seems other people are just as weird as me! Well, I guess these are things nobody ever talks about (but which may lay there in the back of the mind to surface whenever one least expects it). Mostly because these experiences just cannot be communicated in words. They are feelings, states of mind.

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I agree that weird things happen to people in their heads that stay there, in the back of their minds. Only because words truly don't posses the capabilities of describing those most abstract, inner feelings we experience. I believe for that reason people keep it to themselves. Perhaps some believe that everyone else experiences it and that it is a natural thing.

TheStatue said:

That sounds somewhat like it, but perhaps more powerful in my case. "Disconnected" seems to be the one word that describes it best. I felt like I was "outside the illusion", my perception of time changed and I saw everything passing by. It lasted for quite a while and I got some insights out of it. I realized I have to act now if I want something out of life.

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That is quite odd. I experience the disconnection feeling, but the change in your perception of time is very strange indeed. I imagine this is something one has to experience for themselves to fully comprehend. I wonder how others, if any, saw you relative to their time perception. I wouldn't mind experiencing this for myself.

I kind of like when these disconnections happen to me. They are very rare, but when they do happen, something deep inside me hopes my life really isn't real, that what I'm experiencing has been fake all along, that maybe I will wake up in a different mind. Sometimes I wonder if we live in a world like the Matrix. Sometimes, when my mind really starts to wonder, I think things like that those behind the scenes of the real world programmed the movie, "The Matrix," into our world just to mock us; to put it right under our faces knowing we can't do anything about it. Sorry if that sounds crazy (I don't get out much, I mean, at all, really).

What really keeps our conscious inside one particular head anyway? Why does my conscious take the role of this body? I know it all comes down to the cells that make us up, that all the thought-processes are just cells moving in our brains, but sometimes I wonder if there's more to it than that. I mean, at the sub-atomic level the world is a very weird place where things can disappear or pop into existence out of nothing. I know there are experts in this field of quantum mechanics, but there are many mysteries yet to be solved in that realm. Who's to say our conscious can't transfer to another brain. We'd wake up with all the memories of the new brain so we'd have no idea, but perhaps this "disconnection" is but a mere side-effect. You never know... after all, everything in the universe is connected in one way or another. Then again, I am just rambling on...

My apologies if at any time this post strayed off topic.

That's one of the perks of having social anxiety, you stay inside your head to much and reality gets twisted. But to be honest, that "experience" allows you to become a more open minded character. It also allows you to see things in different perspective, and finds multiple ways to approach them.

Then again, you have to question "it" itself too. Because nothing is true, and everything is permitted. Really, this whole thing falls to a whole 'nother level of philosophy.

psychologically speaking, the general term for this is dissociation. or depersonalisation or derealisation. the mind enters a state of detachment, probably triggered by anxiety and/or thoughts of being different.

i notice the "reality shift" type thing most when i'm at work. i'm not sure what sets it off (if it ever is triggered by anything?!), but i sometimes feel like Neo in the matrix when he finally begins to accept the "reality" and how it can be manipulated. easiest scene to describe it is when he fights Agent Smith. just that whole scene fits with how i kinda feel when the "shift" happens. things move around me and look weird, and like they aren't really there, but still have some importance in their existence. it's almost a nausiating feeling, without the sick feeling in the stomach (a sort of dizziness, unable to stand on feet steadily, trying to work out whats going on and keep a grip, if that makes sense)
such a hard thing to explain

yes, I experienced that a few years ago: I think that is your Sp makes you very Spiritual, like sort of detachment from realy, this is our ususal daily 'mental state'
and then in certain situations (I don't know whichj) you just go back on your feet and see the world as it is. The experience can be described like falling from 'sky' to earth , that's why you got scared : does that make sense ? anyway, that's the experience I had a few years ago, and I have to say that it was quite stimulating and lead to me starting new activities and discovering the world