An insight by Premo
I was kind of falling asleep and suddenly I had a very vivid memory from my adolescent years… I often judge today’s teenagers for seeming so unconscious of what surrounds them, but in re-living my memory I was profoundly aware of how narrow my perception of the world was at the time.
Perhaps it’s normal that in that phase of life we are focused on a very limited sphere of interaction with the world, and within that sphere everything is magnified in intensity and importance, sometimes unbearably so. Even the most insignificant thing seems dramatically fundamental.
At least such was my experience, and it impacted deeply the life that unfolded. I was almost like a prisoner within a world that did not quite reflect reality, because it was loaded with all the emotions and thoughts that I attached to it. And they were pretty wild emotions and thoughts… but so out of touch.
At the same time, what the senses perceived was magnified and enhanced. Even now, after 50 years or more, I still remember smells, tactile sensations, sounds, the awareness of space in proximity of my physical body – yet I also remember how narrow the focus was, almost literally excluding so much of the wider world.
How could I even understand empathy and compassion when I was so selfishly focused on all those unfulfilled longings, projections, fantasies, imaginary scenarios?
I am not sure why I am reflecting on this. Or maybe… lately I have been feeling a little restless because, quite quickly, my life has become very limited, and I feel unmotivated and morose, and a bit choked.
The memory that blindsided me was of a brief moment in a dark box at the old city theater: looking at the lit stage from the dark dusty box, the feeling and the smell of the musty, worn, ribbed velvet padding on the chair, the voices resounding from the stage, the intensity of a totally meaningless moment, and the scary incompleteness I felt inside in that brief instant.
Maybe it was an unconscious fear that that narrowness was all I could expect from life. And maybe that’s why I relived that odd instant, because once again I am experiencing a narrowing within and without, and it scares me. Oh, well…
Today there is a definition/diagnosis for those who live the sensorial experience and the world of feelings as intensely as I did in my teen years (and as I still do, actually, most of the time, although I learned to navigate it a little better with meditation): Highly Sensitive Person. But back then I was just someone who “took everything too seriously” and didn’t get much support from my family or anyone else.
Text previously posted on Facebook, published on Osho News with the author’s consent
Featured image by Warren on Unsplash
Comments are closed.