Sharing Stories
We are interested in learning more about the range and variety of human experiences in regard to imagination, perception, behaviour and mental/emotional status. Do you want to share a story? Think about the following questions and respond if you are able. Description of specific incidences and detail are particularly helpful.
I. Inner sight
Can you describe experiences of insight in which you understood something in a unique or different way than before…. either .incidents in which you could see how to link up ideas or experiences in a new way, or times in which you felt that you had a particular type of insight into the way people, situations, or the world works? These experiences might range from the mundane to the life changing, it doesn’t matter, it is all of interest to us!
II. Taken by surprise
Here we are interested in the unexpected….the sudden overtaking of an emotion that we did not know we held…..unbidden visions…..unexpected understandings. Can you describe any such experiences?
III. Perceiving Change
Can you recall a time when you began to see that unacceptable behaviour (something unhealthy, or just ‘not right’) was happening to you or someone you love? When you needed to put a stop to someone’s actions or activities? How did you confront that? Or how was it confronted with you? Can you tell us about a specific instance? What are the things that stick in your mind about it–whatever they may be?
IV. Having to Take Control
Have you ever had to take control of something happening that seemed beyond your control? How did you do that?
V. Day to Day
What is routine in your life? How does it serve (or disserve) you? Is there anything you’d like to change about the routine, or lack thereof, in your life? If yes, what and why?
If you are interested in participating, please respond to one or all of these questions,. You could write about a specific instance from your life, or that of someone close to you. If you’d like to make a piece of art–drawing, music, film, anything you can think of–do not hesitate to send that in as well. We can use it all.
You can respond by posting a comment on the blog here, or contact us at silentsproduction@gmail.com to get more involved. If you wish to respond anonymously, type in general in required name field, and general@yahoo.com in required mail field. Tell us your story, or enquire about upcoming workshops.
October 9, 2008 at 2:23 pm
I was drawn to take a look at your website by your SCUDD posting, and am fascinated by your project. I have a small anecdote to share.
I am now 42. Half my lifetime ago, I was on the verge of leaving university, and began having panic attacks. These were brought on by situations in which I felt out of control. A common occurrance, in the days of conveyer belts in supermarkets, would be that my inability to get the shopping in the bag before it started piling up and rolling around would cause me to faint! The panic attack itself would increase in such situations as I felt unable to control what I could sense were irrational responses.
Up until that time I had lived in a very creative and imaginative realm, almost devoid of routine. I watched the films, read the books, wrote the plays and made the kind of theatre that I wanted to, day and night, with very little externally imposed structure. I was using the resources of the university as I pleased (this was in the days of full grants, when no-one wanted a first class degree, just experiences!)
As a child I had spent lots of time living in imaginary worlds, exploring my responses to things slowly and in depth. I had a close and loving family who encouraged any kind of creative activity. Although we did the things we were expected to do, going to school, paying taxes, we did not really go in for routine tasks on the domestic front. We prided ourselves on being “spontaneous”.
When I began having the panic attacks the doctor suggested burn-out. I realise now that I had overloaded myself. I was busy making devised, highly personal drama work for student productions, for edinburgh, for touring. I was feeding and feeding off of my imagination. Fortunately, I was also externalising this process through outputs of creative products.
I used to wonder whether the panic stemmed from too little routine and too much imaginative freedom, or from a dawning realisation that life would have to change, that there was some kind of “normal” looming that I would have to learn to comply with (rather late in life at 21) I now think I was asking the wrong questions.
I now believe that sanity is best preserved by sharing one’s imaginative realm through creative outpourings, whether that be writing, drawing, dancing, drama, etc etc. If one is blessed/cursed with “an overactive imagination” it is crucial that one has a means of expressing it. Suppression leads to some kind of mental white noise, imaginative foldback, where reality and fantasy merge and start to consume each other. Putting the imagined into the real, through some means of communicable artistic expression, is a necessary human activity. Like speaking a dream, it enables us to take a step back and see what it is we have been conjuring up.
What is “normal” in the creative community is regarded as “crazy” in other communities. Perhaps the fine line between “genius” and “madness” depends on access to the resources of expression and acceptance of the products of such expression.
Good luck with your project.
October 13, 2008 at 8:19 pm
I was 59 years old, suffering from my second crisis of life. The first crisis was the typical midlife crisis. I was a work-a-holic. This one concerned what I knew to be the true way for me to live out my vocation at that moment, but it was very difficult for others to accept. I was a teacher and evangelist.
A friend invited me to see the movie “Dead Poet’s Society.” I accepted because it was a good diversion to my state of depression. The movie turned out to be the story of my life. I cried through most of it from the depths of my soul. The movie spoke to me loud and clear assuring me that I was not crazy. That I was on the right track. That unfortunately I was not able to continue working in the institutional part of my vocation.
Two days later I was able to make the decision to change my “job” and start out anew. After seeing the movie, it was no longer hard to make that move. I am 19 years on the other side and am very content walking a different path, using my gifts in a different way, outside the institution.
Without having seen the movie I may have been still sitting in depression, still carrying the crisis.
October 14, 2008 at 1:01 pm
1.Inner Sight
I got this idea that I could affect the way I feel in my heart by physically moving my body. Its like I can alter my way of “walking in the world” by literally physically changing how I walk. I can understand another’s person’s point of view by changing where I am actually physically standing. I can nudge myself out of an angry, irritated mood by relaxing the muscles of my face, breathing in, and breathing out a smile. A facial expression of benevolence leads to an inner sense of benevolence. Physically opening myself, holding my arms up to the sky, makes me feel less emotionally defended and rigid. Prostrating myself to the earth makes me feel, immediately, without mediation of thought, respectful of life. This insight happened by accident. For the past 15 years I have practiced it. The practice changes me….for the better.
2. Taken by Surprise –
Visions and/or alterations of perception. That happens, not on a regular basis, but frequently enough in my life that I can make a list. Usually occurs when I am experiencing massive stress, but not always. I had a vision of myself as an old woman once, I was standing in the kitchen. I was in an awful dilemma, had to make a extremely difficult choice . I walked into the kitchen, holding dishes to be washed, and I saw, briefly two old women. One hard,driven,unsmiling. The other soft, flexible, smiling. Side by side. 30 seconds or so, maybe less. It was an instructive vision, like an instructive dream. Sometimes I think about the path not taken. No regrets. Some longing, but no regrets.
Another time, I experienced kind of a physical teleporting. I was in a situation that was profoundly painful, so stressed I felt myself altered, wondered if it was a type of psychosis I was experiencing. Looking back now, I think I was mildly psychotic, I could do what I needed to on a day by day basis, but my sense perceptions were distinctly altered.Everything was intense…the leaves on the trees seemed to have starker dimensions, noise was louder, light was brighter. Everything seemed “more-ish”. This went on for a period of weeks. And then I began to have a sensation about the doors of houses. It started when I was a passenger in a car, and I would look at houses on the road, as people usually do, and suddenly I would feel myself actually standing at the front door. No longer in the car. Nothing more or less than that. I never saw anything in the house, or heard anything, I would just feel space and distance alter. And I’d both feel afraid, and intrigued. I found that I could control this sensation, kinda like you can control whether or not you see double by looking at your nose. You can do it, or not do it. At first it was not voluntary. Then, I took it under control. Now, I can think about it, but I can’t actually do it. I cannot alter distance and space to where I land on your front porch anymore!
I would say that I have some god/cosmic-related experiences that take me by surprise, not at all often but rather consistently, ever since I was a child. Had some thought or understanding just take me by utter surprise, some “burning bush” experiences. I learned that the physiological feelings of awe and fear are absolutely identical….i learned it one day when driving home from a women’s prison where everyone seemed mean and cruel save for one little woman had a smile like sunshine exploding. I got in my car and started driving down a lonely country road. about halfway home i looked up at the blue sky day, and felt it. felt the hair on the back of my neck raise, my heart pounding out of my chest, my brain waves changing, I felt God with me. Present. God as goodness in the midst of pain, God as truth in the midst of distortion, God as power rooted in the powerless. Anyhow, it was fearsome awesome!
Vision -World Trade Center….. the early morning of sept 11, I woke up to use the bathroom. I walked out of my bedroom, started walking down the hall, and I had an extremely vivid vision or maybe hallucination. I heard loud screams, moaning, gasping. People jumping from buildings , buildings coming down, and high broad tongues of fire. It was like a vision from hell. I had never in my life had an experience like that before. I was just standing in the middle of the hall, groggy from sleep, and all of these visual and aural sensations were raining down on me. I was shocked fully awake, let myself just be in this vision for a while (a few seconds, a few minutes?), used the bathroom, groped around for my rosary, went back to bed, prayed and prayed until I fell asleep. I didn’t have a sense of what that was about, I just knew I needed to stay awake for a while and pray. Next morning, t.v. on, world trade center. So shocking that it was not until about noon that I thought, oh my god, that’s what that vision was about. I have no understanding of this, I am just reporting.
October 14, 2008 at 1:04 pm
i was young. I had an alcoholic father who liked to drink scotch. I was living on my own, shared an apartment with a friend. I never perceived myself as having a drinking problem, probably cause I was very thin and couldn’t really drink that much without getting drunk, which never felt very good cause I would throw up. But, hey, I did like the taste of scotch – daddy used to put me on his knee when I was little and let me sip from his drink – from my child’s viewpoint, it was kind of a sweet thing, he’d be drunk and affectionate, and he’d share with me. Anyhow, I grew up, and my favorite drink was scotch…on the rocks. Whew, I liked that. Just typing this out now, I taste it, it was gooood. Anyhow, I was in my early twenties, was having a bad patch, and one day after work, found myself feeling stressed, opened the cupboard door and reached for my bottle of scotch. I can see what I was wearing that day, see the kitchen, the cupboard door, my arm reaching for that bottle….to relieve pain. Whew! That scared the shit out of me, I took that bottle, poured it down the drain, and never tasted chevis regal again. It was a crystal clear awareness: he did this to drown his pain. I’m taking a step down his path. Good God, noooooooooooooooooo.
October 15, 2008 at 3:22 pm
Years ago a friend asked me if I would agree to offer pro bono counseling sessions for folks who had AIDS. I agreed. The first person I met came to me, already gaunt from the illness and told me he was dying. No prior training or life experience prepared me for the fact of his raw truth and his ability to state it with such honesty. My heart sank as I shared with him how incompetent I felt. I told him I would try my best. He and I became fast friends as I did with his partner as well. I violated all professional boundaries; what he needed was an honest relationship, not a professional. I was with him through the end. His partner and I each held one of his hands as he quietly slipped away. I learned that not knowledge or training or professional standards help others, only honest, caring human relationships.
Another dear friend of mine enfolded a woman of another race and with serious physical and mental disabilities into her family. Many frieds of this family also embraced our new member, but we were mostly adults. One day my young, very young (3-4 years old) grandaughter was with me at my friend’s house. Without hesitation, this child happily walked up to the woman of another color, in a wheelchair, and joyfully interacted with her. The inclusiveness with which children accept others was heart-warming to behold.
October 28, 2008 at 11:51 pm
The Hospital and the Recital
Shadows raced about the walls twisting and fumbling around. Outside the moon was full and talking to the voices in my head. I stared at the hospital walls as an Indian shadow puppet show filled the room. Demons had leaped from wall to wall chasing the moonlight canvas, jumping and diving in and out, and off the floor. A host of shadows gathered only to dissolve into the ether and disappear into the floor and under the bed. It may have been minutes or an hour I don’t remember how long I stared at that bare wall.
Then my name was called and I pushed my feet into slippers and opened the door. I walked out to the corridor to the medication trolley. Three pills and a small paper cup of water were pressed to my hand. Then I presented my tongue as instructed and walked back to my room.
As I got back into the bed out of the corner of an eye, there was a grey flicker, a shadow darting under the bed. I got into bed. Someone came to the window in the door and looked in on me and they had turned out the light.
Outside the moon shone brightly, shrouded in black clouds it hung in the sky like a beacon
In my room the whispering began, the laughter and seductive comment, the angry male voices and the tinkling laughter of a female one. Then the thick blanket of forgetful unconsciousness as the sleeping pill hit its mark.
It was the middle of the night when I woke, should I say was rudely awoken? There was an elderly woman in the next room, shouting incoherently at an imaginary God and his minions. I got up and went to the toilet, before looking down the corridor to see the night staff. They had been sat reading a book as if nothing mattered. I got back into bed, outside the window the moon was half hidden behind the roof tops .My mind began to race back to the shadows, were they under the bed?
A chill ran down along the curve of my spine, everywhere was dark and strange in the moonlight. Over the rooftops came a Banshee, floating, screaming as her dark hair flowed over the roof and the white veil of a fluid dress fell about her form. She came right up to the crack of my open window, only to float out over the hospital roof again. Shaking I got out of bed to spill a circle of water on the floor, ghosts wont cross water I told myself. Then hurriedly I got back into bed.
The old woman was still shouting as a grey shape of a shadow had come flying from under the bed and flew under her door. She began protesting that her name had been mistaken and that she wasn’t the one that they were looking for. Terrified I sank back into the bed,not moving, not daring to go to her aid. Then she began to scream of the Tower of Babble and that she had been possessed .I sat silent in my narrow bed. Footsteps descended along the corridoor ,a doctor had arrived with the night staff. They opened the door to see the old woman huddled in a corner screaming and gnashing her teeth at them. I got out of bed and went to peep into the room, my mistake! As the nurses struggled with the snapping and snarling woman the doctor grabbed my thumb and presented it to her. Then I screamed as she sunk her sharp dentures into the flesh and bone .I pulled my hand away and headed back to my bed .My room was quiet and dark but warm and comforting. I sank back into the warm bed, nursing my poor thumb.
Songs of comfort danced in and out of my head, gentle lullabyes and hymns. Slowly I drifted off to sleep. The next morning there was a voice from the doorway that disturbed my sleep, “Get up Breakfast is here”. It was the morning staff, knocking on all the doors. I got out of bed, my head was still buzzing with ideas, I was having conversations with myself as I walked along the corridoor to the dining hall. There, had been a pile of buttered toast on a trolley and a great metal teapot full of utility tea. I hate tea .In a daze I took a piece of toast. The dining room was full of people but to me it was as if it were empty .I was so deep in my world, a world of spirits and creatures and God, that food wasn’t important .I sat on the edge of my bed and stared out of the window .In the distance amongst the clouds, He was calling ,a gentle soft male voice saying “Why would I not love you?” I ate my daily bread .Then I began to cry ,a sadness washed over me that seemed as though it would never stop, it lingered for days, at least it appeared too. The nurses came to comfort me, they put their arms around me saying “Lets take one day at a time “My back burned from their touch and from the marks where their hands had rubbed, my wings began to unfold. That was the day when the shadows had crept under my bed and the voices whispered evil thoughts into my head. I had murdered my baby, I had killed it myself, that’s why it hadn’t lived. There was no such thing as a miscarriage if you use contraception, I had murdered it. I cried some more and then some more. The next pill round, my pills were changed, then there was a red one too, poison! The staff had handed me the tablets and the paper cup and I stuck out my tongue. Back in my room I stared at the dirty yellow walls. Shapes shifted around and danced for me for a while. Then a host of demons bowed down before me, bubbling over the grime covered floor before disappearing into the tiles. I straightened the dingy pink duvet cover and sat on the edge of the bed. My thumb hurt, there were bite marks on it. For a while I was lost in the pain of it. I got into bed and I slept some more.
When I awoke there was a young girl outside my room sitting with her back to me. She was crying and her arms and legs were covered in bandages. Some of the staff were unwrapping her legs, they were covered in brightly coloured cartoon characters. Some of the skin was bare, they were experimenting on her, I had thought, this was a burns hospital after all, they were practicing plastic surgery. Tattoo removal, the poor girl was covered in them. After a while and a few fresh bandages the girl vanished to the dark pit called the smoking room .That’s were they all went, not that it had bothered me I preferred my own company. I headed for the day room, a lounge with easy chairs and clinical tables. It was like an orthopedics waiting room. In a corner there was a scrabble set. So I sat down and pulled out a handful of tiles. I used them like runes, they spelled out messages, messages for me only, each hand full made perfect sense .The squares cast in perfect sentences. Then as a shape shifted under the grey door, a member of staff arrived and switched on the T.V. “Dinner’s up” She said. I made my way to the dining room, chased by a grey ghost. On the trolley there was some food , if you could call it that , an unappetizing mess of greasy rubber omelettes, potato balls and tinned spaghetti. I turned on my heel, I was still being chased by the grey ghost, but suddenly food wasn’t important. I headed for the safety of my room and the shape dissolved around me, sending me into inner panic.
In the room I straightened the duvet and sat staring at the wall, the wall had been a major source of entertainment. I couldn’t say how long I sat there staring at the play of light and shade but it wasn’t long before the medication trolley came along again. I endured the same routine of pills, paper cup and stick out your tongue. Later I had heard the staff moving around the ward it appeared that Tea was up. It was Good Friday and there was cardboard fish cut to shape in its greasy batter wrapper and reshaped chips. I ate them and regretted it as soon as I had eaten The room was full of people, some had been zombified in my head or was it a chemical cosh, it had been hard to tell the difference. There were two zombies reading the Bible from cover to cover in rapid succession. A hymn sang defiant silently in my head.. .There is a Green hill far away, I longed for that hill as I felt my wings begin to unfold again. Along the corridor my room beckoned and I began my solitary vigil for the light show. Some bright spark thought it a good idea to play music in the P.A. system, so it wasn’t long before the Time warp was stuck on a loop. The old woman went mad, summoning demons from every quarter They were tall, taller than the shadows and moving about the corridor as if they’d been caught in strobe lighting. They jumped from one end of the corridor to another with the old woman gnashing and snarling after them. Staff appeared, it was time to get changed for visitors soon. Visitors! Who would come angels or aliens, shaking I had pulled on some clothes not seeing what I was wearing .”Angela you have visitors “said one of the staff.
I made my way back to the dining room. There the disgusting repast had vanished and now I sat at my prison table. Formica, tatty, with plastic chairs and on the insipid yellow walls, a poster, “Life is like Garlic bread.” Don’t ask me why but I still haven’t worked that out. My visitors had arrived, I recognised who they were but then I didn’t know them, they were like strangers to me. There were a man and a younger man sat at my table, no aliens then, I just don’t remember the conversation, just lots of looking across the table how long would I have been sat there? A bag had been produced with snacks and clothes and a c.d. player. I opened my mouth and spewed out the greasy fish and unpalatable chips, yes I was sick, violently sick. Nurses arrived to hurriedly clear the mess and I walked back to my room carrying the bag, visitors forgotten, there were no goodbyes, they just left. I got into bed and I slept some more.
Another medication trolley came and went with the same routine, pills, paper cup and tongue out. Then came the tea trolley, I hate tea, milky, vapid, tasteless, wet liquid in its giant teapot.
I got undressed again and got back into bed. When I awoke in the middle of the night the moon was full and shining through the window, hovering over the bed, a golden angel sang. She flowed like the Banshee, in her golden robes with great wings flapping gently in the air. My back began to burn again and I felt the buds of my own wings unfold. In the corner of the room, the tree of life grew and gleamed, silvered in the moonlight. “Get back in bed” someone barked from the doorway. I lay still, hidden under the covers. A Philippine member of staff came over and turned on a night light. “You, want bath? I rob you hair” I had long hair why would she rob my hair, the demons must be in her hands, I said nothing.
It was then, I was told to eat some toast. Apparently I hadn’t been eating and I was on medication for diabetes. So why was the food so awful! I ate my daily bread in the form of toast and a hymn sang silently in my head. Oh when the Saints…came marching in, I chanted at the demons of the night.
The days that followed had been pretty much the same, I took the medication, I ate the toast and I snacked on fruit and crisps. I didn’t eat the food, the vile hospital food unfit for human consumption .I began to faint, my blood sugars ran low and I was ill. The demons had grown wild whispering in corners, scratching at my face and arms and stalking my waking hours. The ward lights flickered from light to shade as they raced up and down the corridoor dissolving into the floor and under the chairs .The world was being eaten alive by demons and only I could see them, I stayed quiet trapped in their conspiracy. The shadows began to change they formed images of my loved ones typing away at the desktop as they ran along the ground to attack the typist shaded ,unaware of their intent. The medication trolley creaked along the corridor and shortly after I stuck out my tongue. Days rolled by and soon I was pronounced well or at least they’d had me there for long enough. The voices still whispered, the demons still chased but I was pronounced well enough to go home with the strangers who had visited me.
At home everything mocked me, the human beans I ate, were bubbling in the pan screaming “don’t eat me” as I put in the spoon. I still ate my daily bread, toasted granary with butter, delicious. The sweet and sour ribs from the local chip shop were human ribs and I knew it. My partner had been cloned from one of those ribs while I was in hospital I knew that too because his eyes kept changing colour from green to aqua. At home we communicated very little it was like walking on eggshells, thoughts’ formed conversations with themselves in my head. Then my partner announced that we were going out to Theatre Clwydd to see Brian Pattern, a favourite treat. I liked poetry. The journey in the car was filled with armies of angels riding golden dragons and heading out in a jet stream around the car. There was a stream of golden light racing out in front of the bonnet and I had been elated. The miles on the motorway had sped by and soon I was drinking coffee in the Foyer waiting for the show. The theatre was full when we took to our seats, I had no sooner sat down than the house lights went out and Brian came to the Stage. As he weaved his poetical stories and I had watched as the ghosts of Brian came out of his body, white ghosts with tortured faces, happy ghosts drawn with laughter lines, then I saw them. In 3D solid dark shapes on two legs that ran along the stage. Black, heartless creatures, devouring the laughter and the tears, drawing nurishment from the emotions of the crowd .In silence ,I had watched with fear a lump in my throat .Then the lights went up and it was time to go. I don’t recall the poetry or the questions raised by the audience, just the glorious spectacle .My partner never spoke and there had been nothing said, I was deep in my world. There were no angels or golden glories on the way home, only the silence of the long journey home to England. Home there had been little conversation and medication forced into my hand as I went to bed, only to dream of dragons and angels.
In the middle of the night I awoke, my son got up and followed me as I descended the stairs, he had looked tired.
We had had a row, he said that did I not care what I was doing to the family and that they were all sick of me being crazy. I had to get well .I was driving them all nuts! My world had begun to crack, the golden angels hung their heads in shame .He had gone back to bed while I stared at an old grandfather clock, the remains of a meal on the table ,an empty room and an empty T.V. screen. I recall that a red devil’s beckoning face swam before me on the blank screen, egging me on, I was useless, worthless. The demons had clamoured around the room calling for me to give in.
And I had succumbed I gave up the fight. I held the medication boxes in my hand and emptied the three boxes I had a glass of water and began to swallow, one after another. This was where it all stops I had told myself as I stuck out my tongue for one final time. I slipped from consciousness, the last time and the dark descended. The buds of my wings had begun to unfold and I floated like the pale screaming Banshee above the stillness of my body. A red coloured snake circled around the white flesh of my leg, writhed upward till it reached my neck and I was in the arms of my many laughing demons ………
copyright reserved Sandra Banawich 25th July 2005
sbanawich@sky.com