RE-sensitization

[Brenda86]

I wanted to share something I've noticed recently about myself and see if anyone has experienced something similar.

Given the state of the media and that like most kids I grew up watching everything from the daily news to the latest horror movie, I suppose it's no wonder I became quite desensitized to violence/gore/death.

I used to be able to look at some pretty horrific stuff without really being bothered by it too much.

But over the past few months, I have noticed that I just cannot watch/view things like that in the same way. My boyfriend and I rent a lot of movies. He likes to get the horror stuff (which I've realized he likes the more paranormal oriented ones rather than gore, so I've tried to steer him a bit ;) ) but I just cannot watch any really violent, gory stuff anymore.

I keep thinking how gross it is to want to watch stuff like that for ENTERTAINMENT, especially with movies oriented around the gore where STORYLINE seems to be a deformed byproduct of the movie rather than the being the reason for it.

I mean I have been getting sick to my stomach, literally, looking at things that didn't bother me before.

I looked at some pictures on the Cass website earlier from the war in Iraq and started crying - realizing these things happen because we all go about our lives in such a daze that we allow such things to happen in our world senselessly.

I was just wondering if anyone has had this experience with re-sensitization. I guess it really started after I began doing the meditation even though I haven't been doing it as regularly as I would like to.

 

[knowledge_of_self]

I wanted to share something I've noticed recently about myself and see if anyone has experienced something similar.

I can relate to what you are expressing. But I think in a way, my view of looking at any form of entertainment has changed since I’ve read the C’s material and the recommended psychological reading material, like ponerology. I can see the ponerization in many video games, TV shows , movies and even commercials. And I think the reasons for this stems from increased knowledge input and a change of ‘frequency’ within me that just doesn’t resonate with certain forms of entertainment anymore.

Which kind of reminds me of the topics discussed in these two threads, regarding different forms of ‘pathological art’.

http://www.cassiopaea.org/forum/index.php?topic=14204.0
http://www.cassiopaea.org/forum/index.php?topic=14178.0

I keep thinking how gross it is to want to watch stuff like that for ENTERTAINMENT, especially with movies oriented around the gore where STORYLINE seems to be a deformed byproduct of the movie rather than the being the reason for it.

I mean I have been getting sick to my stomach, literally, looking at things that didn't bother me before.

By doing the breathing exercises and reading/learning the recommended psychology reading, which is vital knowledge for your mind/soul; you are changing your ‘frequency’ and no longer find ‘negative’ things such as “blood” and “gore” attractive in any way shape or form for entertainment value. I think this is a healthy step towards finding the real you :)

I looked at some pictures on the Cass website earlier from the war in Iraq and started crying - realizing these things happen because we all go about our lives in such a daze that we allow such things to happen in our world senselessly.

I also get very emotional when I see ANY form of injustice towards any form of life. Be it war pictures, or some other injustice even to 2D life forms, it chokes me up and I cry too. Sometimes the ugliness just gets a bit too much for me to handle and I shed tears, but I always think THIS IS IT. This is the world we embraced as 3D STS-- it's not all beautiful and the truth needs to be seen objectively on it's own. It is what it is, and we should never turn a blinds eye to it. Recognize it, and hope to change the ugliness within our selves, so that maybe our 'frequency' changes and we 'evolve' to more than STS beings... hope that makes sense

 

[Mountain Crown]

Hi Brenda,

This is happening to me also.

 

[The Mechanic]

I can relate to what you're saying Brenda. I became very desensitized to images of violence during my childhood and early 20's.

I remember watching horror films at birthday parties when I was 15 or so, having nightmares about them and actually hating the experiences. Still, peer pressure made me go through with that. I was just too afraid of my friends' reaction to tell them that I was afraid to watch those films. These experiences, and I presume also watching 'action' movies that were already very violent back then, desensitized me to violence, torture and murder on screen. I could watch very violent movies with some mild inner reaction, but no way near to the extent it should be.

I never could stomach the real stuff, though I never actually saw real (as in, not acted) images of murdered human beings or human beings being killed until I was about 25 years old. These images shocked me to the core. I still remember seeing that, although it's a long time ago.

The process of re-sensitization as you describe it has been going on with me for a couple of years now. I'm now in my early thirties and I remember the last horror movie I saw. It was about 5 years ago. I hated it and decided I wouldn't rent those anymore. Nowadays I just can't watch it. Also, I don't like to see violence in movies anymore, I can't enjoy it. For me, a good story can be very well told and acted, but totally spoiled by too much violence. I've observed that my first reaction is often to just look away. It's just so anti-entertaining to watch that 'entertainment'.

I sometimes have to push myself a little when a sott article comes up with a link to pictures of for instance war casualties. Watching those images disturb me greatly also, but I think it has purpose to look at those as they're real, as opposed to all the fake violence in movies and the like. Still I find it hard to go through. It can be so shocking. I vividly remember a picture I saw from Iraq, taken when US soldiers killed a couple traveling with their children in a car. The image of a girl crying her heart out, blood all over the place, a soldier moving the girl away from the car she was just in... It's not like the image hunts me, but I can still feel the horror I felt when I first saw it when I think about it. Those poor helpless children, traumatized for life, violently robbed of their caretakers, the people they love and depend upon most, their mom and dad... It makes me very very sad. Images I saw more recently of wounded children in Gaza invoked the same reaction. Still, when pictures like that come up I often consciously decide to look at them, because I think it helps me to have a more objective view of reality.

I don't really know my position on the desensitized <-> re-sensitized scale (if it's as simple as that), and I suppose that I'm still quite desensitized to lots of stuff. I also think that reducing my 'intake' of violent entertainment has helped me a lot toward re-sensitization.

 

[Laura]

The process of re-sensitization as you describe it has been going on with me for a couple of years now. I'm now in my early thirties and I remember the last horror movie I saw. It was about 5 years ago. I hated it and decided I wouldn't rent those anymore. Nowadays I just can't watch it. Also, I don't like to see violence in movies anymore, I can't enjoy it. For me, a good story can be very well told and acted, but totally spoiled by too much violence. I've observed that my first reaction is often to just look away. It's just so anti-entertaining to watch that 'entertainment'.

It's an interesting thing, isn't it, how you begin to appreciate totally different things.

I sometimes have to push myself a little when a sott article comes up with a link to pictures of for instance war casualties. Watching those images disturb me greatly also, but I think it has purpose to look at those as they're real, as opposed to all the fake violence in movies and the like. Still I find it hard to go through. It can be so shocking. I vividly remember a picture I saw from Iraq, taken when US soldiers killed a couple traveling with their children in a car. The image of a girl crying her heart out, blood all over the place, a soldier moving the girl away from the car she was just in... It's not like the image hunts me, but I can still feel the horror I felt when I first saw it when I think about it. Those poor helpless children, traumatized for life, violently robbed of their caretakers, the people they love and depend upon most, their mom and dad... It makes me very very sad. Images I saw more recently of wounded children in Gaza invoked the same reaction. Still, when pictures like that come up I often consciously decide to look at them, because I think it helps me to have a more objective view of reality.

Yes, I'm the same way. I can't watch the fake, gratuitous stuff, but I feel that somehow I must at least be a witness to the real suffering of others. If they are experiencing it, how can I turn away and try to pretend it isn't happening?

That little girl you mention actually does haunt me. And how many more are there whose lives are destroyed and then shoved into the darkness and no one knows or cares?

I remember one day when I was working on sott by myself and I came across some horrible photos of women and children who had been killed or seriously injured in Iraq and I just got SO angry at the complacency of people and I published a whole page of these images so that folks would have it in their faces exactly what they were doing. Well, of course, those doing it can have it in their faces and still not care and only people like me get so upset that they want to scream and rage against the injustice.

I try to imagine how I would feel if I was in the position of those who are suffering deprivation in this world. I would at least want ONE other person to know I existed and suffered and knew it was wrong and spoke out against it and remembered me. I guess that's why I make myself look at them. It does upset me - sometimes for a LONG time - but I feel that it is a form of giving to be a witness and to speak out. Sometimes, in this world, that is all we can do, but it's something.

 

[anart]

I mean I have been getting sick to my stomach, literally, looking at things that didn't bother me before.

The process of re-sensitization as you describe it has been going on with me for a couple of years now. I'm now in my early thirties and I remember the last horror movie I saw. It was about 5 years ago. I hated it and decided I wouldn't rent those anymore. Nowadays I just can't watch it. Also, I don't like to see violence in movies anymore, I can't enjoy it. For me, a good story can be very well told and acted, but totally spoiled by too much violence. I've observed that my first reaction is often to just look away. It's just so anti-entertaining to watch that 'entertainment'.

It's an interesting thing, isn't it, how you begin to appreciate totally different things.

Yes, years ago I used to really 'like' horror movies, and movies about serial killers, the darker the better. I have no desire whatsoever to watch them now. In fact, when I've accidentally exposed to that type of stuff these days, I recoil - just can't watch it. I've wondered if part of that is that I've gained a deeper understanding of how impressions (a source of food, by the way) affect us deeply. Considering the visceral aspect, though, I think the larger part of it is simply that I have begun to wake up and to be able to see (and instinctively sense) that poison is poison and what is and what is not a beneficial (objective impression). I think this is a step by step process and probably continues until we're finished with our lessons here. Rather like it's simply what does and does not 'fit' anymore with who we are and who we are becoming... (osit)

 

[Gertrudes]

I can relate to what you're saying Brenda. I became very desensitized to images of violence during my childhood and early 20's.
.....
The process of re-sensitization as you describe it has been going on with me for a couple of years now.

I have also been noticing this gradual process of re-sensitization throughout the years.
More recently, I have noticed this process accelerating and extending itself to more subtle things, such as cultural values and how they manifest themselves. As I often read in this forum, the devil really is in the details, and it is quite amazing to start noticing these little devils hidden in our day to day lives and in the very things I've always taken for granted as normal.
Deedlet mentioned a few threads that I find address this issue quite well. To those, I would also had this one http://www.cassiopaea.org/forum/index.php?topic=14103.0 on Positive Dissociation.

I try to imagine how I would feel if I was in the position of those who are suffering deprivation in this world. I would at least want ONE other person to know I existed and suffered and knew it was wrong and spoke out against it and remembered me. I guess that's why I make myself look at them. It does upset me - sometimes for a LONG time - but I feel that it is a form of giving to be a witness and to speak out. Sometimes, in this world, that is all we can do, but it's something.

I have been thinking about this lately. Taking a few of SOTT articles as an example, you'll find absolutely horrific descriptions of human behaviour. Rape, murder, torture, you name it. There are really no words to convey this, it is beyond horrific. I can't image what happens to these souls. When the question of the soul smashing came up in this http://www.cassiopaea.org/forum/index.php?topic=13699.0 thread, it really got me thinking what will happen to those people? Do they stand a chance, any chance?... I don't have an answer, but it is had for me to imagine how they do...

Yes, I'm the same way. I can't watch the fake, gratuitous stuff, but I feel that somehow I must at least be a witness to the real suffering of others. If they are experiencing it, how can I turn away and try to pretend it isn't happening?

This is how I feel, but I honestly don't know how to do it sometimes. Somethings are so profoundly upsetting that it completely shakes my core, and I end up not being able to watch it until the end.
Once, after watching an extremely shocking documentary I ended up in the toillet throwing up. It was too much.. Since then, I have put on limits into what do I actually watch. I feel very divided in this subject though, I find that part of the reason for this general complacency is the fact that we never really "bother" to see all of these things, to actually look at them straight because it hurts...well, if it hurts us, imagine how it hurts those people!!
I wonder, what would happen if we would endure seeing those things? maybe some of us would actually wake up to what's happening.

By doing the breathing exercises and reading/learning the recommended psychology reading, which is vital knowledge for your mind/soul; you are changing your ‘frequency’ and no longer find ‘negative’ things such as “blood” and “gore” attractive in any way shape or form for entertainment value. I think this is a healthy step towards finding the real you :)

I don't really know my position on the desensitized <-> re-sensitized scale (if it's as simple as that), and I suppose that I'm still quite desensitized to lots of stuff. I also think that reducing my 'intake' of violent entertainment has helped me a lot toward re-sensitization.

This is also how I see it, which reminds me of Gurdjieff's three types of food: the ordinary food we eat,the air we breathe and our impressions.
Here is a quote from ISOTM

It is not difficult to agree that air is a kind of food for the organism. But in what way impressions can be food may appear at first difficult to understand. We must however remember that, with every external impression, whether it takes the form of sound, or vision, or smell, we receive from outside a certain amount of energy, a certain number of vibrations; this energy which enter the organism from the outside is food.

EDIT: just noticed that Anart has posted in the meantime and had already mentioned impressions as food

 

[Marcus-Aurelius]

I can also relate to this. I am becoming quite unable to watch violent movies. I think I developped a "don't think about it, think about happier things" button at some point in the past to accomodate other people sufferings, even my own. But seems like things are changing now, I cry quite everyday when thinking about what is endured by certain people I see in the street. And more recently, after a little depression, think the re-sensitization process showed me the next logical step: DOing. I am currently realizing that I can not see this horror and keep silent, scream in my corner or complain about this state of affairs with people who often don't get my point. I thought I should DO something about this, to join people who are already DOing what they can to make other people aware of what is going on. And a quote often comes to mind when thinking about this, though I don't remenber the exact words and the author: "Nothing more is needed by evil than for good people to do nothing."

 

[Brenda86]

I remember one day when I was working on sott by myself and I came across some horrible photos of women and children who had been killed or seriously injured in Iraq and I just got SO angry at the complacency of people and I published a whole page of these images so that folks would have it in their faces exactly what they were doing. Well, of course, those doing it can have it in their faces and still not care and only people like me get so upset that they want to scream and rage against the injustice.

I believe that may be the exact page of images I was referring to. I just saw all the pain and suffering and it broke me down because it was REAL. And I was able to see it as REAL. When I was desensitized I looked at "entertainment" and real gore the same way. I never really LIKED it, but they didn't bother me because I had gotten USED to it. Now they both bother me, but actually in different ways. The fake stuff is not something I want to watch, and makes me a bit sick to my stomach. But these REAL images, they evoked so many feelings in me that I just cried.

Quote from Gertrudes:

I have been thinking about this lately. Taking a few of SOTT articles as an example, you'll find absolutely horrific descriptions of human behaviour. Rape, murder, torture, you name it. There are really no words to convey this, it is beyond horrific. I can't image what happens to these souls. When the question of the soul smashing came up in this http://www.cassiopaea.org/forum/index.php?topic=13699.0 thread, it really got me thinking what will happen to those people? Do they stand a chance, any chance?... I don't have an answer, but it is had for me to imagine how they do...

It is definitely hard to imagine, especially if you try even for a moment to put yourself in that situation and imagine the sheer horror. But I suppose it probably varies from soul to soul. Like how some people can grow up abused and still find a way to sort everything out and have a decent like and how some people descend into madness, and any number of middle grounds. But I don't know.

It was good to hear about some other people's experiences, though. I mentioned my re-sensitization to my mom and sister in passing because they wanted to see the new SAW movie for Halloween, and they did not like my comment about how I just can't see watching people get killed, even though it's fake, as entertainment anymore. Actually, my sister told me I was over analyzing it, and I had to laugh. I told her, "Well, that may be true, but have you analyzed it AT ALL?"

So yeah, just good to hear other people are feeling the same way. :)

 

[Laura]

I remember one day when I was working on sott by myself and I came across some horrible photos of women and children who had been killed or seriously injured in Iraq and I just got SO angry at the complacency of people and I published a whole page of these images so that folks would have it in their faces exactly what they were doing. Well, of course, those doing it can have it in their faces and still not care and only people like me get so upset that they want to scream and rage against the injustice.

I believe that may be the exact page of images I was referring to. I just saw all the pain and suffering and it broke me down because it was REAL. And I was able to see it as REAL. When I was desensitized I looked at "entertainment" and real gore the same way. I never really LIKED it, but they didn't bother me because I had gotten USED to it. Now they both bother me, but actually in different ways. The fake stuff is not something I want to watch, and makes me a bit sick to my stomach. But these REAL images, they evoked so many feelings in me that I just cried.

Interestingly, that was the page that got our account frozen by paypal for publishing "pornography"! Now, get this, real porn sites are hooked up to paypal and you can use it to pay for the exploitation of women and children, but god forbid you should expose people to the truth of what their abdication of responsibility has led to.

 

[Brenda86]

I remember one day when I was working on sott by myself and I came across some horrible photos of women and children who had been killed or seriously injured in Iraq and I just got SO angry at the complacency of people and I published a whole page of these images so that folks would have it in their faces exactly what they were doing. Well, of course, those doing it can have it in their faces and still not care and only people like me get so upset that they want to scream and rage against the injustice.

I believe that may be the exact page of images I was referring to. I just saw all the pain and suffering and it broke me down because it was REAL. And I was able to see it as REAL. When I was desensitized I looked at "entertainment" and real gore the same way. I never really LIKED it, but they didn't bother me because I had gotten USED to it. Now they both bother me, but actually in different ways. The fake stuff is not something I want to watch, and makes me a bit sick to my stomach. But these REAL images, they evoked so many feelings in me that I just cried.

Interestingly, that was the page that got our account frozen by paypal for publishing "pornography"! Now, get this, real porn sites are hooked up to paypal and you can use it to pay for the exploitation of women and children, but god forbid you should expose people to the truth of what their abdication of responsibility has led to.

I don't normally post such short replies, but that's just... ridiculous.

 

[Oxajil]

I think I've been sensitive my whole life, but more in the latest years.

I came on this world feeling unsafe and only trusted my own family. I remember my aunt and her family ringing the door, but my little brother and I didn't open the door, even though we knew it was them. I remember looking out of the window with my little brother and we were watching them as they were watching us, asking us to open the door. But we didn't. (we were home alone)

Always was walking close to my mom, there were a few people though who I also liked. But mostly I just trusted God and my family. Everyone else could have been a dangerous stranger.

I read in Myth of Sanity about certain people keeping a knife in their shoe for that unknown enemy out there who isn't really out there. A behavior that probably is because of some kind of trauma. I wonder that if I have a soul, what kind of trauma I went through in my past life that I'm living this life in such ''carefulness''. It could be totally something else though.

I've noticed in the last year that I feel very much connected to children. I remember reading an article about how children were raped and mistreated in prisons in Iraq, it just breaks my heart and couldn't take it anymore. It was the first time in many years I cried very much and for a long time. I'm not sure if there were any pictures, reading the text was just really hard for me, because I pictured their innocence and sensed their pain. It's inhumane.
It's so unfair. The same with innocent people suffering under the hands of the psychopaths.

It fills me up with anger. I'm angry because this suffering can be prevented! It gives me the desire to stand up and help everything and everyone. But that would be a stupid thing to do, to do something based only on emotions. So now I have made the choice that while doing the Work, I will help people, those who ask, in small ways. And maybe one day in a big way, perhaps together.
Now that I See and understand the suffering I want to help. And I think I can, through knowledge and being. I think that little by little I can help.

 

[Bluestar]

I used to be able to look at some pretty horrific stuff without really being bothered by it too much.

In my teens I would go to a horror movie and watch between my fingers. Missing probably half of the movie. So in my twenties decided I would force myself to watch them and believe I became desensitised to them. Giving myself the excuse that if watched I would face my fears. Knowing that it was hollywood and all make up and props so this helped. Then once desensitized I could watch them and critique all the nonsense in it. I created a buffer...

So this halloween with all the horror movies on TV and in the movies, I had not much desire to watch them. Especially movies of torture like Saw ( so disturbing to me, even the thought of the genre). Something inside just had no desire to watch. And at times I found myself watching a horror or "action" movie or program due to the family watching, my thoughts started to think about if that was real when that car blew up, someone would be really badly hurt. Or when the cop car crashed that a father or mother may have just been killed. Or that poor person was somebodies child. Of course knowing it was fiction, but somewhere somehow a real person may experiencing something similar. I eventually got up and went to read something. Actually I find myself wanting to read either the forum or a book then watch TV at all these days.


What does get me as well is the pain and suffering of others that hurts so much. Sensitive as I am I have been known to cry at a commercial yet all those years I could watch the portrayal of humans suffering some form of evil, even tho it was not real it still was representing suffering. Makes me sad that I was so wrapped up with myself wanting to be buffered from my own fears of the horror that I allowed myself to become numb to it.

 

[Mike]

I recently watched a movie that had a trailer for the upcoming movie 'Brothers': http://www.moviefone.com/movie/brothers/31198/main

Jim Sheridan helms this remake of Susanne Bier's 2004 war melodrama, this time with Tobey Maguire and Jake Gyllenhaal taking the lead roles of two brothers torn between war and love in this Relativity Media production. Maguire stars as a soldier who's sent to Afghanistan as his deadbeat brother (Gyllenhaal) stays at home with his sibling's wife (Natalie Portman) and kids.

and the acting and emotions seemed so high and real in the trailer that I know I don't want to watch the movie. The trailer was enough to send my emotions in turmoil. Also, after reading this tread I really have no desire to see the movie '2012'.

 

[Windmill knight]

I sometimes have to push myself a little when a sott article comes up with a link to pictures of for instance war casualties. Watching those images disturb me greatly also, but I think it has purpose to look at those as they're real, as opposed to all the fake violence in movies and the like. Still I find it hard to go through. It can be so shocking. I vividly remember a picture I saw from Iraq, taken when US soldiers killed a couple traveling with their children in a car. The image of a girl crying her heart out, blood all over the place, a soldier moving the girl away from the car she was just in... It's not like the image hunts me, but I can still feel the horror I felt when I first saw it when I think about it. Those poor helpless children, traumatized for life, violently robbed of their caretakers, the people they love and depend upon most, their mom and dad... It makes me very very sad. Images I saw more recently of wounded children in Gaza invoked the same reaction. Still, when pictures like that come up I often consciously decide to look at them, because I think it helps me to have a more objective view of reality.

Yes, I'm the same way. I can't watch the fake, gratuitous stuff, but I feel that somehow I must at least be a witness to the real suffering of others. If they are experiencing it, how can I turn away and try to pretend it isn't happening?

That little girl you mention actually does haunt me. And how many more are there whose lives are destroyed and then shoved into the darkness and no one knows or cares?

That girl haunts me too, and her little brother next to her. She's crying in desperation and he is silent in shock and fear. Same thing with that Iraqi man who had his picture taken while crying on a line of wooden coffins. Same with the Palestinian girl who got all her family killed by an Israeli boat during a picnic on a beach. Pure nightmares. I absolutely despise war and what it does to people.