Music as a narrative

[monotonic]

Today I realized this was a way to describe a certain experience I have with music.

Occasionally while going about my flow of thoughts I will have a moment where a thought seems to strike a note. These tend to be simple thoughts, which were very natural flowing and also are applying something I have learned. At the exact moment there is no hesitation, anticipation or second-guessing. The thought has passed fluidly in and out before that can occur; but the thought tends to come after an instance of mental denial. At this moment I hear a musical "phrase" that is deeply rooted somehow in the mentation. I cannot really separate the music from the thoughts even though it is an audible sensation. They are almost the same. It is like a single experience through multiple senses.

During this time I will be observing myself, or trying, and the backdrop to my thoughts will be a narrative that is mainly impressions, but when something stands out I pause the flow of thoughts and the impressions develop into an observation which I consider. Sometimes these impressions are indecipherable in which case it may be an old memory of a traumatic incident, or simply something I'm ignoring at the moment but can't ignore any longer.

I've realized that sometimes the narrative takes on a musical nature. It is fully spontaneous, and each time it is like I am having that thought for the first time. Although as I understand, if any moment does not seem like the first of that moment, then it is because you have anticipated it.

My experiences tell me that the mind can take on music symbolically and use it like a language. I feel music is like a narrative. It could be that that is how the adaptive unconscious processes music.

I've noticed sometimes I seem to think in symbols. For instance when I am in deep thought and I think of someone taking on a perspective, the corresponding visualization is that of a person pulling a loop over their head, like you would a necklace. From my perspective, putting on a shirt or a necklace or putting my head through a window is a similar sensation to when I try to shift my perspective in thought. Ultimately the visualizations and impressions seem to have the purpose of linking together so that long thoughts can be developed and maintained. The impressions are like puzzle pieces and each one is created by the adaptive unconscious to serve as a flexible, dependable link in the chain. I don't think this happened on it's own; I think it is the result of my effort to think past the limitations of my working memory. The synesthetic nature of some of these impressions may indicate that I am drawing on multiple parts of my brain.

There appear to be caveats to this process. The symbolic process needs to be translated to language. When the symbols aren't constantly informed by language and don't have the linguistic feedback loop to guide them, they take on a life of their own and what follows, in my experience, is basically a dream, often without images. In other cases, it's the familiar experience of finishing your thought but not really understanding what you were just thinking. It seems like you have "forgotten" what you were going to say, or that you don't know how to say it. My understanding is that people just aren't aware of this layer of thought and the impressions pass by unnoticed. The impressions dissolve very quickly when not in use, and because they don't link directly with language they don't stick in memory/associate very well. We learn from a young age that what isn't a word doesn't exist, so these "sub-verbal" thoughts fall by the wayside. They are after all very slippery and not easy to study, and don't bring instant gratification or even the promise of future utility. For a child who's wellbeing hinges on pleasing their parents, instant results are favored and anything that slows that down is considered deadly. Anticipation instead becomes the way of life.

I think these experiences started after I started practicing breathing exercises and relaxation exercises before sleep, which increased my awareness of the transition to dreaming as well as my dream recall. I had some lucid dreams as well.

I think being able to control thoughts at this level has improved the way I think and increased my capacity. I am also better able to pay attention to other things while thinking. I can have longer, more nuanced thoughts before forgetting or becoming confused. I am not as easily distracted and can think easier while in pain.

So, how does this look to you? What is your perspective? Where am I wrong?

 

[Palinurus]

Hi monotonic,

Interesting introspection experiences you're describing!

Would you be inclined to do further research into some of the foundations of music as a narrative you may want to start with an excellent series of six 1973 lectures on this subject --and many related topics-- by Leonard Bernstein, which can be found here (among other sources): _http://www.openculture.com/2012/03/leonard_bernsteins_masterful_lectures_on_music.html

In 1972, the composer Leonard Bernstein returned to Harvard, his alma mater, to serve as the Charles Eliot Norton Professor of Poetry, with “Poetry” being defined in the broadest sense. The position, first created in 1925, asks faculty members to live on campus, advise students, and most importantly, deliver a series of six public lectures. T.S. Eliot, Aaron Copland, W.H. Auden, e.e. cummings, Robert Frost, Jorge Luis Borges — they all previously took part in this tradition. And Bernstein did too.

Delivered in the fall of 1973 and collectively titled “The Unanswered Question,” Bernstein’s lectures covered a lot of terrain, touching on poetry, linguistics, philosophy and physics. But the focus inevitably comes back to music — to how music works, or to the underlying grammar of music. The lectures run over 11 hours. They’re considered masterpieces, beautiful examples of how to make complicated material accessible. And they’re available in full on YouTube.

Additional source: _http://www.leonardbernstein.com/norton.htm

Hope this helps a bit. :)

 

[Buddy]

So, how does this look to you? What is your perspective?

Looks to me like a gain in lucidity and maybe a bit more. One benefit in having at least two simultaneous observation streams is an enhanced differential awareness. An example might be when one thought stream notices a difference between two things being compared and another thought stream notices a difference between two other things it is also comparing and both of those noticed differences are stored as a logical abstract object. And it doesn't stop there.

At this point you have two abstract logical objects (two different "differences" noted) and these two observations are stored along with what you also notice about the difference between the two differences. This is meta-level information modeling in your memory. Later, you can mentally walk this web and recall these relationships as info, even if the info is not stored with mathematical quantification or with specific linguistic identifications. Basically, you quantify on the fly.

Interestingly, to me, as soon as you put the info in words to communicate this with others, it seems that some dimensions of the knowledge get flattened and it's hard to feel satisfied that someone really understands what you're saying. Do you ever experience that phenomena with some people but not with others?

The reason I think this is at least part of what you're talking about is the synasthasia or synasthetic connection. I also experience some thoughts and mental observation streams rhythmically and sometimes with audible musical tones. That's probably why I prefer syncopation to predictable synchronization in some music I enjoy. It allows me to feel like I'm positioned in time, somewhere just before the next note will be sounded and seeing a coherency in a whole.

Concerning the idea that if the symbolic stream is not corralled into a linguistic frame it seems to live on as a dream, that sounds like what some of us in the old ADD forums used to describe as our frustration with the two poles of "hyperactivity" and feeling like "a daydreaming slug." John Ratey provided a model that helped many of us see the spectral nature of mentation and understand the resemblances between these supposed "opposites" within a framework where there are many 'shades of gray'. Combine this framework (A Users Guide to the Brain) with the findings in neuroscience that support the idea that music enhances inter-hemispheric communication for those of us with fewer connections between the two in the corpus callosum and two major benefits emerge:

1. Understanding a bit more about what's going on reduces the stress response from some sources of stress.
2. Anxiety over so-called bi-polar type experiences diminish, leading to a more creative outlook on brain development from an evolutionary perspective and fewer manifestations of the kind of behaviors that seem to concern others.

At least, this is how I'm presently looking at it all.

These are just my thoughts and may not exactly coincide with your 'music as narrative' idea. Palinurus may actually be closer with an answer. Hope this is not too confusing, though. If it is, just ask and I can describe some of my experience a bit more if needed.

 

[monotonic]

I will try to look at the videos, although youtube doesn't work on my computer. Thanks for posting that.

Interestingly, to me, as soon as you put the info in words to communicate this with others, it seems that some dimensions of the knowledge get flattened and it's hard to feel satisfied that someone really understands what you're saying. Do you ever experience that phenomena with some people but not with others?

This is definitely an experience I've had. As a child, my unconscious understood a lot of scary things about what was happening to me in school. I could tell something was wrong about all of it, but to anyone else I was just a confused kid with personal issues. There were a few teachers who shared the grief and I knew they were able to feel the same, but not any better than me at expressing it. It was as if nothing was real unless it was a word, and the only words I knew were the words of the people who's purpose it was to coerce me in any way possible to do what they wanted me to do.

It sounds like "flattened dimensions" can also be just a perception. The impressions feel like "feeling". One can come to identify with the feeling and be oblivious to the message, especially if you think it doesn't exist. A person so identified may project these feelings onto others and expect them to intuitively understand vague and confused sentences. This can happen, but mostly by accident or between specific people.

I have learned to "interrogate" this part of myself. It is like the method of imagining yourself in a situation to try and observe the adaptive unconscious response. In this way I've learned my brain knows some surprising things even though I have never consciously thought about these things. If there is the impression of an unacknowledged dimension, then the impression can be interrogated and usually tracked to its source. This takes patience and concentration and a burning desire to "see" what's going on in your head. Anticipation, wishful thinking and lying to the self frustrate the process.

When I hear tones they can be similar to the beautiful synth piano here:

http://ocr2.blueblue.fr/files/music/albums/ff6/1-03%20Joshua%20Morse%20-%20Remember%20(Awakening).mp3

Other times I hear stuff like this:

http://ocr2.blueblue.fr/files/music/albums/ff6/2-01%20bustatunez%20-%20Wild%20Child%20Ballad%20(Gau).mp3

 

[H-KQGE]

I will try to look at the videos, although youtube doesn't work on my computer. Thanks for posting that.

Interestingly, to me, as soon as you put the info in words to communicate this with others, it seems that some dimensions of the knowledge get flattened and it's hard to feel satisfied that someone really understands what you're saying. Do you ever experience that phenomena with some people but not with others?

This is definitely an experience I've had. As a child, my unconscious understood a lot of scary things about what was happening to me in school. I could tell something was wrong about all of it, but to anyone else I was just a confused kid with personal issues. There were a few teachers who shared the grief and I knew they were able to feel the same, but not any better than me at expressing it. It was as if nothing was real unless it was a word, and the only words I knew were the words of the people who's purpose it was to coerce me in any way possible to do what they wanted me to do.

It sounds like "flattened dimensions" can also be just a perception. The impressions feel like "feeling". One can come to identify with the feeling and be oblivious to the message, especially if you think it doesn't exist. A person so identified may project these feelings onto others and expect them to intuitively understand vague and confused sentences. This can happen, but mostly by accident or between specific people.

I have learned to "interrogate" this part of myself. It is like the method of imagining yourself in a situation to try and observe the adaptive unconscious response. In this way I've learned my brain knows some surprising things even though I have never consciously thought about these things. If there is the impression of an unacknowledged dimension, then the impression can be interrogated and usually tracked to its source. This takes patience and concentration and a burning desire to "see" what's going on in your head. Anticipation, wishful thinking and lying to the self frustrate the process.

When I hear tones they can be similar to the beautiful synth piano here:

http://ocr2.blueblue.fr/files/music/albums/ff6/1-03%20Joshua%20Morse%20-%20Remember%20(Awakening).mp3

Other times I hear stuff like this:

http://ocr2.blueblue.fr/files/music/albums/ff6/2-01%20bustatunez%20-%20Wild%20Child%20Ballad%20(Gau).mp3

I like this post as it makes some of my experiences with music as a narrative seem clearer. The 1st link with the piano is the type that has always affected me deeply in any genre of music that uses it this way, especially a piano or a saxophone which (in the vein of the 1st link & even more "deeper") evokes melancholy. Looking back i would always try to explain the music or the portion that was so strong as to feel that way but to no avail, others would just laugh & dismiss it as just an instrument doing what it does, or say that "you love your music don't you?" completely missing the point.
I'm sure i gave loads of fun for them when i would burst into song & emphasize certain points in tracks.(& non-vocal)
I'm sure my childhood would have been like yours (confused kid, personal issues) if i'd ever expressed myself but there were too many uncaring macho types around for that, but i had a great music teacher who everyone loved as he made learning fun for all & easy to understand. The higher-ups would eat into the schedule of the few teachers like this on the basis of their bull cr*p curriculum. Go figure. Your point about identifying & oblivious to the message is spot on too.

 

[monotonic]

Sometimes the music seems to be just for a calming effect, with no special symbolic relation to the narrative. For instance, when you have to let go of wishful thinking it is stressful because you have to open up to other possibilities that may be numerous or scary. The shock of this can send someone running back to their hole, activating all the self-defenses. But when you have knowledge you realize where you came from is no less scary save for a limited perception. With both options harboring tremendous resistance it is like time has frozen as the two impulses cancel out. You know that pain is in both directions and you must soon move on. To do this you must overcome the paralysis which requires letting go. But how do you let go when your hand is frozen? The only way is to relax deeply, and the mind draws from all its positive experiences to bring into focus the good in the moment, which balances out the bad and restores a degree of freedom of movement. For me this is when I hear tones or music in addition to having spontaneous thoughts about the joy of breaking free from the slavery and pain of ignorance. Being both the marble and the sculptor, this may be the moment of striking the chisel.

I believe the music is similar to the experience of pendulation described in In An Unspoken Voice. Music appears to cause a sensation of emotional passing. The sensation of movement invokes the knowledge of "this too shall pass" which breaks the identification with the lower, transient influences and provides a degree of insulation from the fear in the moment.

I think this pendulation can be understood like tape bias in recording or dithering. The pendulation induced by music will increase mental flexibility but may also obscure other things. For instance when intellectual thought needs to take the stage, music may modulate the emotions in ways orthagonal to, and obscuring the intellectual process. In this situation a person must turn the music off or increase mental distance (ignoring or emotional decoupling). I have been in situations where music was making math for instance difficult, and also where music made it easier to work.

I believe in casual listening music provides what you could describe as "sub-pendulation". That is, pendulation takes place but not in relation to trauma. For this reason it may not necessarily change the overall procession of thought, but it will increase the sensitivity and flexibility by virtue of a "tape bias" effect. The pendulation of music will allow subtle influences to more likely overcome mental reluctances. The point in this is that pendulation seems to be a much more common and universal process than I first thought when reading Levine's book. Tape bias seems to be a highly applicable analogy for sub-pendulation. Actually, I think pendulation could apply to each center individually, and sub-pendulation would be applying pendulation to a center different than that in the case of trauma. So maybe sub-pendulation is not a good name?

Another factor in this is how the pendulation is applied. It has to be in the right place and at the right intensity. Otherwise it becomes at best a distraction and at worst like rubbing a wound. At best it acts like tape bias. In other cases it acts like dithering and obscures part of the signal. At worst it makes the problem worse.

 

[monotonic]

I'm sure my childhood would have been like yours (confused kid, personal issues) if i'd ever expressed myself but there were too many uncaring macho types around for that

Are you sure? How else would you learn to not express yourself if not by trying and being abused for it? It sounds like you are describing yourself after that point, not before. I was describing myself before. We all learn to stop attracting attention somehow.

 

[H-KQGE]

I'm sure my childhood would have been like yours (confused kid, personal issues) if i'd ever expressed myself but there were too many uncaring macho types around for that

Are you sure? How else would you learn to not express yourself if not by trying and being abused for it? It sounds like you are describing yourself after that point, not before. I was describing myself before. We all learn to stop attracting attention somehow.

Hmm... perhaps i didn't make myself clear. As i understood it you couldn't express yourself in school because of whatever you found frightening unconsciously, so you came across as a "confused kid with personal issues."
For me there were far too many direct examples of "sensitive" kids getting bullied when expressing themselves in a non-macho way, every detail was picked apart. I did have occasions where i expressed myself & got abuse in school but those weren't music related at the point in time i had in mind. My previous post referred to outside of school from school leaving period until age 18 with some kids from there & others not. I wanted to stay on the topic of music specifically so i wouldn't start venting about school days since as i've said, it was at the end of that period & just after concerning communication with others not understanding the way i "saw" music.

Of course i learned to hush up after getting burned enough times when i realized that others were not like me.
Anyway, apologies for the misunderstanding especially if this post isn't clear/clearer.

 

[monotonic]

It wasn't fear that kept me from expressing myself mostly, but the inability to describe my experience. I wanted to and tried to express what was making me miserable, but while I felt it acutely I couldn't express it in language. I always thought that if I could get someone to understand and ACT on that understanding, that it would stop. So I was driven to try and express it but found no one would take me seriously. When you feel something you cannot describe, especially when you're a child, people seem to think you have an overactive imagination or think you're missing bolts.

In any case, the topic of this thread is still music, but there's nothing wrong with being clear.

 

[Buddy]

As a child, my unconscious understood a lot of scary things about what was happening to me in school. I could tell something was wrong about all of it, but to anyone else I was just a confused kid with personal issues. There were a few teachers who shared the grief and I knew they were able to feel the same, but not any better than me at expressing it. It was as if nothing was real unless it was a word, and the only words I knew were the words of the people who's purpose it was to coerce me in any way possible to do what they wanted me to do.

It seems as if we can "be" an awareness of whatever, yet without a useful mental analog or set of them, we can lack any way to form an unambiguous identification of what we know. It's the "unsaids" surrounding the "saids", the implicit around the explicit, the conceptual unknown surrounding the conceptually known, the nagual in which the tonal has its existence, so to speak. As one simple concrete example which doesn't have to be related to yours, for a long time as a child and a youth, I could see the dissonant patterns that make up a 'double-bind' and a few of its variations and I knew when the pattern set was repeating, but lacking knowledge of any such concept with any referent behaviors, all I could do is to choose to 'act out' or suffer in silence.

It sounds like "flattened dimensions" can also be just a perception.

Indeed, and a perception of perception. A bit more concretely, you can build and perceive a mental model of the houses on your block based on their relationship to that little pink block house on that corner next to the railroad and to your position as an observer. As long as the model is accurate, you'll know where you're at no matter what, and as long as you know at least one house number, you can calculate any other on the fly. But more relevant is the ability to step one level up from that model and build into your memory representation, deliberately or automatically, the relationship of this block to others, including ones across town and as they relate to other places you've visited and so on - including aesthetic qualities of design, apparent intention of city planners, etc.

I generally think that all such information is available to everyone all the time anyway, and you can sort of play 'games' with the proprioceptive sensate (the patterns are most likely being reinforced in the motor center via feedback loops to and from the cerebrum and cerebellum and everything in between). Ex: imagining being on a train and watching the block "pass by" and switching to a house and watching the train "pass by", then switching to a bird's eye view watching yourself do both alternately and simultaneously (like a superposition of two things that still remain distinct) and then using those perspectives as metaphor for adopting and removing various other perspectives in a way that feels functionally similar to when you put on and take off a coat.

The impressions feel like "feeling". One can come to identify with the feeling and be oblivious to the message, especially if you think it doesn't exist. A person so identified may project these feelings onto others and expect them to intuitively understand vague and confused sentences. This can happen, but mostly by accident or between specific people.

Yep as my own experience IRL and on this forum can most likely attest, I guess.

When I hear tones they can be similar to the beautiful synth piano here:

http://ocr2.blueblue.fr/files/music/albums/ff6/1-03%20Joshua%20Morse%20-%20Remember%20(Awakening).mp3

Other times I hear stuff like this:

http://ocr2.blueblue.fr/files/music/albums/ff6/2-01%20bustatunez%20-%20Wild%20Child%20Ballad%20(Gau).mp3

Nice. I can't even remotely claim that kind of clarity or length. I do hear occasional actual tones suggestive of an attempt to syncopate an existing rhythm of speech or internal narrative (like: "hurry it up, hurry it up, get to the point! I'm already ahead of you and know what you're going to say!") but internal narratives, as such, are more like multiple sound bites - bees buzzing around a beehive - suitable to a default attention span that's very brief by some people's standards.

Music as narrative, for me, is more like sensing a kind of deep, unclear rhythm at the periphery of awareness. I feel it as a strong impression, similar to what you mentioned about impressions. On occasion that I give it sustained attention, it only comes close enough to "suggest" parts of a real song that I might compose and try to bring into existence if I were so inclined.

In the past, I have been so inclined. That was the motivation for teaching myself to read music notation and practice most of the chords and a few melodies on a piano.

So far, what usually happens when I actually focus on the music I perceive is similar to what happens when I try to bring the memory of a dream into waking consciousness: as long as I am aware of the music and feeling it, I "just know" there'll be no problem "remembering" it in real time, but as soon as I try to "remember" it, or break it down into specific notes - to quantify it - it's like the analysis kills it, similar to the way Mark Twain described how the beauty of the Mississippi River disappeared for him once he learned to navigate it by boat.

Whatever, anyway there's a bit of frustration involved, as I mentioned elsewhere on the forum on the subject of dreams, I think.

These are just my thoughts as inspired by your post. I didn't really expect that we would share an identical experience, but I seem to be enjoying a feeling of some correspondence, even if I didn't word it exactly right to show it.

As concerning how this all relates to the Work observations you've made, including the references to 'pendulation, I'll have to save that for another post.

 

[H-KQGE]

Music as narrative, for me, is more like sensing a kind of deep, unclear rhythm at the periphery of awareness. I feel it as a strong impression, similar to what you mentioned about impressions. On occasion that I give it sustained attention, it only comes close enough to "suggest" parts of a real song that I might compose and try to bring into existence if I were so inclined.

In the past, I have been so inclined. That was the motivation for teaching myself to read music notation and practice most of the chords and a few melodies on a piano.

Buddy i'm posting this as a lot of what you're saying is quite similar to what i am trying to but failing as it seems. Focusing on a "deep unclear rhythm at the periphery of awareness" is in line with my feelings especially difficulties in trying to decipher those impressions. This is probably the main reason for my enrolment in a music production (leading into sound engineering course with a degree upon completion) course 13 years ago rather than the "i love music" thoughts i had. (because i stopped focusing on something so fleeting & intangible with a fundamental lack of reference points)

do hear occasional actual tones suggestive of an attempt to syncopate an existing rhythm of speech or internal narrative (like: "hurry it up, hurry it up, get to the point! I'm already ahead of you and know what you're going to say!")

Happens far too regularly for my liking - if i understand you correctly.

So far, what usually happens when I actually focus on the music I perceive is similar to what happens when I try to bring the memory of a dream into waking consciousness: as long as I am aware of the music and feeling it, I "just know" there'll be no problem "remembering" it in real time, but as soon as I try to "remember" it, or break it down into specific notes - to quantify it - it's like the analysis kills it, similar to the way Mark Twain described how the beauty of the Mississippi River disappeared for him once he learned to navigate it by boat.

Whatever, anyway there's a bit of frustration involved, as I mentioned elsewhere on the forum on the subject of dreams, I think.

These are just my thoughts as inspired by your post. I didn't really expect that we would share an identical experience, but I seem to be enjoying a feeling of some correspondence, even if I didn't word it exactly right to show it.

Exactly. I wanted to stay clear & specific to the topic of music without veering off onto other topics, yet what you say about dreams is the bigger part of the music as a narrative theme for me, but i didn't/couldn't express this well. (i was actually hoping someone would get the gist & elaborate within their own experiences)
I think my "problem" is a twofold one. One part is the music & not having anyone experiencing similar & the 2nd being the way visual impressions affect me. It's all a bit of a jumble at times for me, the daily experience of words, colours, numbers & textures, & what seems to be a major trigger, for things that at times i wonder about past life/future life, is my olfactory sense. Somehow (& i'm sure abuse & trauma in early youth plays significant roles) looking at say a building & the way the light hits a part of it transforming its dull features, crossed with the general surroundings of people milling around on a warm summer's day in what's considered a nice area, with a gentle breeze & the swaying of leaves, light traffic on the road birds chirping away... then a certain smell would send me into a daydream/mental reverie or something & i'll either have a vision of something similar to the one i'm witnessing, or just get overwhelmed with a rush of feelings that i can't fathom. This is normally what i describe to myself as melancholic as i'm usually quite sad in that moment, yet if i sort of "go with it" it can be quite pleasant. Which is weird, to me at least.

I began to have a moment with my aunt about 4 years ago after leaving a spiritual life expo thingy at Earle's court (London UK) & i had one of these moments (which is the example that i had in mind above) & tried explaining to her (since i long gave up doing this with people as none around me seemed to have experiences like this - or wanted to share) & she seemed to be getting it, but something distracted her (since found out she as a poor attention span as most of my family do) & she got "knocked out of the moment."

Maybe these should be broken up & posted in the dreams & memories thread or something i don't know.
Analysing it in the moment was never fruitful just as with my early musical (separate) experiences & granted, limited abuse from it, so i stopped trying to figure out the meanings as i'd get my head in a spin. Btw, sometimes i sink into a "daydream" where i see things (like an unclear dream) but if i ask questions of what to do with my life as in "where am i going wrong?" "how should i proceed?" then i usually get answers, but these are fleeting, yet my normal dreams are quite lucid.
Anyway, i appreciate this thread as it's given me more insight into my experiences & i'll be trying to integrate more of these in the hope of understanding them. I also didn't expect to share identical experiences but i'm pleased that there are others out there that can understand. :)

 

[monotonic]

Well, I guess this is an interesting development. Like I said before, I've been driven to try and understand this "under the surface" world of thought, initially because as a child the stream of impressions "told" me that it had a potential way out of my misery. I have always thought that if I were able to describe successfully it to others, in essence network about it, that I would be unlocking a part of myself. But it seems there is a lot of patience involved in getting to the point where it can be described even in a very crude way. Because the observation affects the measurement, the observation has to have a known relationship to the observed so that it can be compared to the result.

For me when I hear tones it is all about the melody and/or the harmony. The rhythm only matters in as much as the sequence of tones may be rhythmic.

Another thing that precludes tracking down these impressions is bad diet. Gradually improving my diet has decreased mental noise and increased working memory. If I had not gone ketogenic I may not have had the clarity to think about any of this. Before then it would have taken immense concentration to overcome the mental noise. As I said, these impressions don't just hang around. You cannot forget and then remember, like you would with other things. These impressions are gone once you forget. Mental noise makes the process slow and exhausting to an extreme, if not impossible.

Some things are extremely detrimental to the stream of impressions. For me, these are:

1: Dairy (aside from certain goat cheeses maybe), grains
2: Obsessive videogaming (I think non-obsessive videogaming is possible but not much fun or worth doing, and still not healthy)
3: Negative sexuality
4: Gases from a furnace that hasn't turned on for a while
5: Bad diet in general
6: Anything that reduces attention span
7: Anything that causes a feeling of pressure in the head

Each of these has a variable effect depending on amount. As the amount increases, the impressions disappear starting with the subtlest. They are replaced with negative emotions; that is to say if you try to feel an impression in this state, instead you will feel for instance obsession, anxiety, confusion, anger, blissful delirium, and so on. In the worst cases this will lead into a dissociative episode where you will will be ranting in your head for a minute or so, completely oblivious to everything else. This is really a horrible state to be in because positive emotions no longer seem to exist. If you act on what you feel you become a psychopath. In this situation I find the only solution is to think only practical thoughts, behave as you would behave normally, and to have patience. It goes away eventually. Time really, is the only cure. I think I have a few times caused this state to recede by somehow accessing strong positive emotions, but it is unlikely and I am not going to experiment with my mental health.

Empathy is one thing related to the impressions. When I'm watching someone, if I can relate to them at all, there will be a stream of impressions that, if I were doing/thinking/feeling what they were, would be the stream of impressions that I would have. This stream of impressions can be and has been blatantly wrong. It seems to be the result of placing myself in the shoes of the person I'm watching, and the stream simply is constructed in that context. The stream can be extremely detailed depending on how well I relate, but still wrong. Projection and all that stuff.

My experience has not been that only a few people have this experience. Rather, I think only some people become aware of it and/or pay attention to it. After all, these feelings or impressions are part of the scenery of the mind. You don't have to explicity observe them in order to use them. Just because a person never pauses to inspect the wallpaper does not mean they have never seen it. But on closer inspection the wallpaper may be more interesting than they anticipated. Still, no one thinks they have anything to gain from scrutinizing wallpaper. The C's have said that curiosity is a spiritual function.

Here is an example of the stream of impressions that I think most people will relate to. Say you have an idea. You feel this idea has great potential but you don't know how. So why is it just a feeling? Why isn't it obvious just WHAT is the potential you see? A person may get nowhere or get frustrated and give up. Someone more familiar with this process will, in some way they cannot describe, get further in sensing just what is so great about this idea. But it will appear to them as though they started at the feeling of potential and then are suddenly standing at the next thing; they won't remember anything in between. Someone who has the skill of "interrogation" however will sense multiple potentials at each juncture. With concentration, as long as he is able to feel the potentials he does not need to waste working memory on thoughts and a verbal narrative. By conserving working memory he will be able to see multiple potentials ahead, as one would in chess, and even a web of potentials. Good engineers for this reason are able to come up with optimal solutions in almost the blink of an eye. What separates a "genius" from the rest may simply be a highly developed ability of "interrogation". It could also be good genes/diet/phsychological hygiene. It could also simply be that a person has walked those steps so long they can be retraced blind (but why would you want to do that?).

 

[monotonic]

Exactly. I wanted to stay clear & specific to the topic of music without veering off onto other topics, yet what you say about dreams is the bigger part of the music as a narrative theme for me, but i didn't/couldn't express this well. (i was actually hoping someone would get the gist & elaborate within their own experiences)
I think my "problem" is a twofold one. One part is the music & not having anyone experiencing similar & the 2nd being the way visual impressions affect me. It's all a bit of a jumble at times for me, the daily experience of words, colours, numbers & textures, & what seems to be a major trigger, for things that at times i wonder about past life/future life, is my olfactory sense. Somehow (& i'm sure abuse & trauma in early youth plays significant roles) looking at say a building & the way the light hits a part of it transforming its dull features, crossed with the general surroundings of people milling around on a warm summer's day in what's considered a nice area, with a gentle breeze & the swaying of leaves, light traffic on the road birds chirping away... then a certain smell would send me into a daydream/mental reverie or something & i'll either have a vision of something similar to the one i'm witnessing, or just get overwhelmed with a rush of feelings that i can't fathom. This is normally what i describe to myself as melancholic as i'm usually quite sad in that moment, yet if i sort of "go with it" it can be quite pleasant. Which is weird, to me at least.

I began to have a moment with my aunt about 4 years ago after leaving a spiritual life expo thingy at Earle's court (London UK) & i had one of these moments (which is the example that i had in mind above) & tried explaining to her (since i long gave up doing this with people as none around me seemed to have experiences like this - or wanted to share) & she seemed to be getting it, but something distracted her (since found out she as a poor attention span as most of my family do) & she got "knocked out of the moment."

This seems to reflect my experience exactly. Very recently, while reading, which for me is a meditation, I've had this experience. I found if I just sat in silence and felt the emotions, rolling them between my fingers so to say without any other thoughts or impressions, a memory of my childhood would burst into my vision and after I came back to myself the feeling would have somewhat dissipated. The way I responded to this was strongly influenced by In an Unspoken Voice by Peter Levine.

Analysing it in the moment was never fruitful just as with my early musical (separate) experiences & granted, limited abuse from it, so i stopped trying to figure out the meanings as i'd get my head in a spin. Btw, sometimes i sink into a "daydream" where i see things (like an unclear dream) but if i ask questions of what to do with my life as in "where am i going wrong?" "how should i proceed?" then i usually get answers, but these are fleeting, yet my normal dreams are quite lucid.
Anyway, i appreciate this thread as it's given me more insight into my experiences & i'll be trying to integrate more of these in the hope of understanding them. I also didn't expect to share identical experiences but i'm pleased that there are others out there that can understand. :)

As I posted above, you may look into diet if you have not already.

I've found that at the moments of shocks, in the 4th way sense, that my being able to feel these impressions would greatly increase. Emotional clarity became great. The longer you can go at these points without lying to yourself and falling back asleep, the more internal clarity will be preserved from these moments. It seems that the usage of shocks increases this clarity. Anything that puts you to sleep reduces clarity.

As far as asking direct questions in the blank space of the mind, it could be interrogation, in the sense of putting your subconscious in the position of being asked the question and watching its response. This would seem like a textbook example. In your case there is evidently a very complex thought process going on under your nose, that you may be able to become aware of.

 

[Buddy]

Here is an example of the stream of impressions that I think most people will relate to. Say you have an idea. You feel this idea has great potential but you don't know how. So why is it just a feeling? Why isn't it obvious just WHAT is the potential you see? A person may get nowhere or get frustrated and give up.

monotonic, what you've been describing seems much clearer today, especially with your recent additions to the thread, like Reply # 11, and the fact that, for a change, I'm rereading your posts without being exhausted from work. Seems like I'm always too tired to be participating on the forum during the exact times that I do.

If the stream of impressions you're talking about is like what I feel flows like substrate to my ordinary daily awareness, then, for me, it's something I just listen to when I already have a question or problem that needs an answer, but I've not thought to actually interrogate related impressions. I don't know that I would or could avoid shaping an answer according to some assumption, belief or expectation that I'm unaware of having ATM. Also, I think of this stream as information that I can in no way possess or call my own even when I use the language with the usual syntax and personal pronouns.

For me, it's certainly more a felt phenomena and I also tend to think of it with a self-organizing principle that I believe exists. And the 'organizing self' is not a 'self' that is related to any conception of "me", necessarily. For all I know, if this stream has an owner, it may be GAIA's dream or Nature's biosphere, or perhaps a morphic field or else a set of such fields or information traveling on photon streams from across the galaxy, or quantum foam or whatever. IOW, it may just be a field of self-aware data forming and un-forming gestalts, entangling or mixing with local environmental data in my nervous system - a sort of quantum entanglement, I suppose.

I do 'get' fragments of an unfamiliar melody on occasion when some stimuli is especially pleasing or intense for me but it seems to be just barely on my side of the hypothesized liminal threshold. And I can only focus on it obliquely when present, else it dissipates. I don't recall any fragments having recurred, either. Maybe, as you say, once gone, no return. I sometimes wonder if I have been attracted to a certain song just because something about it resonates with me at a level where an original and similar experience with this fragment occurred though I may no longer remember it? I don't know.

Actually I look forward to a day when I might more directly and intimately connect to this current, but I have only an idea of this potential. And I only have that from looking into subjects with the word "quantum" in the name, like quantum biology, and the quantum brain. If you haven't already, you might like to explore quantum philosophy, theory, mechanics, biology and brain to some extent. You might even feel right at home, since you apparently already know of "co-observing and co-affecting" (observation affects the measurement).

Maybe if I keep reading and living life, keep discovering pieces to the puzzle and flipping and rearranging existing pieces, something more tangible will click into place.


BTW, when you feel it might be appropriate and if it's not too much of an aside and won't take you disagreeably off your point, could you talk a little more about your process of interrogating impressions and what kind of emotional shocks, in the fourth way sense, you're referring to?

 

[monotonic]

If the stream of impressions you're talking about is like what I feel flows like substrate to my ordinary daily awareness, then, for me, it's something I just listen to when I already have a question or problem that needs an answer, but I've not thought to actually interrogate related impressions. I don't know that I would or could avoid shaping an answer according to some assumption, belief or expectation that I'm unaware of having ATM. Also, I think of this stream as information that I can in no way possess or call my own even when I use the language with the usual syntax and personal pronouns.

Observation and memory is key here. You don't expect to guide the stream as it's running. Instead you think what you are thinking, and when something stands out, you remember what you did and what you felt during that thought (attention span seems to be the one prerequisite that comes before all else). It's a whodunit; the deed has already been dun. If you get confused and distracted, it is either a reluctance to be truthful to yourself (either generally or with the specific questions being asked), or it is a lifestyle problem, possibly one of the things I mentioned. I think most people have the experience with butting up against this wall, and they identify this sensation as their own "dumbness". With persistence, you can penetrate this barrier even if by chance and creativity. However, if you don't understand what is going on, it is more likely you'll give up before making progress. Therefore it is helpful to understand that this mental resistance is not dumbness, but just resistance or reluctance and that something useful may be waiting at the other side, though getting there is like walking a tightrope blindfolded with varying degrees of ADD. As this is repeated, it becomes second nature however to pay the fare (effort) to pass, if you have that much or are willing to spend it (which amounts to a realistic appraisal of effort).

Possession is another one of those things that corrupts the impressions. Possession as a feeling wipes all the dishes off the table, as it anticipates one acceptable result and has no curiosity or patience for subtle details and discovery. It doesn't belong at tea parties. In the process of interrogating, the feeling of possession must be counteracted by seeing one's self-importance and the reality of that feeling like an observer would. This robs negative feelings of their corrupting influence and allows them to pass in one door and out the other without interrupting proceedings. However without knowing enough to see the truth about possession, it may be allowed to manipulate the proceedings.

When the feeling of possession or any other negative feeling comes up however, we must be able to identify it. Otherwise it will not seem remarkable. It is common to see possession in language or behavior but if the feeling comes up in the mind without corresponding language, and it is too late once it becomes behavior, then we need to be able to identify it by the way it feels. A person who does not study these feelings will be driven by them without ever knowing the cause of their behavior.

Our knowledge about these emotions comes from external sources most of the time, and the way we interpret these sources varies. If we relate deeply to some material, then the material will evoke in us the impressions the writer wanted us to feel; this literally represents knowledge the writer used to write, not merely "feelings". The deep sensation of feeling when reading a good book reflects a coherence to the impression stream; that is the impression stream behaves as though the reader were experiencing what is read. Good writers are able to sculpt the stream to produce deep, unique feelings, drawing on knowledge of their audience (which may come consciously or subconsciously from empathy or study). If we are open to new experiences, we will "adopt" these impressions, and begin to experience life through them; the impressions will enrichen our experience and add to the freedom of our thought as potential thought paths. When I am reading, I try to adjust the visualization of what I'm reading to give the richest impression stream. The subconscious responds to the visualization to produce impressions (you are interrogating the subconscious where the visualization is the question asked). When visualization fails, the text seems dry and impenetrable; the visualization is how we relate to a book. Visualization doesn't mean just images; it is an internal construction of an experience of the book through whatever senses that may occur. The visualization helps to unify the aspects of what is being read. The more cohesive and engaging the visualization, the better the information is learned. The point is, you may read a lot of books about emotion and virtue but may never be able to identify in yourself the emotions in question if you don't construct a mental sandbox and "play" with your subconscious.

These impressions:

1: Describe relationships as though they are equations.
2: Amass associations of every kind as though they are sticky balls rolling wherever they are used.
3: May be combined and separated; combining them is joyous but separating them is painful and difficult, especially when ingrained. (making connections versus eliminating assumptions)
4: Make thought more efficient. They allow thought to occur faster than language. Of course. Something would have to, wouldn't it?
5: Act in sequence; the result of the preceding impression passes to the next. I see them like a cascade of levers.

I have described impressions before as thoughts before they are thought. Sometimes I will have an impression that I can't describe, but as time goes on I will keep accessing it because it is like a burning question except it is not a question yet, consciously anyways. Eventually, as it acquires associations and connections, it will snowball into a theory or idea that I can finally describe in language. Impressions like this can last for years before being completed. I can easily imagine a physicist who is driven by this "intuition" to learn; there is joy each time the impression gains definition by some new knowledge, and eventually the physicist has endured years of seemingly pointless studies to finally bring the impression into full consciousness, and to present his theory to the world.

Once an impression is fully illuminated, it becomes obvious where it connects to other topics so it readily jumps into place and helps complete a bigger picture. At this point it becomes clear there are misconceptions still attached to it. The impression is refined, pruned, and distilled to its essence. Once illuminated, it is obvious if the extra bits need to be trashed or if they do in fact have somewhere else they belong.

For me, it's certainly more a felt phenomena and I also tend to think of it with a self-organizing principle that I believe exists. And the 'organizing self' is not a 'self' that is related to any conception of "me", necessarily. For all I know, if this stream has an owner, it may be GAIA's dream or Nature's biosphere, or perhaps a morphic field or else a set of such fields or information traveling on photon streams from across the galaxy, or quantum foam or whatever. IOW, it may just be a field of self-aware data forming and un-forming gestalts, entangling or mixing with local environmental data in my nervous system - a sort of quantum entanglement, I suppose.

Every attempt to bring in psychic phenomenon to describe my experience has been at most self-flattering and at least, failed or proved unnecessary. There are times where I think I may have accessed psychic phenomenon through this, but to me the impressions are only a way of thinking that is part of the machine. Certain uses of the machine are bound to result in psychic outcomes, but that is not something unique to this impression stream as far as I can tell. It may FEEL like intuition, or that you know something you don't, but I've almost always found once interrogated, that I subconsciously made the conclusion based on known or subconscious knowledge, and that I wouldn't have needed to be psychic. People reading this may think that I am describing some mysterious spiritual process but really I think this is just a description of a person's inner emotional life.

I do 'get' fragments of an unfamiliar melody on occasion when some stimuli is especially pleasing or intense for me but it seems to be just barely on my side of the hypothesized liminal threshold. And I can only focus on it obliquely when present, else it dissipates. I don't recall any fragments having recurred, either. Maybe, as you say, once gone, no return. I sometimes wonder if I have been attracted to a certain song just because something about it resonates with me at a level where an original and similar experience with this fragment occurred though I may no longer remember it? I don't know.

I think what I wrote above describes this "resonance". Ordinarily, we are not able to construct a coherent impression stream. If we osmose the impression stream from an external source however, a sense of internal clarity is achieved. This internal harmony is felt as joy, but the internal structure is not advanced enough to welcome the new structure in a lasting way, so entropy generally returns. Still, the experience of internal clarity alone can be enough to shift a person towards gaining some of it permanently. New thoughts while the clarity is present will be felt more clearly and better ways of thinking found.

I realized that I wasn't really sure why a shock increases clarity or what kind of shock does. I will have to think about this more. It seems to have more to do with putting someone outside of their comfort zone where mundane thoughts don't chatter. Once one has seen the subtler impressions clearly, it is easier to pick them out through the chatter, and they tend to expose the chatter as meaningless. When the source of chatter is eliminated, you become calmer (less pressure in the head) and attention span increases. Attention span definitely seems to be at the center of all this.

I'm sorry if this isn't totally clear. There is just so much to write and I've never written any of this before. What you see is basically the first and most complete translation. My attention span is not large enough to contain this whole concept so it may not flow. If I didn't have specific questions I were responding to, I wouldn't know where to start.