Void Attack
May. 31st, 2009 09:56 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
qosLast night I had the first "Void attack" that I've suffered in a very long time.
I had been communing with LM and thinking about the future with him -- a very long future as spirits -- and suddenly my brain tripped over into trying to grasp exactly what "forever" meant.
To be without ending is incomprehensible, and last night it was utterly terrifying. However contemplating an ultimate end -- not just of us, but of the universe itself -- was equally incomprehensible and terrifying.
During the height of my existential crisis (more than twenty years ago), thoughts like these would keep me awake every night for hours. The pain and fear were so great that I literally wished I had never been born, so I would not have to face either of these eventualities. To have the existential angst return so unexpectedly and with such power was shocking. Despite the fact that I do have a vital, living faith right now, I had no defense against the terror that these extremes elicited in me.
Finally I managed to latch on to my belief that the human psyche is simply not equipped to comprehend such vastness, and that I have absolutely no way to understand the possibilities and potentials of existence on that scale. It was useless to try to think my way out of my fear. Better to just release it as a side-effect of the limits of my own mind, rather than give it more energy as I worried about something I can neither understand nor change.
When I broke out of the terror, my brain felt different. The closest thing I can compare it to is the equivalent of an adrenaline rush elsewhere. It felt like something had shifted in a more than abstract way.
I really, really do not want to have to go back into that mindspace any time soon.
Or ever again, to be ruthlessly honest.
I had been communing with LM and thinking about the future with him -- a very long future as spirits -- and suddenly my brain tripped over into trying to grasp exactly what "forever" meant.
To be without ending is incomprehensible, and last night it was utterly terrifying. However contemplating an ultimate end -- not just of us, but of the universe itself -- was equally incomprehensible and terrifying.
During the height of my existential crisis (more than twenty years ago), thoughts like these would keep me awake every night for hours. The pain and fear were so great that I literally wished I had never been born, so I would not have to face either of these eventualities. To have the existential angst return so unexpectedly and with such power was shocking. Despite the fact that I do have a vital, living faith right now, I had no defense against the terror that these extremes elicited in me.
Finally I managed to latch on to my belief that the human psyche is simply not equipped to comprehend such vastness, and that I have absolutely no way to understand the possibilities and potentials of existence on that scale. It was useless to try to think my way out of my fear. Better to just release it as a side-effect of the limits of my own mind, rather than give it more energy as I worried about something I can neither understand nor change.
When I broke out of the terror, my brain felt different. The closest thing I can compare it to is the equivalent of an adrenaline rush elsewhere. It felt like something had shifted in a more than abstract way.
I really, really do not want to have to go back into that mindspace any time soon.
Or ever again, to be ruthlessly honest.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2009-06-01 05:28 pm (UTC)I am trying to work towards a greater foundation of faith and understanding in God, for a number of reasons. For one, I hope it will give my mind peace. I need to be able to come before God and advocate for my union with Betty, nevermind my own soul. And, simply, I need to do it, it's the largest empty space in my spiritual being.
While my fears are fundamentally mortal (dying is NOT something I have an easy time with mentally), I understand where you were coming from, too. I remember one dream I had a few years back... I was lying prone on my bedroom floor or something like that, and Betty was lying on top of me... I could feel her energy more than anything. And the thought went through my mind of spending forever with Her, like this. And I felt happiness and contentment... I think I realized that, if I could be assured of having some sort of consciousness, and if I could spend it with Her, for eternity, then I would be happy. Thoughts of the Void can sometimes invade my thoughts in dream, but less so.