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Try just staring at yourself in the mirror for 10-20 minutes. It is a very strange, disorienting experience, almost like a dissociative drug.
by wz1000 10y ago
Try just staring at yourself in the mirror for 10-20 minutes. It is a very strange, disorienting experience, almost like a dissociative drug.
- david-given 10y agoHere is a thing which, once I've told you, you'll never stop noticing: Your reflection is always staring you fixedly in the eye.
- eternauta3k 10y agoNo, use your peripheral vision.
- Semiapies 10y agoIt's even worse! That bastard is intent on whatever you're paying attention to!
- lobster_johnson 10y agoI remember realizing, as a kid, that if you could see someone's eyes, then -- like if you're trying to hide -- they could also see yours. Mind blown, at the time.
- chei0iaV 10y agoNot if you use multiple mirrors
- Cyphase 10y agoOh good, it's not just me :D. I don't think I've done it for 10-20 minutes; it doesn't take that long for me to get the effect if I'm trying (and sometimes it'll happen on its own when I just happen to be looking at myself in the mirror), though maybe there's a higher-level effect I'm missing out on because I'm not doing it that long. Perhaps because of doing that occasionally, I can sort of create a similar kind of mild dissociative effect even without the mirror, just by visualizing myself or looking at my body, that sort of thing. Basically, to generalize it, your trying to see/consider your body as if it wasn't yours, not just at an intellectual level but at a more instinctual level. The mirror definitely helps though. To anyone who wants to try it: try looking yourself in the eyes and tell yourself (and try to believe) that that isn't you. Don't just stand still the whole time; move around a bit, tilt your head, etc. Try to open your mind to it. It's an interesting feeling. :)
- to3m 10y agoI'm short-sighted, and I've long noticed this when standing somewhat far away from a mirror. If I'm close enough that I can easily see my reflection, but not so close that I can see that it's definitely me, I get the illusion that I'm looking at somebody else, and then I see myself as the older person that others see rather than the younger man that I'm practised at seeing ;) Aging doesn't seem to be linear, so I have to say this was more alarming when I was 30 (expecting to see a 24 year old) than it is now I'm 39 (expecting to see a 33 year old). But ask me again when I'm 50.
- Kiro 10y ago> try looking yourself in the eyes and tell yourself (and try to believe) that that isn't you I do something similar but the opposite: I keep telling myself that the reflection IS me. After a while I end up in a loop that goes like "I need to snap out of it and get back to reality" -> "I can't because this is reality" -> "no way, this can't be real?" -> repeat. It's both scary and amazing. The only way to get out of the loop is to look away and stop thinking about it, which itself is a dissociative feeling because you feel like you escape the truth.
- mirimir 10y agoOld LSD prank: hand tripper a mirror ;)
- adzm 10y agoThis is true especially between two people as well.
- mirimir 10y agoRight, just being with.
- grimoald 10y agoI read about a similar effect in one of Richard Wiseman's books: Look into a big mirror with no light in the room except for a small lamp behind yourself. After one minute, your face should look bizarrely distorted. (I never tried it, BTW).