That weird sensation that only lasts a few minutes

brisklynx51 said:😲
I get the same "thing" happening—no warning at all. It usually hits right when I'm drifting off. It feels like these little bubbles or spheres just growing inside my head. As soon as I snap my eyes open, it stops. And yeah, it can happen again 🤷. I eventually pass out... it doesn't really freak me out, but I guess I'm curious about the how and why 🙂

As far as the sleep stuff goes... sometimes when I finally hit the mattress, I get this sensation like I'm sliding through some kind of smooth tunnel at breakneck speed, and then suddenly—BAM—everything just grinds to a halt. It scares the hell out of me every single time, jerking me wide awake and leaving me drenched in a cold sweat🤷

wiredmaker18 said:It’s not hallucinations. It’s more like this sensation... thoughts constantly clashing over something massive yet somehow tiny at the same time. Like this quiet voice that manages to be piercingly loud, almost screaming at me, wrapped up in this underlying fear. Then there's the feeling of sliding through something perfectly smooth and level, only to slam straight into chaos—a nightmare of jagged edges and sharp points—and I'm moving through it all at high speed.

This exact thing has been happening to me since I was a kid. It only hits occasionally, so I never really gave it much thought, but reading this definitely caught me off guard.
Usually, when it happens, I first see something incredibly pure, white, and completely smooth. Then comes the dark stuff—crinkled, rough, and sharp. After that, it's images of things that are impossibly huge followed by things that are microscopically small, or a mix of both. Like seeing something massive and heavy standing right on top of something tiny and distant. That whiteness and purity before the rough, crumpled part sometimes gets even thinner, paler, and finer, just before hitting that jagged mess. And there's never an emotion attached to it, like sadness or joy. Just a sensation...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bk7CxHCasts

Something like that, just kidding... but seriously, check it out, it's pretty wild.

I’m glad you started this thread. You described that bizarre sensation so perfectly—it’s something most of us seem to run into, myself included—but I could never quite find the right words for it, or maybe I just didn't dare to say it out loud. I haven't been able to wrap my head around what it actually is until now. Here it is:
"There's this quiet voice that manages to be piercingly loud at the same time, almost like it's screaming at me, wrapped in this underlying fear. Then comes the sensation of sliding through something perfectly smooth and level, only to suddenly plunge into pure chaos—a nightmare of jagged edges and sharp points—and I'm tearing through it all at high speed. "
I don't know if you'll agree with me, but I suspect this feeling is actually a repressed memory of childbirth. It likely applies to those born naturally. Think about it. I personally never experienced that specific sensation because I was born via C-section, so there were no voices or smooth channels for me...

"Suddenly, my perception of everything around me shifts. Objects feel more massive, yet I get this impression they are smaller and within arm's reach. For instance, I'll be lying in bed and feel like I can just reach out and grab the doorknob.
The stuff happening inside my head is even weirder. They aren't hallucinations, just a sensation—thoughts constantly clashing between something massive and something tiny. It isn't a physical feeling; it's just an intense presence in my consciousness. "

Regarding that part, I experience the exact same thing. The most overwhelming sensation is this total lack of proportion—the tiny versus the gargantuan. I don't even know how to explain it—like trying to shove a massive, round boulder through a one-inch gap under a door, or seeing endless huge black planes flying low right over my head... and all of it is fueled by this deep anxiety and latent panic...
Please, does anyone have any insight into what this could be? I'm leaning toward it being tied to early childhood trauma or the shock of growing up, but...???????

Look, I wasn't exactly born through the usual channels. I don't get this sense of moving through some kind of tunnel, just these jarring, opposing extremes. One second it’s something perfectly smooth and sterile, pure white, then suddenly it’s heavy, jagged, and rough. Something tiny holding up something massive. It all just plays out like a series of flashes passing right in front of my eyes...

This is a genuinely fascinating topic..

I think it would be incredibly useful if someone here—perhaps someone who has actually sat down with a psychologist or psychiatrist for one reason or another (or maybe specifically because of this)—could describe the phenomenon to a professional. It would be great to hear what the clinical side of things has to say about it.
Speaking purely from a layman's perspective, I don't necessarily view this as something "abnormal," but it’s certainly intriguing given how many people seem to experience it.
The theory proposed by Charles Smith8 isn't something we can just dismiss, either. Who knows what kind of remnants might still be lingering in our subconscious from those early stages of life when we hadn't yet developed a sense of self or an awareness of our own existence..🤷

wiredmaker18 said:It’s not hallucinations. It’s more like this sensation... thoughts constantly clashing over something massive yet somehow tiny at the same time. Like this quiet voice that manages to be piercingly loud, almost screaming at me, wrapped up in this underlying fear. Then there's the feeling of sliding through something perfectly smooth and level, only to slam straight into chaos—a nightmare of jagged edges and sharp points—and I'm moving through it all at high speed.

This exact thing has been happening to me since I was a kid. It only hits occasionally, so I never really gave it much thought, but reading this definitely caught me off guard.
Usually, when it happens, I first see something incredibly pure, white, and completely smooth. Then comes the dark stuff—crinkled, rough, and sharp. After that, it's images of things that are impossibly huge followed by things that are microscopically small, or a mix of both. Like seeing something massive and heavy standing right on top of something tiny and distant. That whiteness and purity before the rough, crumpled part sometimes gets even thinner, paler, and finer, just before hitting that jagged mess. And there's never an emotion attached to it, like sadness or joy. Just a sensation...

I used to experience that as a little girl too, mostly whenever I had a fever.

Huge, then tiny—but really huge, then just miniscule.
Crumpled and smooth, and then it would pulse. But there was this bubble
then I'd pass through it.

Just some sort of abstract sensation.

It never scared me, but it was strange.

But if you're hearing voices... I don't know...😕 you should probably discuss that with a psychiatrist.

crimsonwalker80 said:I am going to attempt to articulate this with as much precision as possible, though, quite frankly, even I struggle to pin down a definition for this sensation.

I’m twenty-two years old, and looking back, I can recall these episodes occurring since I was just a child. It always follows the exact same trajectory; I recognize the onset instantly, knowing full well that I am about to embark on this experience again within the next few minutes. It typically strikes when I am exhausted—perhaps during a mid-afternoon nap or just as I’m drifting off to sleep. Suddenly, my perception of the objects surrounding me undergoes a radical shift. Objects seem to gain this immense mass, yet simultaneously, I harbor this bizarre impression that they have shrunk in scale and are hovering right within arm's reach; for instance, if I’m lying in bed, I get this overwhelming sense that I could simply reach out and grab the doorknob across the room.

Inside my mind, things become even more surreal. These aren't hallucinations in the traditional sense, but rather an intense internal sensation—a constant, paradoxical tug-of-war between thoughts of something being gargantuan and something being microscopic. There is this quiet voice that manages to be piercingly loud at the same time, almost as if it’s shouting at me, all underscored by a mounting sense of dread. Then, I experience this sensation of hurtling through something perfectly smooth and level, only to plunge headlong into a chaotic nightmare of jagged edges and sharp protrusions, moving through it all at breakneck speed. None of this manifests physically; it is purely a phenomenon existing within my consciousness. The moment I attempt to focus on one specific sensation, it slips from my grasp, only to reappear in some other part of my periphery that I wasn't attending to. I am perpetually submerged in this medium, unable to truly grasp its nature. It feels as though I am constantly on the precipice of understanding exactly what is happening, but the truth always eludes me by a hair's breadth.

The entire episode lasts about five minutes before vanishing entirely without any lingering physical aftereffects. What infuriates me most is this absolute inability to comprehend the mechanics of it. Once the event concludes, the memory begins to fade immediately, making it incredibly difficult to describe the sheer intensity of those few minutes. It is as if my brain switched into an entirely different operating mode. This doesn't happen often—maybe just a couple of times a year.

In the past, I kept this to myself because the sheer strangeness of it was frightening, but I was stunned last year when, during a conversation with my college roommate, I realized he experiences the exact same thing. He tried to explain his version, but he too found himself stumbling for the right words. However, we are both certain that we are navigating the same type of "disorder"—this strange duality of something being tiny, quiet, and yet massive and deafening, combined with that feeling of passing through a specific medium. He described it somewhat like traveling through a tube that isn't hollow, but is instead completely solid.

I would be immensely grateful if anyone else who experiences such phenomena would share their accounts. Does anyone know what this might be? Is it a recognized condition? Is there any literature or research on this topic? Most importantly, is this something serious, and should I be seeking out a psychiatrist to discuss it?

This has been happening to me since childhood as well.
Thanks for sharing this here. I honestly thought I had finally lost it and wasn't normal. I'm not claiming to be perfectly sane, but it is somewhat comforting to see that there are others like this.
For me, it started with dreams where everything I did seemed to happen in an incredibly small window of time. I could count the seconds precisely—1, 2, 3—but everything felt so much faster. When I performed two actions, it felt as if there was no interval between them, as if no waiting occurred at all. I figured I'd fight fire with fire, so when it happens again, I try to intentionally do strange things and speed them up, but that usually just makes the situation worse.
You used the EXACT right words. I could never figure out how to explain it to anyone. Now, at least, I can. Thank you.

Charles Smith8 might be onto something there. Who knows what’s buried in our subconscious from back before we even realized we existed...

I remember certain things I was dead sure I hadn't experienced in this lifetime, only to realize years later that I actually had. It was just that my current feelings, doubts, and desires had layered over them so much that they felt like distant echoes from some ancient past.
It’s the same deal with dreams. I remember once, when I wasn't exactly a kid anymore, watching a horror movie right before bed just as an experiment. I never really had issues with it back then—nothing more than your average kid—but recently I decided to intentionally watch the Texas massacre, the old 1974 version. I tried to analyze what specifically makes that movie terrifying without letting it force its way into my head so I couldn't sleep. Turns out, I still couldn't sleep. But the fear wasn't about someone actually breaking into my room with a chainsaw; it was more of a creeping dread from the sheer wrongness—and I hate using that word because "wrong" is so subjective—that permeates the film. It’s the atmosphere, not a bloodbath. Anyway, not to drag this out, but I've come to the conclusion that if dreams have any meaning at all, I don't recognize it as such. To me, it looks like just a way for the brain to process impressions gathered during the day. The brain just sorts them into designated slots, clearing out the excess. Something like that. So why didn't I dream of anything else equally unsettling after a movie that hits that hard? Simply because that impression stayed fresh and unprocessed in my brain.
One other thing feels weird. This sounds ridiculous, but I used to be able to feel it, though I haven't in a long time. The easiest way to describe the sensation would be this: imagine your lips are covered in tiny ridges, making them feel rough, like a piece of corrugated plastic tubing. With that sensation on your lips, a second feeling kicks in, as if your lips are rapidly sliding left and right, or back and forth, sliding over one another. Sounds silly, I know, but it happened to me more than a few times.

What's going on here, people? Another thread died? Figures. Nothing good ever lasts long enough... I was actually looking forward to reading more about those folks who are stuck in limbo—knowing they aren't what they claim to be, wishing they could be something else, but just being unable to make the jump. What an absolute mess of words. Honestly, the devil is in the details. All these weird vibes you guys are putting out are starting to rub off on me. Oops.

wiredmaker18 said:What's going on here, people? Another thread died? Figures. Nothing good ever lasts long enough... I was actually looking forward to reading more about those folks who are stuck in limbo—knowing they aren't what they claim to be, wishing they could be something else, but just being unable to make the jump. What an absolute mess of words. Honestly, the devil is in the details. All these weird vibes you guys are putting out are starting to rub off on me. Oops.

Have you ever read Castaneda?

Just a little something, though it was quite a while ago. I’m planning on diving back into his work this summer. I’ve read plenty over the years—stuff from Sai baba, Meher baba, Babajia, and the like—but it’s been ages since I really sat down with it. There’s some interesting thought there, even if I prefer keeping my distance so I don't end up following anyone blindly like a mindless drone...

Honestly, you guys really need to get off those drugs😁

What drugs? Someone bring up drugs? Where?🙂

I’ve been dealing with this since I was a little kid—objects just seem to swell up and get huge, then shrink back down again. It happens pretty often when I lie down in bed and close my eyes... I never really worried about it much, honestly, I didn't think much of it. The only other time I ever heard of anyone experiencing something like this—besides reading through your posts here—was when my sister took a tumble while skiing and ended up with a mild concussion. She told me, "Oh man, it was terrifying; for a second, I actually felt like everything around me was growing and shrinking, it was awful!" I tried telling her, "Girl, stop exaggerating, it's not that big of a deal, I've dealt with this my whole life," but of course, she didn't believe me. She basically thought I was just trying to steal the spotlight because she was the one who actually hit her head 🙄
anyway... it felt a little weird to realize it's a thing. It makes sense that it would happen after a concussion, so you start wondering why it keeps happening to me all the time. But hey, at least now I know I'm not alone...

hmmm... I never really had anything quite like that happen to me, but I guess when I was just a little kid, sometimes whenever I’d close my eyes, this image would just pop up... it gave me this really strange feeling, but not a bad one, more like... I don't know, maybe a room or some kind of space filled with these perfectly smooth, rounded squares or clips or something like that... everything just felt so soft and had these seamless colors and shapes... and then, out of nowhere, the whole image would just sort of crumble away and everything would turn rough and totally ordinary... though I haven't actually gone through any specific experiences lately 😢

I’ve been trying to make sense of all this...
all of it...
it’s just that everything feels larger... yet smaller at the same time...
it’s not that one thing is big while another is small, or that they change shape...
it is simply that they are both large and small simultaneously
I can't quite put my finger on it... I once had this dream about a shipping container that was impossibly tiny, falling from the ceiling right toward me, and everything felt so... jittery... like when a computer glitches out (it was only about 1x1 cm) and then I woke up... I don't know why, but it hit me so hard that I wasn't really myself for two whole days...

wiredmaker18 said:Just a little something, though it was quite a while ago. I’m planning on diving back into his work this summer. I’ve read plenty over the years—stuff from Sai baba, Meher baba, Babajia, and the like—but it’s been ages since I really sat down with it. There’s some interesting thought there, even if I prefer keeping my distance so I don't end up following anyone blindly like a mindless drone...

I read him a long time ago, but what you're saying really reminds me of his journeys into other realities.

Beyond that, it brings to mind those hypnagogic states—you know, when you're drifting off to sleep or waking up from a nonsensical dream where you're lucid, and suddenly thoughts, visions, and sensations become weirdly, even bizarrely, intertwined.

Plus, I'm honestly not even sure what "reality" is anymore. Are we just conditioned to see things the way we do because society and our upbringing—with their careful selection of impressions—have dictated what we should look at, how we should look at it, and how we should experience everything?

I was reading recently about how at birth, a child has the highest number of neural connections in their entire life. As we grow through conditioning and upbringing, most of those connections snap, leaving only the ones that get heavily reinforced through repetition and training. Think about that—it means we start with infinite potential, only to spend our whole lives narrowing it down. We aren't just limiting our opportunities; we're shrinking our very perception of reality. In a sense, we're just regressing as we age.

Be careful with the castaneda stuff. Take small doses, go slow... don't end up blowing a fuse or something. 😉

wiredmaker18 said:Just a little something, though it was quite a while ago. I’m planning on diving back into his work this summer. I’ve read plenty over the years—stuff from Sai baba, Meher baba, Babajia, and the like—but it’s been ages since I really sat down with it. There’s some interesting thought there, even if I prefer keeping my distance so I don't end up following anyone blindly like a mindless drone...

seriously, why does everyone have "Bab" in their name?🤷

🤣

Alex Wood3 said:I’ve been trying to make sense of all this...
all of it...
it’s just that everything feels larger... yet smaller at the same time...
it’s not that one thing is big while another is small, or that they change shape...
it is simply that they are both large and small simultaneously
I can't quite put my finger on it... I once had this dream about a shipping container that was impossibly tiny, falling from the ceiling right toward me, and everything felt so... jittery... like when a computer glitches out (it was only about 1x1 cm) and then I woke up... I don't know why, but it hit me so hard that I wasn't really myself for two whole days...

Can someone take a look at my clip and tell me if the vibe is similar?

Here’s the link again:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bk7CxHCasts

Thanks, I'm actually pretty curious about what you guys think.

Look, I’m definitely no medical expert or anything—just speaking from my own little corner of experience here—but even with those slight variations (like how some folks don't deal with actual hallucinations), it feels like all these cases are pointing toward some version of sleep paralysis, or maybe hypnagogia/hypnopompic states. I'm pretty sure we've touched on these sleep disorders before around here—honestly, since about 70% of people end up experiencing some kind of sleep paralysis at least once in their lives, it would be super weird if it hadn't 😕

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep_paralysis
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypnagogia