I started meditating a few months ago. It took me a while to find a technique that worked for me, but eventually I found that the best technique for me was to concentrate on the flame of a candle for a while, and then blow it out, close my eyes, and focus on the "afterglow" of the candle (you know how you can still see lights after you close your eyes). I found that with much concentration, the afterglow would soon appear to be a red dot.
Several months ago, Elexina gave me a meditation technique that I couldn't do, but even then, I noticed the red dot.
Anyway, now I find that I can see the red dot when I concentrate with my eyes closed without using the candle first. I meditate in the dark, so it isn't that I'm simply seeing light through my eyelids. Also, I can think of different colors and will the red dot to become white, blue, purple, etc. It seems to me that I literally see a colorful dot (which can also spread out and become a colorful screen) when I close my eyes. It is nothing supernatural or incredible - it really is like I'm looking at the same blackness that I've always looked at, but now I notice that I can see colors in the blackness. I'm sure if you close your eyes and look for a dot or blob of color at center in front of you, you'll notice it, too.
My question is whether this is psychological or physical. Is there a biological cause for seeing such a dot, or is it simply that the power of the mind to imagine things is strong enough to make me think I'm seeing colors. Would a blind person be able to see them?
Posts: 2241 | Location: In between | Registered: 06-03-02
The first phenomenon you describe is an afterimage, familiar to all of us after a photographic flash. This arises from the retina in the back of eye, and is well understood physiologically.
The second phenomenon you describe, seeing images in total darkness (eyes closed or lights out), long after any afterimages have faded, probably arises from the visual cortex in the brain -- the higher processing center for vision. The brain always seems to want to make something out of nothing, replacing random noise in the visual system with meaningful patterns. I've experienced this and I think most people have.
Perception (and mis-perception) is at the boundary between psychology and physiology. Whether to call it "physical" or "psychological" is a semantic question. It's really both, in the sense that something is actually happening in your visual system, but it involves higher-level cerebral consciousness to perceive and interpret it.
Whether a blind person could experience this probably depends on the type of blindness. Somebody blind from birth, whose visual cortex never properly developed, might not be capable of this.
I'm making educated guesses. Any experts out there?
Posts: 1888 | Location: U.S. | Registered: 06-03-02
A couple months ago something truly amazing happened to me as I lay in bed. I was somewhere on the verge of sleep, but still very aware of my surroundings. With my eyes closed, I began to very vividly see the exact occurrences of one day in my childhood; every detail! I had never recalled these memories until this point. It was as if I were watching it on television.
Wondering if I was really awake, I turned my head to the other side. The scene that was playing abruptly stopped. Then I turned my head back and it started right back up again. I did this several times and as I lay there reliving that day I wondered if I would ever be able to do this again. Soon it stopped and I was so excited I got out of bed and got a drink of tea in the kitchen. On a piece of paper on my bulletin board I scribbled, "you weren't dreaming." I went back to bed and almost immediately I started having visions again. But this time they were different. It wasn't sequential information I was seeing, but more like a 360 degree scan of random images from my memory. I could turn them off and on too with the turning of my head. Soon, I fell asleep. When I woke up the next morning, sure enough, in the kitchen on the bulletin board was "you weren't dreaming."
Wow! That sounds so strange, Kendor. Once I had a dream-ish sort of experience that was similar, except instead of replaying the past, I thought I could see my bedroom room through my eyelids. The view of my bedroom was crystal clear in detail far beyond what I usually see when dreaming, but my eyes were closed, and at the time I thought "I can see through my eyelids!". I was semi-awake - I think it must have been a lucid dream.
Thanks for the reply Professor. I knew that the first thing I saw was the afterimage, but I couldn't explain the red dot. Your explanation makes perfect sense. Considering Kendor's story and my memory of seeing through my eyelids a few years ago, it is pretty amazing what the mind can conjure up.
Posts: 2241 | Location: In between | Registered: 06-03-02
Try this yourself on public transport. Because of the low background noise and occasional external prompting, if you manage to fall asleep, dozing on buses and trains can often lead to striking hypnagogic states. In spite of this, this is not always the most practical technique, as you can sometimes end up having to explore more than your own consciousness if you miss your stop.
Sarai said it best: "pretty amazing what the mind can conjure up."
Posts: 1888 | Location: U.S. | Registered: 06-03-02
This could be a side affect of the afterglow, but next time you do it, try to mold the dot, but start with something simple. If you can change it's appearance then it's psychological, and your mind is doing this. Once you get better at it, it's a lot more fun. Some shapes to try: beginner: star, square, line intermediate: apple, chair, animal advanced: scenery, movements, sounds and smells I mostly do solitary meditation, but when in a group it's fun to hear what people can do. Weather this is spiritual or not, that's up to the person, but all in all, it builds your senses and helps focusing skills.
Originally posted by Sarai: I started meditating a few months ago. It took me a while to find a technique that worked for me, but eventually I found that the best technique for me was to concentrate on the flame of a candle for a while, and then blow it out, close my eyes, and focus on the "afterglow" of the candle (you know how you can still see lights after you close your eyes). I found that with much concentration, the afterglow would soon appear to be a red dot.
Several months ago, Elexina gave me a meditation technique that I couldn't do, but even then, I noticed the red dot.
Anyway, now I find that I can see the red dot when I concentrate with my eyes closed without using the candle first. I meditate in the dark, so it isn't that I'm simply seeing light through my eyelids. Also, I can think of different colors and will the red dot to become white, blue, purple, etc. It seems to me that I literally see a colorful dot (which can also spread out and become a colorful screen) when I close my eyes. It is nothing supernatural or incredible - it really is like I'm looking at the same blackness that I've always looked at, but now I notice that I can see colors in the blackness. I'm sure if you close your eyes and look for a dot or blob of color at center in front of you, you'll notice it, too.
My question is whether this is psychological or physical. Is there a biological cause for seeing such a dot, or is it simply that the power of the mind to imagine things is strong enough to make me think I'm seeing colors. Would a blind person be able to see them?
Posts: 3 | Location: Mystic India | Registered: 03-21-07
Its amazing!! I jus experienced an afterimage or watever else ya call it n started searchin the net for answers n landed up here. I'll share the experience with ya since its fresh in my mind.As soon as I closed my eyes a lil tightly I saw 2 blue rectriangular images same sized, moving away .......n then a red spot appear in each of these blue images, but these red spots appeared to b comin towards me, n then slowly as they appear closer they appear to b human forms but slightly different from each other......the feelin dat I was experiencin was jus ecstatic n while enjoyin the same I jus happen to open my eyes (without realisin dat I was openin 'em)n everythin jus vanished.And after dat though I tried closin my eyes tightly again .....I see nothin.I wud wanna know wat n how n why did I happen to experience this.
Posts: 3 | Location: Mystic India | Registered: 03-21-07
Here's one for you guys. What does it mean when you can see a whole entire room(in greyscale and in almost perfrect detail) with your eyes closed; after only about 5 seconds of exposure time while fully awake in a busy enviorment. On top of that able to rotate that image in 3d as if your eyes were open by moving your head. No BS I'm serious, I have been wanting to know the answer to that for awhile. If anybody has any ideas on this feel free to tell me. Background: I have been meditating for the past 10 years I meditate almost everyday(about 5 days out of a week)usually twice a day. While meditating I drift through tunnels, mist, places, ect... If this means anything I am only 23 years old. I am also VERY spiritual.
To some, this may seem to be a fabrication and those people are entitled to their opinions, but what I posted here is the truth, however hard it may to be to believe.
I dislocated my sacrum in a tobogganing accident once, and a doctor on the scene wrote me out a prescription and sent me to Emergency. There I received an injection and was put in a ward by myself. The pain went away, and that's when I started hallucinating. It was wonderfully vivid, and I have strong memories to this day. (Whether accurate memories, I can't say; but at least the 'flavor' is there still.)
I saw that I was in a rather dim room (not the brightly-lit ward with pale green walls) that looked a little like a cluttered antique store. There were all sorts of objects on shelves -- old mantle clocks, Meerschaum pipes, kerosene lamps with leaded glass shades, books with old shabby leather bindings -- and the walls were full of shelves. I studied each item carefully. If I glanced back at an item I had studied before, it was unchanged.
Then I noticed a small doorway in the wall, and it opened onto an empty narrow room -- also dim and mysterious. I thought, "Wow, wish I could see what's around that corner!"
And the scene very obligingly rotated slowly so that I could see down the wall. And it too was lined with intriguing objects! The perspective was correct -- by that I mean, just what it would have been in 'real life' if I had moved to glance into the second room, instead of it shifting all by itself.
Posts: 6249 | Location: British Columbia, Canada | Registered: 06-11-02
