• We have updated the guidelines regarding posting political content: please see the stickied thread on Website Issues.

Weird Psychological Thing Re: Big/Small

Me too :)

I too have had the big/small, far/near experiences from my youth.

I recall particularly one dream/vision which was much like I imagine the front of a temple would be - a shallowly stepped stone area with many stone pillars supporting some sort of roof to the entrance way. I felt extreme fear as I looked at these pillars, as I could simultaneously see them, say, 20 feet away whilst also examine the cracks in the stone and green moss on the surface of them as if they were, literally an inch in front of my nose. This seemed abhorrent and filled me with fear.

I was interested to read of bouncing balls and planar surfaces in replies as another dream/vision I recall is vaguely related (although nor particularly big/small as I can see). It was the image of a golf ball (of all things) perpetually rolling towards me... during which there was an ever-present male malevolent laughter! This was truly horrifying.

When discussing with friends, they related similar stories of (for example) a production line or conveyor belt on which were rocks which were both diamond-hard and razor sharp as well as soft and super-fluffy - which was of course terrifying.

I don't recall these being during times of fever but I do know when I *was* feverish I would experience some very odd sights.
 
When I was really little--probably about 5--I used to be able to make the things in my bedroom disappear into the distance. For instance, if I concentrated very hard, I could make the bedroom doorway, which would have been a crack of light showing around the door itself, recede far far off into the great beyond. Then I could pull it back close to me again. I could do the same thing with the closet door and the windows and any furniture that surrounded these entryways. I could only do this at around this age and only when I was in bed at night. It was a wondefully powerful feeling!

At around the same time, I had a recurring dream of a secret room that was accessed through a hallway in a shopping mall. I would push open the door and there would be large endless stairs, of irregular height, leading up into a hazy nothingness. I used to actually look for this mystery staircase when my mum took me shopping. Never found it, alas.

These both seem to be entrance/exit things. Any Freudians out there?
 
I remember watching an episode of Sapphire & Steel when I was a kid where a bedroom seemed to elongate.The memory of this merged into to of the big/small near/far dreams I used to have.
 
I've been quite fascinated by this topic, although I had not experienced the big/small feeling myself. At least that's what I thought until I saw the chateau picture. I then realised that I have experienced something similar. A friend once emailed me a picture of an iceberg floating in clear water. When I opened the email I could only see the top of the iceberg. I scrolled down and saw the huge piece underwater and I actually felt a feeling of shock and almost horror, along with a kind of lurching feeling like when you go over a bump in a car. I always found the picture very creepy and disturbing after that. I found a similar picture on Google images; I'm not sure if it's identical but it gives me the same unsettling feeling:
[url=http://www.angwinreporter.co...w.angwinreporter.com/pix/Pictu ... ceberg.jpg
[/url]
The subject of floating downstairs when young also seemed vaguely familiar to me. After thinking about it I remembered that I used to stretch out my arms and press my hands against the walls so I could actually suspend myself that way and sort of float down several stairs at a time. I'm wondering whether some of you might have done a similar thing, but now you remember it as floating downstairs.
 
Just an addition, as well as having some of the above ones, I can also envisage something being completely black and completely white at the same time.

I have noticed that these things mostly occurred when I was lay on my back with a firmish pillow or my hands, under the lower back of my head.
 
It's interesting that you mention a certain type of pillow which you are usually using when this occurs. I find that an odd sensation of texture always accompanies this strange experience, sometimes brought on by focusing on the lightness of the sheet resting on my chest.

Do you find the experience unpleasant? I find the sensation of a heavy/light, spongy/hard texture extremely disturbing... I can imagine that perceiving something as both black and white could be distressing, just because it would be so hard to get your head around it. This sort of thing makes my brain itch. Urg. Horrible feeling.
 
Big/Small

I used to get this as a kid if I was 'over tired'; that is my body was absolutely exhausted but I could not sleep, even though I wanted to.

I would tend to see geometric shapes - usually circles more than any other - and my perspective would be at the same time incredibly close to it so it filled my vision, and yet far away so it was smaller than my fingernail.

I would also have a physical sensation of zooming in and out, quite dizzying, and mental associations of quite dissimilar things (like your clay and hair example).

Looks like a much commoner experience than I thought!

Pearl Knight
 
AndyX said:
That's interesting - I used to get something like this a lot as a child, as well as the big/small illusion. Still happens when I'm very tired sometimes (and falling asleep)
Whenever I've tried to explain it I've found it nearly impossible.
For me it's more like.... imagine holding a small object between your first finger and thumb and 'rolling' it slightly so you can feel the texture. The weird thing is that this little stone or whatever is simultaneously tiny, huge (planet-sized), light, heavy, sharp and angled, soft and fuzzy. It's almost like been in two places at once and experiencing two different things at the same time somehow.
There's also a kind of 'pins and needles' sensation for some reason.
Anyway, it's a very very wierd feeling and somehow very unsettling. As you say it's the contrast of scale that does it - 'universe in a grain of sand stuff'!
I'm not sure how well I've described this, but I think it's the best I can do.

PS I haven't been smoking Salvia or anything!

I know exactly what you mean! Makes my head spin. I get it when drifting off asleep, and can spend hours experiencing the feeling. Or at least, hours often pass between the initial sensation and waking again, sometimes only a few minutes - which feel like forever.

I kinda enjoy it, but at the same time find it incredibly distressing sometimes.
 
RE: Big/Small Thing

Mine was/is never fever induced but I do get a strong sense of vertigo, a mild gagging sensastion, light to heavy disorientation and disassociation with my eyes open or closed. Also, I seem to get bigger as the (mental) room gets smaller, and everything seems to get really close but really far away, but I never seem to be able to break out of the room. Somehow spaghetti, yes, spaghetti, and escalators with glass sides are involved when I get really really big. The spaghetti thing isn't a craving but there seems to be spaghetti noodles everywhere like filaments. I can induce a mild version of it just by sitting really still and de-focusing my eyes, also through meditation, or in a hypnogogic state. It was and or is never really nightmareish but it can be unplesant. I remember waking up often as a child and having to shake it off for a while before being able to go back to sleep. Also, if I didn't lay awake for a while the feeling would just come right back as I tried to drift off again. I've never had periods of intensity such as when I'm sick or anything like that. Currently I'm 29 and I remember at least as far back as my early teens having this feeling, even now I still have it. In my late teens it quite often precluded my deeper meditation sessions and left me unable to mentally focus for a while afterwards. Even now as I write about it I get the same slight vertigo, a bit of a gag reflex, shakeyness in the hands, and a light disassociative/floating feeling. Textures never really played into it but I could see how they would be rather disorienting
 
I get that big/small feeling too. It doesn't happen all that frequently but I feel as if my fingers are huge and swollen and I'm rolling a needle or something between them. Thought it was just me, but obviously quite a common thing. It doesn't seem to matter whether I'm ill or not.
My ex-husband used to have a real thing about "biting wool". If I said it to him, or he thought about it, he would just go mental and could imagine himself doing it. Needless to say I would casually drop it into the conversation if I was annoyed with him....Any wonder we're divorced? :lol:
 
Hey that teeth/wool thing came up on another thread yesterday...coincidence?!

And what you say about your hands seeming swollen is quite familiar...My father used to describe it in a similar way and I think someone has already mentioned that there is a Pink Floyd song (comfortably numb) that has lyrics along the same lines... My hands swelled up like two balloons....it's fascinating that such an obscure and specific experience is relevant to so many people.
 
:shock:

Wow. I so remember these kinds of dreams from when I was young. It was more of a very vague feeling, and I could never quite remember what it was about, except a feeling of something HUGE and small at the same time. The best I can remember is some sort of giant rolling rock coming after me.

I also had a similar dream once while having a fever. I even talked in my sleep and my sister found me sitting up straight and talking nonsense about rocks and ... pancakes. Yep.

I can identify with the 'loss of perspective' and everything closing in on your face feeling as well. And that iceberg picture! Wow! That really brought it back to me!

As for an explanation.. right now it's late in the evening, and I can conjure up how it felt pretty easily. Perhaps it is simply a case of being very tired and your sensory input being distorted by sleep? Doesn't quite explain the vivid dreams, but AFAIK, nothing really explains dreams.
 
I used to get the big/small thing as a kid and found I can still do it now, usually when I'm falling asleep, if I lie on my back and imagine holding a ball in between my thumb and forefinger it feels impossibly huge and completely tiny at the same time. I quite like it though for some reason, it feels mysterious.

Squonky~ said:
I found a similar picture on Google images; I'm not sure if it's identical but it gives me the same unsettling feeling:

http://www.angwinreporter.com/pix/Pictu ... ceberg.jpg

Brrrr. That's weird. I have the exact same feeling when I see pics like this. They creep me out and make my eyes ache.
 
I remember posting about the big/small thing in another thread, but will add it here in case a neurologist does someday wander in and do a quick count of experiencers as compared to total membership; after which he/she may decide it's interesting enough to research.

I saw a screen, similar to a tv screen, except at the time I hadn't seen a tv. The screen was filled to absolute capacity with motor-bikes, all tearing around noisily. There was a man on each bike. It was all black and white. No colour. The sound was deafening; no let up at all. Some of the bikes were upside down. They tore in every direction and completely filled the screen; you couldn't have put a match between them: like orchestrated bedlam. Then in an instant this mess of movement and noise was replaced by silence so total, it virtually hummed. And from right of screen rolled a small ball. It seemed to be aware. As it rolled silently towards the centre of the screen, it grew progressively larger until it was huge and filled my sight. It continued, growing smaller as it rolled to the left. Then back to the screaming, roaring motor-bikes. Then utter silence as the ball commenced it's weird, silent roll. The ball was unnerving.

Another time, my parents were arguing heatedly in, of all places, a caravan. Frightened, I was scrunched up against a window, watching them, hoping it would stop. At some point, their heads became immense. Then their mouths became immense and out of proportion to their large heads. I could no longer hear them shouting; it was exactly as if the sound had been turned off. I watched in terror as my mother's mouth, then my father's, opened and closed in silence as they yelled at each other. They were still shouting at each other, but it was as if they were doing so in silent, slow-motion. It was hideous, seeing their mouths magnified; seeing the huge teeth as their mouths opened and closed angrily.

Then my father turned towards me. He was speaking directly to me with his enormous mouth in his enormous head, but I could not hear him. Then my mother turned her attention to me also. Possibly I looked terrified and upset. And possibly they now were attempting to reassure me, because they were laughing, as if their argument had all been a game. But I did not hear the sound of normal laughter. Instead, it was as if the sound had been chopped up. So what I heard was a snatch of distorted voices, then silence, then another burst of noise, then silence and so on. They continued moving towards me, to the point they seemed like two huge, distorted faces with large open mouths, looming above me and accompanied by bursts of rat-a-tat-tat laughter interspersed with silence. They resembled horrifying, open-mouthed heads similar to the ones at fair-grounds; the ones you try to toss a ping-pong ball into. I don't think I ever regarded them in quite the same way after that episode.
 
I used to get this sort of thing a lot as a child. Still do sometimes.

The most powerful instance of this big/small thing occurred in a dream, which involved the placement of some huge, vague shape - which even then I couldn't describe - right next to a single tiny matchstick. Seeing them together was strangely horrifying, as it all seemed to imply that such a degree of size between the two items was wrong somehow.

The only other times I get the same sensation - though it's rare nowadays - is when I see a lit cigarette which has been left in the ashtray for a while. The length, slimness and steadyness of the smoke stream when seen in a room-like context is weirdly disturbing. It's as if the smoke stream is both just a little bit too long and a little bit too steady to be entirely bearable.

I've heard that Salvador Dali was preoccupied by this big/small thing as well, and I can readily believe it - many of his works feature vast, flat arid spaces occupied by only one small isolated detail. Note also his take on St. Anthony's Temptation, and the long, spindly legs of the elephants; the large tapering down into the small, with little more than a horizon as background. A pretty good illustration of the phenomenon, I think.
 
I remember reading this thread but not really understanding it awhile ago, but now I have a recommendation for anyone who wants to experience what this thread is talking about.

There's a video game called Katamari Damacy which is something of a sleeper hit due to its odd premise. Basically you control a tiny ball of gravity that makes other objects stick to it. The object of the game is to collect stuff on the ball, making it bigger and bigger, and of course as the ball gets bigger, it can pick up bigger things...

It starts off OK, when they give you a 5cm ball and ask you to collect stuff until it's 10 cm. You do that one on a table, picking up thumbtacks and ants. But as the game goes on, they ask you for bigger and bigger collections of junk...


It's very hard to describe the feeling of absolute incomprehension (which the mind of course turns into humor) when you pick up a speck of something and realize it's the entire neighborhood you started the game off in.


Long story short, if you can't grasp what this thread is about, play some Katamari Damacy to get an idea.
 
Remembered another one. When I'm lying in bed and just about to fall asleep, it feels like my vision is zooming out away from me. Like that camera trick they use in movies when the object in the foreground stays in the same position while the background extends outwards. Except a lot quicker. Used to happen all the time when I was younger and I found recently I could still do it now.

And yeah, Katamari Damacy rocks and exactly the kind of thing we're talking about. :)
 
I used to get this ALL the time as a kid, and still get it quite often now (I'm 27). When i was a kid it would wake me up in terrible nightmares that I could never explain apart from that there was something massive or infinite which was overpowering everything.
I agree its the same sensation as the comparison between something very soft, and something very hard. I imagine feeling my way through a very very soft substance like cotton wool, but suddenly feeling the sharpness and hardness of something like shard of diamond within the softness.
Recently I've been thinking a lot about enlightenment, and the principle that everything in the whole universe is inter-related and ultimately the same thing - a 'one-ness'. When i meditate on this thought, it brings the same sort of feelings, but in a much more relaxed, easy to deal with way. Perhaps these dreams and feelings are the minds way of trying to deal with the vast infinity of everything, in comparison to what we consider our 'separate selfs'. The feeling of gut wrenching horror is the feeling of the ego being dissolved, and the panic of losing touch with one's self.
 
Perhaps these dreams and feelings are the minds way of trying to deal with the vast infinity of everything, in comparison to what we consider our 'separate selfs'. The feeling of gut wrenching horror is the feeling of the ego being dissolved, and the panic of losing touch with one's self.

A similar thought had occurred to me, though what made me doubt it was that most people seem to experience this thing when they are young children.... I just don't think young kids are really that...existentially aware... if you know what I mean...
 
hokum6 said:
Like that camera trick they use in movies when the object in the foreground stays in the same position while the background extends outwards.


A friend who works in film tells me that this sort of simultaneous zoom in/zoom out shot is known as a 'trombone'.

Sorry, totally OT, I just thought that was a cracking name for it...

Bob
 
matthieu kassovitz used that to great effect in the film 'la haine'.
 
A similar thought had occurred to me, though what made me doubt it was that most people seem to experience this thing when they are young children.... I just don't think young kids are really that...existentially aware... if you know what I mean...

I've been thinking about this. Perhaps what is happening in a child is the same thing but in reverse, i.e. creation of the ego, as a separate object from the rest of the universe. I'm not sure at what age kids become conscious of themselves, but it might correspond with the ages at which these dreams seem to start. It would explain why they continue throughout life, perhaps only ceasing when one becomes fully aware: fully conscious of both their own consciousness and its purely subjective viewpoint, and the way that it is identical to everything else in the universe. If that makes any sense.
This is probably a very direct and inexplicable experience of the underlying process which drives the rest of our thoughts and dreams, the need to understand ourselves and our place in the universe.
 
HowardMarks said:
as a separate object from the rest of the universe.

That sentence alone is very nearly enough to evoke this feeling for me.

HowardMarks said:
I'm not sure at what age kids become conscious of themselves, but it might correspond with the ages at which these dreams seem to start.

What a pity babies can't speak! I wonder if this is what is often diagnosed as night terrors... My mother said when I was a about 18 months old, we were staying with some relatives in France. She had put me to bed, but had come running back up sometime later when I started screaming hysterically. She said I was very distressed and had vomited all over my pillow.. Now the reason I mention this is because when I was 13 I had a recurrence of the big/small thing, that (probably due to being slightly feverish) lasted for a long time after I had woken up. I remember throwing myself down on the bathroom floor and rolling about on the cold tiles, completely unable to bear the sensation...Anyway, I was saying "I need to vomit...I need to vomit across the universe". I have no idea why... But then years later, I was talking to my partner about this big/small thing, and he said, whenever he got it, it would be liike he was standing unsupported somewhere in space, watching a huge tide of vomit creep across the universe....

I don't know if it's just the fact that this can be a nauseating feeling, or something else. But I think maybe the incident when I was in France was the same thing, and that's why I threw up. (of course my parents have entirely different theories, they are convinced the room we were staying in was haunted)...
 
Older kids do get night terrors, but I suppose it's possible.
 
It is very interesting that so many people have had this experience. This is my description of it, as i used to describe it when I had the experiences as a child and when it happens as an adult, usually when i'm having a fever:

It's like this whole experience starts in one of two ways:

1. I can only describe it like this: I become aware that somewhere, hard to describe if it's inside my body, my mind or elsewhere in the universe, something rather small and soft exists, it's made of a very soft and fluffy material, then suddenly something starts to grow with enormous speed inside that material, the growing stuff is the total contrast to soft and fluffy. Its the spikiest hardest sharpest thing you could imagine (the weird thing is that all this is being registered not so much by my normal senses, it's kind of like I'm aware of this on another level also and it's very uncomfortable) The spiky, sharp stuff grows into an unimaginable size in the matter of fractions of a second and seems to dominate all of reality, very scary and uncomfortable.

2. Same scenario, but without the soft and fluffy at the beginning. The hard, spiky stuff just pops up out of emptyness.

Just as a previous poster described, this experience can stay for awhile after I have opened my eyes. As i wrote above, this often happens when i'm having a fever, but have happened at other times too.
 
Sleep/semi sleep

Ive had similar experiences in the sleep/semi sleep realm for many years.

I remember when young (I think the last time was about 15) having a reoccuring, vivid but very surreal dream where i was trying to handle some kind of volatile substance (which seemed to be invisible, and have no other sensation to other than a force around it) It would of course suddenly expand to some kind of terrifingly massive size. I would then wake up, but be convinced it was somehow real for a couple of minutes.

Whilst in the forces, I did a lot of shift work and "stag" guard duty. I found that in the small hours, while unbelievably tired I could create auditory hallucinations at will, the most reliable of which was created by leaning forward and thinking "laughter, laughter" - and I would instantly hear a loud blast of canned "audience laughter" which would start and end equally suddenly.

I think this lead to a long period of sleep disorder, I think called sleep apoena. It was the full on waking up, that is being semi aware of my surroundings, but being unable to move despite terrific effort. Id sense all kinds of strange entities in the room whilst in this state - absolutely terrifying! It was only when this started happening while not sleeping alone that I was sure that these were only visions from my dreams. I can understand where the tales of being "hag ridden" and the more recent phenomena of alien bedroom abduction come from now.

Thankfully now in my thirties, and in a more stable "civvy street" job, all such strangeness has ceased....... sometimes I miss the old days.


You must all think I'm so strange, and you'd be right! :?
 
i have not read every single reply in this thread so i apologise if someone mentioned this already...

i see wat u all mean its jus i get the same thing but with distance...

particularly if im standing infont of a glass door or a shop window looking out i start to get confused how far the glass is away from my face and objects on the other side of the glass seem to be closer ... amd i feel asthough im mesmerized in some way...

or if im on a train id get a very quick feeling of anxiety and i wud be very confused as to wat direction the train is travveling in

(my mind would convince me the train was moving in the opposite directin and wud eventually feel like the train is pushing in on itself figthing to go bac kor forward!!)
..and id feel dizzy while i treid toi get my bearings..

same thing?
kind of?
:?
 
I've never experienced the big/small thing. Now I feel in the minority after reading this thread!

Closest I have come to it is having a split second zooming image come towards my face when I'm on the cusp of sleep. Usually something unpleasant like a spider or a grotesque face.

Other times I've had the feeling of not knowing one leg from the other while sitting and of seeing purple and green flashing blotches whilst trying to fall asleep but I know the latter is a blood pressure thing.

I'd quite like to experience the big/small!
 
big/small is freaky/deaky ... i had a friend at university whose variation of it was that he dreamt he was playing a pinball machine while being simulataneously inside the game being shot around the board ... but the feeling he described was remarkably and definitely the same
 
Back
Top