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Can you sense your fears?


Light Strategist
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Bit of a weird one for me, to post because I'm usually pretty upbeat but it's on my mind and keeping me up at 6:10 AM so I may as well ask it for the hell of it.

For people with an easily spooked disposition around certain situations, does your body react in a certain way to alert you to your particular fear before it happens?

For me personally, I can flip out pretty noticeably if I hear an insect buzzing in the same vicinity as me. Flies, Bees, Wasps... I instinctively hear that distinct buzzing and evacuate their vicinity.
What's weird about this for me is that as I can get pretty hot while I'm sleeping, I often leave the window open a little bit when I go to sleep, as you'd probably expect. The weird part is that no matter how deeply I may be sleeping, my body can literally force itself awake if an insect that buzzes in that way flies anywhere close to my window at all so that I can close it to prevent it from entering.

Could be 3 minutes, could be 3 hours. But my body will pump adrenaline and force me awake as a defense measure against their close proximity.


Does anyone else get a similar thing to this or am I just weird in that regard?

It seems like such an odd (if admittedly helpful) ability.

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I feel like this is a hard question to answer for me specifically, since most of my fears are more mental, or dealing with the mind, but yes, I feel like I can. I have jolted away randomly due to paranoia about something, or if I'm afraid for some reason, or other such things like that. I don't have any particular memories or what they were about, but I definitely remember having moments like that, where my body forced me awake out of fear. As well as moments I feel great unease, and find a different place to be around to feel safer.

I don't think it's particularly related, but whenever I know I have to be up by a certain time for something, my body will always wake me up before then, whether I slept for 10 hours or 3. I will almost always wake up 95% of the time.
It might have to do with my pretty small fear of disappointing people by not being around when needed, but who knows.

So, my answer is, I think so, but I don't have many fears of physical things, and if I do, I don't live in a place where they are particularly common or I have to worry about them.
Sorry if this was unhelpful.

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I don't wake up to loud noices around my house, but if there is something stepping silently around in the house then i wake up. My dog Satan dosen't switch sleeping position, he walk to the other end of the livingroom and sleeps there. My girlfriend gets so frusterated about this, because she don't want to wake me up if she needs to refill her glass of water.

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4 hours ago, Caster said:

I feel like this is a hard question to answer for me specifically, since most of my fears are more mental, or dealing with the mind, but yes, I feel like I can. I have jolted away randomly due to paranoia about something, or if I'm afraid for some reason, or other such things like that. I don't have any particular memories or what they were about, but I definitely remember having moments like that, where my body forced me awake out of fear. As well as moments I feel great unease, and find a different place to be around to feel safer.

I don't think it's particularly related, but whenever I know I have to be up by a certain time for something, my body will always wake me up before then, whether I slept for 10 hours or 3. I will almost always wake up 95% of the time.
It might have to do with my pretty small fear of disappointing people by not being around when needed, but who knows.

So, my answer is, I think so, but I don't have many fears of physical things, and if I do, I don't live in a place where they are particularly common or I have to worry about them.
Sorry if this was unhelpful.

Wouldn't say it's unrelated entirely. I can definitely relate to the situation of mental fears forcing me awake for no reason too. Heck, sometimes I can't go to sleep because my brain decides I've been in the same room for so long that it feels like the walls are closing in and my bedroom is currently dangerous and that's usually never fun.

3 hours ago, Peder said:

I don't wake up to loud noices around my house, but if there is something stepping silently around in the house then i wake up. My dog Satan dosen't switch sleeping position, he walk to the other end of the livingroom and sleeps there. My girlfriend gets so frusterated about this, because she don't want to wake me up if she needs to refill her glass of water.

What's funny about this is that I'm sorta the opposite but pretty much the same. If someone pokes their head in my room, the sound of the door brushing against the carpet can wake me up. But a bomb could go off outside and I wouldn't know about it until I eventually crawl out of bed.

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I have a fear of spiders, not sure if it's arachnophobia or not quite as serious as that (like, super-tiny spiders don't bother me, as long as it's not a super-close picture of them, and yes, spiders on photos do make me feel uncomfortable). I wouldn't call it "sensing", but I do this thing when I, like, turn around in room - for example if I want to sit down - and if there was a spider anywhere and it came into my field of view, I would involuntarily turn back to where it was, even if I saw it for only less than half a second... It doesn't even have to be a big spider.

Now, this might happen because, when I was small, I used to check around my whole room every night before going to sleep, to see if it's clear of spiders, but after some time I stopped doing it, because having to deal with a spider was so much more stressful than the fear that a spider might be there somewhere (which was unlikely anyway, since I clean my room real often exactly because of this...). I guess my brain just learned to spot spiders whatever I do, and alert me by forcing me to turn back to them, which I don't mind, but than I feel like I have to do something about it, which is a problem still. I somehow have to get over it, or move even more to the north where there are less spiders than here...

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How very fascinating.  This topic. I read a lengthy article on Psychology Today about what exactly is instinct and another one on intuition, and some of you are basically describing those keen senses. There was a paragraph or two about primal abilities we had that never went away. Suffice to say, it seems like whether you know it consciously or not, your self defense mechanisms can still activate to protect you or shield you from things you want to stay away from.

Like you said Light Strategist, I can also hear insects, no matter how faint the noise they make. Like i can hear their scurrying across the floor or when they jump. Flying especially catches my attention. My eyes even instinctively know where to look and once I spot them, I go squish them. 

Despite how silent they can be on their paws, i can also sense and hear cats (and dogs). I just feel their presence and face them. I had a bad run in when I was a kid and never got over it so I dislike animals in general. Im not mean to them or don't bother them, i just dislike them being next to me if they aren't caged or on a leash.

After im done killing a bug or figuring out their is an animal next to me, im always amazed i even noticed in the first place. I question (internally) how I caught that when I was previously  fixated on a game or if I'm out, when I'm busy. It just always surprises me.

Those articles mentioned how you can improve those senses but it takes time. I'd link them cauae they were pretty interesting reads, but im on my phone so ill have to edit later if I can get to it. 

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Not really. I hate spiders with a passion and they always make my heart jump and I freak out a little. I can usually keep my composure better if there is another person or pet animal near me as it is easier to deal with fear with if I am not alone, but my mind still goes "FUCK!!!" and my heart skips a beat.

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On 6/1/2020 at 5:57 AM, AnonymousSpeed said:

Is this dog named after John Adam's dog?

I had to search up who this John adams is. No, he is named after the devil himself. Specifically the one in Shin Megami Tensei.

Edited by Peder
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