I appreciate the distinction latent in the post between artly immersion and everyday immersion. And the recasting of dissassocation in terms of a break of immersion with the everyday, with one's one experience, is a really good point. I wouldn't have thought of that. Hm.
I'd be interested if there's any psych type studies on how game-playing and whatnot, esp. in a communal setting, may help people with depersonalization and dissaasoiative disorders.
Thanks for reading, Cara. I'm wishin' you a good weekend too.
This post is wonderful, per usual. I was glad to see the last footnote— this whole piece reminded me of playing Sign with y’all. Fun times. Immersion is an interesting thing to lack psychologically, and that’s how it’s come up for me recently. I feel like there’s the level of immersion like you’re talking about, in which someone is watching a movie or having some other experience that they may be pulled out of and into “regular life”, and then the type of immersion that most everyone expects to experience all the time— the kind most folks don’t question, the immersion in the human condition.
I’ve found that the disruption of that second type— if it is a different type at all— is a lot more difficult to reconcile. You can just stop watching the movie and retreat back to “regular life,” but what kind of “regular life” is standing behind, say, a dissociative episode? You’ve already transcended the “regular life” boundary. That’s what you’re un-immersed in. I don’t know. Much to consider.
Another angle of this that I think is valuable is the idea that immersion into media, like the movie thing about which you write, can have real impacts on your immersion in the human condition. I’m thinking back to Sign here, and I’ll use that as an example, but there are so many other scenarios where I think this would apply. Like, with Sign, we were playing a game, however “in it” we were. It was not real. And yet a month later, I still remember the signs we developed and how we used them, the friendships and rivalries between our characters. More importantly, though, I remember walking back to my room that night thinking about how wild it was that for a few hours, a quite strange and generally disconnected individual like myself felt genuinely included and communicated-with. It made me feel like I really existed— in the same world other people exist!
Maybe that’s the cure to the cognitive dissonance that is depersonalization— having meaningful immersive experiences in your own life despite the glass wall between you and it. I don’t know. I’m just thinkin’ out loud.
Anyway, this post is fantastic and I will continue to think about it. It’s funny, though, how too much thinking about one’s immersion in something can actually take you out of the something and into the realm of the Philosophical (trademark sign), which is often not an ideal place to be. You’ve given me much to be Philosophical about today. Ultimately I am grateful for it… I think. Such is the nature of things.
Thanks Nicholas, as ever, for the phenomenal writing! I miss seeing you around campus. Have a great weekend.
I appreciate the distinction latent in the post between artly immersion and everyday immersion. And the recasting of dissassocation in terms of a break of immersion with the everyday, with one's one experience, is a really good point. I wouldn't have thought of that. Hm.
I'd be interested if there's any psych type studies on how game-playing and whatnot, esp. in a communal setting, may help people with depersonalization and dissaasoiative disorders.
Thanks for reading, Cara. I'm wishin' you a good weekend too.
This post is wonderful, per usual. I was glad to see the last footnote— this whole piece reminded me of playing Sign with y’all. Fun times. Immersion is an interesting thing to lack psychologically, and that’s how it’s come up for me recently. I feel like there’s the level of immersion like you’re talking about, in which someone is watching a movie or having some other experience that they may be pulled out of and into “regular life”, and then the type of immersion that most everyone expects to experience all the time— the kind most folks don’t question, the immersion in the human condition.
I’ve found that the disruption of that second type— if it is a different type at all— is a lot more difficult to reconcile. You can just stop watching the movie and retreat back to “regular life,” but what kind of “regular life” is standing behind, say, a dissociative episode? You’ve already transcended the “regular life” boundary. That’s what you’re un-immersed in. I don’t know. Much to consider.
Another angle of this that I think is valuable is the idea that immersion into media, like the movie thing about which you write, can have real impacts on your immersion in the human condition. I’m thinking back to Sign here, and I’ll use that as an example, but there are so many other scenarios where I think this would apply. Like, with Sign, we were playing a game, however “in it” we were. It was not real. And yet a month later, I still remember the signs we developed and how we used them, the friendships and rivalries between our characters. More importantly, though, I remember walking back to my room that night thinking about how wild it was that for a few hours, a quite strange and generally disconnected individual like myself felt genuinely included and communicated-with. It made me feel like I really existed— in the same world other people exist!
Maybe that’s the cure to the cognitive dissonance that is depersonalization— having meaningful immersive experiences in your own life despite the glass wall between you and it. I don’t know. I’m just thinkin’ out loud.
Anyway, this post is fantastic and I will continue to think about it. It’s funny, though, how too much thinking about one’s immersion in something can actually take you out of the something and into the realm of the Philosophical (trademark sign), which is often not an ideal place to be. You’ve given me much to be Philosophical about today. Ultimately I am grateful for it… I think. Such is the nature of things.
Thanks Nicholas, as ever, for the phenomenal writing! I miss seeing you around campus. Have a great weekend.