Thursday, September 22, 2005

remembrancE oF thingS pasT

I was sent to a distant place. A place I haven’t gone anytime in my life. The bus reached there on time. I stepped out from the bus and looked around for a while. Hey, this place, though I haven’t visited at least once in my life seems to be a lot more familiar to me. It seems as if I had been here a long time ago. But I am sure I am here for the first time. Am I dreaming?

I was asking for a book to my friend. She looked for it in her shelf and after finding it, handed it over to me. It was a green book. But hey, I remember this sequence. The moment this event occured, I remembered the same person giving me the same book some where in the past! But I know that it hadn’t ever happened! Did it really happen in the past?

My mind remembers similar situations. Sometimes it comes as an event; sometimes as a word/sentence in a conversation; sometimes as a face in the crowd; all ignite some unknown memory bit hidden somewhere in my mind to expose itself, without informing my grey matter its birth (rather re-birth) and amazingly its very existence in my memory. And it makes me remember that the same/similar sequence had happened somewhere back in time.

Remembrance of things past’ is a book written by Marcel Proust (1872 – 1922). There is an interesting event in this book. The protagonist is having a cup of tea together with a cake. He eats the cake after dipping it in tea. Suddenly that sequence of events remembers him something. He had faced the same situation somewhere else. And came to his mind the memories of his aunt. She used to give him cake the same way when he was a child.

Many times, such spontaneous disentanglement of memory bits are referred to as involuntary memory. ‘Involuntary memory by definition anti-intellectual nevertheless refines away all the unnecessary details of a forgotten moment and retains only its unadorned core’ – Edmund White. In the case of Proust’s book, a similar event had actually happened in the past (his aunt used to feed the hero like that). But then what explains the events I mentioned in the former part?

In fact this is felt by most of the people (70% of the population) at least sometime in their life. French psychic researcher Emile Boirac coined the term Déjà vu to describe such phenomena. Why the other 30% of the population doesn’t feel it is a matter of discussion. Parapsychology associates it with precognition, extra sensory perceptions etc. I was just wondering whether the prophecies made by prophets like Nostradamus and all aren't just a result of Déjà vu?

I forgot about Déjà vu when I first posted this and added the last paragraph afterwards. Thanks Sonia for reminding me about it.


27 comments:

Sonia said...

or maybe it's deja vu

-Poison- said...

if cud see things b4 hand tht wud b groovy >:) lucid dreaming seems to work in some cases like these.

Anonymous said...

it happens a lot wid me...but i dont know why and i end up psychin myself thinkin' how? whr? when? but alas no answers for it...then i feel like am turnin' insane...so just forget it!

Anonymous said...

i belong to the 70%....
weird n cool is how i wud describe those moments.....
prophecies n deja-vu maybe!

Sujith said...

> sonia
yes it is deja vu.. thanx yaar for reminding me that.. :-) i have added a paragraph abt that..

> poison
yes man, seeing things b4 hand is wonderful.. whether it is a dream or is something else is a matter of discussion. :-)

> tangy
thts cool! so u belong to the 70% majority of the population.. :-) have a look at the paragraph i added at the end and also the associated links..

> ranju
scary? sort of yeah... most of the times we just wonder abt it and then forget it. someone else's memory; hmm... needs a lil thinking :-) donno even if v do that it takes us anywhere.. some ppl who believes in reincarnation thinks that these bits of memory are that of similar events which occured in our past lives.. still arguable a topic as there doesnt exist something called proof.. :-)) have a look at the last paragraph i added and also the links in it..

> divya
cool! :-) lets find out why the 30% are not feeling it.. may be they dont realized it.. u knw wt, v can associate something to any level if we dont know much abt that thing.. bt then there is no counter argument as well.. :-)

MadV said...

I too come in the 70%. Me and my frnds used to discuss about those 'lost in transition memory bits'.

I dont think that itz past. It is only future. But our perception is not that good that we consider it as past only.

I think it is due to the extra ordinary power of our mind. We actually know our future but are unable to figure out it completely.

Hey have I told you this before?? /*wondering*/ lolz

silverine said...

@Jithu: I am finally here after removing the knife from my back :)) I heard someone reported me to the IT guys. Anyways nice guys, they droped in home and loved the scotch! I sort of struck a bargain with them ;) You will know soon what that bargain was :))Hope you know how to dance on glass LOL

> Well I have experienced Deja Vu many times. It's a feeling of familiarity with incidents, places, things etc. But I don't think it has anything to do with ESP.

Jiby said...

jithu, i have heard from a friend that esp, deja vu, pre-cog and intuition are more pronounced in people born at a certain time and a certain star. i am deep in thought or absent-minded when i am not busy...i think thats why this feeling of deja vu has never happened to me yet. i wish our vedic-age munis with their superb mental facilities were around...so that we cud put these questions to them.

nestpa said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
nestpa said...

I've tagged you the seven tag. Check my blog!

~*. D E E P A .* ~ said...

me too ... i feel it so many a time , that it actually scares me at times ... my friend thinks itz bcoz of multiple universes !!!!

Geo said...

A deja vu is a glitch in the Matrix. It happens when they change something...

:_D

(how could you not put this? )

Sonia said...

you're welcome

Sujith said...

> madV
well there are many different ways to interpret it.. wt wt ecactly is correct, no one knows.. btw i remember u saying this to me once.. :-))

> silverine
this is why india is still a developing nation ;-))

and deja vu attributed to ESP; thts just an argument, as u knw there isnt any proof...

> jiby
oh! here is a man from that 30%.. nice to see u :-)) well even i wander in somethoughts all the times.. bt i feel deja vu.. something against wt u have said.. guess v have to do a time travel backwards and ask those guys ;-)

> neil
thnk u very much man.. bt i was already tagged for the same quiz.. its some three four posts before this..

> deepa
scars u? hmm... there is this film of jet li called the one.. in which they had put forward the concept of parallel universes. each universe consists of the same ppl.. so there are replicas of the same person in all the universes.. they call it a "multiverse".. :-)

> geo
coz i knew that u r going to put this in the comment (see i experience deja vu that time.. he he...)

> sonia
:-)

sinusoidally said...

Cool stuff. I like it.

. : A : . said...

Deja Vu it is.

Very interesting post. Liked the definition,

‘Involuntary memory by definition anti-intellectual nevertheless refines away all the unnecessary details of a forgotten moment and retains only its unadorned core’

Sujith said...

> sinusoidally
thank you :-)

> a
thnx man.. yeah it is an interesting definition by Edmund White..

Anonymous said...

i really enjoy reading your posts...
your choice of topics is great, and your writing style is enjoyable...
keep it up.

hope and love said...

cool post
:))

kickassso said...

A deja vu is a glitch in the Matrix. It happens when they change something...
RUN geo RUN!!!!!!!
:P
Abt deja vu, I guess coincidence does half the work, And the mind does the rest .Maybe not In that proprtion, but that way , I am sure!

Geo said...

@kickasso: I havnt seen the cat yet... plenty of time to RUN ;_))

what say?

(or is it a pussy? Bhu ha ha ha)

Sujith said...

> anon
thank you.. :-)

> HnL
thnx doc! :-)

> kickasso
well since i am not sure abt this, cant take a definitive stand.. :-))

> geo
hmmm... peru geo ennakkiya vere enthokkeyo aakum ennanu ororuthanmarude vicharam.. ;-)

Praveen said...

Interesting... now that I recall, i think there have been instances where I have felt the same.

Sujith said...

> praveen
yup man.. it is interesting.. so u r also in the gang.

Anonymous said...

Great article! Thanks.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for interesting article.

Anonymous said...

Excellent website. Good work. Very useful. I will bookmark!