The Happy Hippy was recently laid-low with a flu virus for almost a week
during which time he experienced various levels of delirium, dillusional
and hallucinogenic effects much of which indicated some experience of a,
normally suppressed, secondary personality.
Alien Hand Syndrome
Alien Hand Syndrome has been most widely documented in cases where sufferers
of epilepsy and seizures have had the two hemispheres of their brains separated
to relieve the problems they suffer.As a by-product of such a separation, many patients find that, quite literally,
their left hand does not know what their right hand is doing.
Whilst a patient has complete control over one hand; they report, and it can be
shown, that they have no control over the action of their other hand.
In at least one case it has been reported that a patient was happily driving
home when the Alien Hand seized the wheel of the vehicle nearly
causing an accident whilst in other cases, simply trying to write one's own
name is thwarted by the other hand pushing the controlled hand away from the
paper being written upon.
Despite various theories around a single consciousness interfering with itself
on a subconscious level; it has been fairly widely accepted that the behaviour
exhibited can be demonstrated to show that there is a separate personality that
exists within each hemispshere of the brain that has seized control over each
hand.
The Dominant Personality
If we accept that we each hold within ourselves two distinct personalities then
it must follow that one of these personalities is the dominant one. That is the
one that controls the way we normally behave and is the one that others see that
lets them determine what our personality traits are.
The second personality must therefore be dormant or repressed under most
circumstances.
Freeing the Secondary Personality
Assuming that we are not going to have such drastic surgery where each
hemisphere of our brain becomes separated allowing each personality to seize
control of various parts of our bodies, do we ever relinquish control to this
secondary personality ?It would seem unlikely that we do so consciously as we would soon be exhibiting
some form of schizophrenic personality. Continual suppression of a secondary
personality is best both for ourselves, our peer group and society as a whole
as can be clearly seen by our attitudes towards those who blatantly exhibit
dual personality disorders.
Subconsciously there are perhaps many times where this secondary personality
can take control ...
Humming tunes
Everyone at some time finds themselves humming tunes, totally out of the blue.
Could this be a case that the secondary personality is happily playing back some
song that leaks into the conscious mind ?
Name Shouting
Lost Driving Time
Dreaming
Everyone dreams and everyone has experienced a day dream at sometime.
Is dreaming a case where we consciously let the secondary personality take over
control of our thought patterns knowing that, as we are asleep, no damage can
be done ? Are day dreams just the secondary personality breaking through at an
inappropriate time ?
If it is our secondary personality that takes control of our dreams then this
would explain why we are able to enter into our own dreams and become part of
them and, with a little practice, control their progress. Is this a case where
the two personalities are interacting ?
These situations arise where the secondary personality is granted some right
of control or it manages to break through the suppression system in place. It
appears to be both normal and common for such experiences to occur.
On the other hand; are there more dangerous situations where the secondary
personality can seize control ?
Emergence of the Secondary Personality
Whilst we normally keep our secondary personality repressed and under control
there may well be times where it emerges and seizes control.
Normally these will be due to lapses in control and suppression from the
dominant personality in such cases as detailed above. There can, however, be
cases where this suppression fails.
There are a number of mechanisms that can be demonstrated to reveal our
secondary personalities - the most obvious being drug influence although
hypnotism could well be explained away if one considers that the secondary
personality is enabled whilst the primary is pushed into the background.
Almost every hypnotised subject describes a feeling of knowing what's going
on but being powerless to control the course of events. In such a case it is
likely that the usual, sitting in the background observing but unable to
influence position of the the secondary personality is switched with that
of the dominant personality.
If we do have two personalities then both are receiving the same information
that we perceive but only one has any affect on our reaction with the real
world around.
Having recently suffered from some form of flu virus I found that, during
almost a week in bed, I was suffering from delirium, delusion and hallucination
that tied in extremely well with this dual personality concept.
Sleep was a complete battle within my own mind with the feeling that there were
indeed two personalities competing to seize control. My dominant personality
desiring nothing more than complete solitude and rest with some other half just
whittering on in some gibbering tongue making such sleep impossible.
This situation was relived, shortly before the fever finally broke, in a manner
in which I can only describe as beating out the demons within. Indeed
it was an extremely powerful feeling of having finally succeeded in suppressing
the secondary personality and retaking control that lead me into this theory of
dual personality in the first place.
During one particularly awful episode I found that I was feeling completely
isolated and distanced from my surroundings. All my movements were sluggish
and although I knew what I was doing and could see the results of my actions I
felt that I was disembodied from the events around me.
Looking at myself in a mirror was one of the most frightening and exhilarating
events that I have ever experienced. Although I recognised myself there were
things that I saw that I could not perceive as my normal self. My eyes seemed
more sunken than usual, I was extremely aware of the distances between my
facial parts and alignments of facial features that seemed different to
normal.
Whilst acutely aware of the differences in perception from normal there was
nothing that I could do that would make me feel as if I was looking at myself
as I normally would.
The only argument could be that my alto-self was viewing my reflected image
through the interpretation of my secondary personality.
The fact that I could rationally stand there and argue this case was equally
strange. This is undoubtedly how the secondary personality normally lived
and existed; disembodied from the real world, a viewer with no control over
my physical body.
Now it's quite easy to argue that whilst under the influence of drugs or in
the depth of illness that the mind takes on some strange ideas and doesn't
quite behave as a text book would suggest, however, there is nothing to
show that such strange ideas are not a result of a secondary personality having
seized some form of control that is itself out of the norm.
I'm slowly coming back down to reality but I am still curious about those
periods of disorientation and mental battles within my mind that took place
during my illness.
I am now a strong believer that we all contain at least two personalities and,
yes, it is frightening, to consider what happens when a secondary personality
is able to seize control.
