Staring?

[GoldenRatio]

Haha, of course. I love a deep day dream. I was explaining to my wife that it goes beyond thinking. I personally have this feeling of relaxation in my facial muscles and essentially the same feeling in my brain. I am also able to really focus on one thought and one thought only, which is peaceful. You would think for how wide my eyes got I was able to see an ant 20 miles away, but I am not seeing anything (not in the literal sense obviously, haha).

 

[Neat Hedgehog]

I absolutely can NOT look someone in the eye unless I know them very well and am comfortable with them. It makes social encounters with strangers (often important people such as future employers or influential adults) very difficult. Glad to hear I am not the only one with this issue - and I would call it an issue, at least for me.

Does anyone else love staring at the sky?

Now that was something I was going to mention, but I wasn't sure if it fit.

I seem to have a strangely animalistic viewpoint on eye-contact. It took me until I was at least 18 to start to realize that people who looked me in the eyes were not attempting to be threatening or confrontational. Under normal circumstances, I will only briefly look someone in the eyes and then look away, because I do not want to convey that I am challenging them. But when conducting business where I am in a position of negotiating terms, or an actual physical confrontation, I will stare into the other persons eyes to challenge them for control of the situation. I have been told I am very good at it, and it is so unsettling it tends to diffuse most altercations before they begin. It's very primitive and rather dog-like, but it does seem to work.

I don't know if I learned that somewhere or not. I have always acted that way ever since I can remember.

(And looking at the sky on a cloudless day makes me feel dizzy like I'm falling... so I tend not to look up much )

 

[Minuet]

Now that was something I was going to mention, but I wasn't sure if it fit.

I seem to have a strangely animalistic viewpoint on eye-contact. It took me until I was at least 18 to start to realize that people who looked me in the eyes were not attempting to be threatening or confrontational. Under normal circumstances, I will only briefly look someone in the eyes and then look away, because I do not want to convey that I am challenging them.

That's very interesting. It's crazy how much power eye contact can have in any confrontation or discussion. Humans have such a strange opinion about the importance of it. And it is important, I suppose, but not necessarily in the way we feel... e.i. if someone isn't looking us in the eye, it is considered a result of maladaptive socialization.

I've always found that when I look into someone's eyes - especially when they are telling me anything personal - I gather more information than they perhaps intended me to receive. I can find a lot of unsaid information in people's eyes, and it tends to be too overwhelming for me... too intense. Has anyone else experienced this? I guess it's my own way of "reading between the lines"; what other people can interpret that through someone's tone or posture, I can gather from eye contact. But I really don't like to do it. It feels like I am learning more than the person wants me to know... and it feels almost disrespectful. I don't know if that makes sense. haha

 

[Tigon]

Thank goodness i found this thread..

I've been backwards and forwards to my doctors for years trying to find an explanation for my going "blank", they've ran CT scans, blood tests, ECGs and a wide variety of other fun tests to try and figure out why i keep doing this. Do you find that you seem to disconnect from the world slightly.. as if things don't quite get processed properly in your brain?

 

[juniorvindahl]

Thank goodness i found this thread..

I've been backwards and forwards to my doctors for years trying to find an explanation for my going "blank", they've ran CT scans, blood tests, ECGs and a wide variety of other fun tests to try and figure out why i keep doing this. Do you find that you seem to disconnect from the world slightly.. as if things don't quite get processed properly in your brain?

Oh, I'm sorry to hear you've had so many tests that found nothing. But yes, I zone out often. (did it a few minutes ago) and sometimes my vision just gets blurry and I can't seem to move my eyes even if I want to, and everything around me is still very clear; I hear people, what they say and do, and once in a while I can even respond - but not move my eyes. Sometimes I can move my eyes only to stare "at" something else. At the worst cases I almost shut down completely; I see things in front of me, but I do not register what it is, I hear sounds but they are not registered as anything other than noise. Nothing penetrates the "zone out". The worst incident (that I am aware of) lasted almost half an hour where I could do nothing. Most of the time I can shake myself out of it, but it takes physical strength for me to do so. And I have processed nothing of what happened while there.

 

[Perry Holia Kerrith]

I have a particularly unique (or so I'm led to believe) perspective on staring. I don't blink. I mean, I do, but where most people I observe will blink as frequently as twice a second on average, I generally go for at least thirty without. (The last time I actually tried I almost made it to five minutes)

That being said, I also have a tendency to stare off into space and be completely unaware of subtle changes in my surroundings for extended periods of time; up to and including someone walking into my line of sight. So I'll often be jolted out of my reverie to find that I've been staring at someone for who knows how long.

These two articles have cooperatively led my peers to unjustly refer to me as a "psychopath" or "serial-killer". Not the best reputation to have (though I believe it's all in jest. Mostly).

 

[Tigon]

I have a particularly unique (or so I'm led to believe) perspective on staring. I don't blink. I mean, I do, but where most people I observe will blink as frequently as twice a second on average, I generally go for at least thirty without. (The last time I actually tried I almost made it to five minutes)

That being said, I also have a tendency to stare off into space and be completely unaware of subtle changes in my surroundings for extended periods of time; up to and including someone walking into my line of sight. So I'll often be jolted out of my reverie to find that I've been staring at someone for who knows how long.

These two articles have cooperatively led my peers to unjustly refer to me as a "psychopath" or "serial-killer". Not the best reputation to have (though I believe it's all in jest. Mostly).

I know your pain there, people can be very cruel

 

[Amina]

Yeah, I do that too!

 

[ghoulbler]

Oh, me too. I always have this furrowed-eyebrow wide-eyed fixed stare and I forget to breathe. I find it usually happens when there is a lot going on around me, everything blurs into one sense. Hearing, smelling, feeling, all blends into one... if that is understandable? So I am not really conscious of what I'm doing or looking at. I make people uncomfortable a lot by staring too much, but it's not at them. In order to think certain thoughts or say things I need to stare at something in particular, or I can't do it, and I get overwhelmed. I get really upset when people wave their hands in front of me when I do this. It's very important for me to go through the whole 'phase' of blanking out, I need it to last through until I'm done blanking out. If it's interrupted, I get very distressed and feel like crying. It interrupts my daily life/priorities a lot, but it's something I need to do.

 

[Maathematics]

I stare into empty space while thinking.

I watch people around me constantly! they are so interesting. I do so using reflective surfaces.

 

[Thea]

I do the zoning out thing. I used to hyper focus when I was reading and you'd have to touch me or say my name right next to my ear to get my attention. Now I stare at the TV. You have to turn it off if you want me to hold a conversation, even if it's not something I want to watch. The same things get my attention now as then. People either find it funny which I prefer or they get really angry like I'm purposefully ignoring them. I used to stare a lot as a child but I'd get told off so now I have a technique I use where I stare for a bit and then look away and then stare for a little longer and then stop. I usually want to stare because there's something out of the ordinary, e.g. someone with a birthmark on their face, not in a cruel way but more because I'm the kind of person that notices the out of the ordinary then wants to investigate it. I understand the social reasons for not staring though.