ok, ill try to get through this without sounding like some egotistical putz. this is merely a description (mainly based on myself) and a question.

ever catch yourself drawing and theres a loss of thought, a loss of the external world?
an example would be you drawing etc and someone is trying to talk to you, but you dont even notice till after a sec or two your brain finally catches up and it registers? if so pleas please please read on.

ive noticed or at least only become aware of in the recent years that a lot of times as im 'arting" ill reach a point unconsciously, where as there is no thought, no external world, no "self". there will be times that im listening to music, and while my ears receive the music and the brain takes it in, simply to not hear it. ill title this as unconcscious/unconscious creation. i believe it has also been titled to "being in the zone" (emitt smith wrote something interesting about it before), thoreau wrote about it in walden pond, and the most famous samurai (miyamoto musashi) wrote about it in "the book of five rings" (the void book). i by no means want to compare myself to these great people, yet this same "state" i reach in meditation and yoga, minus the art. so enough of my ranting.

does anyone else experience this? if so please respond back. even if its a "yes" or an experience. im very interested to know. thank you for taking the time to read this also.

I see it more as becoming to involved I zone out to my sorroundings. Can get me in trouble too sometimes. Sometimes I don't pay attention to someone becuase Im so involved in what i'm doing, its taking my full concentration. Heh.. that's what I think it is for me.

Yea, i agree with Inat. It’s a matter of attention/focus.

Ok, I’ll try and present you with a metaphor; Imagine you have a 500mb broadband internet connection, and the internet connection speed (500mb) is being shared/distributed between five computers, resulting in 100mb c.s. per comp. If four of the computers were to be switched off, then the one remaining computer would be using the full 500mb connection speed. Which in turn will make web surfing a whole lot easier if not more engrossing. (This type of connection could be referred to as ‘being within the zone’)

Note;
# Each computer represents one of the five human senses.
# And the 500mb c.s. represents the amount of attention available for focusing.

make sense?

without sounding like some egotistical putz

from what you said, no egotistical bastard could ever experience this
edit: no egotistical bastard could ever 'understand' this

does anyone else experience this?

yes(but i'm not saying yes just to agree). the thing about the zone is that inside it there is no free will, in order to compress the infinite amount of beauty that nature throws out at you into simple expression inside your mind.
The reason why you forget the external world is because you convey the internal 'thoughts, feelings, colors, senses'(etc) so quickly to the external world that you experience it as feedback and reinforce the pattern so deeply that you become stuck in it.. just like gumming your synapses together by using drugs.. i don't think it can be either enjoyed or disliked, because once it is you throw the illusion of freewill inside the game and become capable of thinking once again

hehe.. Nice metaphor Renuar. I wasn't sure where you were getting at until you mentioned the computers were the human senses. That makes a lot of sense.. Lol.

Yeah I often listen to music while I'm drawing, or a certain type of song over and over again so I can get the feeling, but then I realize it's rather pointless because I zoned out and missed the song playing back about 5 times already... meh. Yeah I agree with two-na and Renaur, to become so terribly absorbed in something it takes up all your attention and you completely lose focus of the surrounding enviroment. In this unconscious state I don't think it's really a loss of free will, but a state of mind where you're doing something that just becomes so natural you don't even realize you're doing it. >_o I'm not quite sure that can be called losing free will.

I can tune out everything that goes on around me too, and focus only on what I'm doing, not notice anything that goes on around me.. It's very helpful for when you want to read or concentrate on something while in a noisy and busy environment.

makes sense perfectly renuar. thank you and everyone else for their input thus far.
im glad tosee the response :D

Dig on the thought solve. You get points just for mentioning Miyamoto Musashi. :}

Have you ever blacked out right after starting up a drawing to wake up and find that it's completely finished? Happens to me all the time.

Damn Picori.

Even the idea of the "subconscious" is a bit theoretical but from what I've read over the years, I think Solve's theories are bit "what if?" in conception and less scientific than say the idea of the subconscious mind.

One cannot unconsciously be awake, unless perhaps they're in a subconscious state, I believe that to be plausible. I believe some people draw ideas from their subconscious mind, or they might be in a subconscious state while drawing, writing or what have you.

Even when someone is "in the zone", they're consciously painting that stroke, drawing that line, etc. A millisecond of thought is still conciseness, even if that person is not really aware of what they're doing.

Hm, I don't know what this has to do with anything, but I've been asleep while still almost as consciously aware of my surroundings as if I were awake.. just that time seemed to be going by ultra fast and I couldn't always understand what was being said around me, although I was aware of conversation and aware of who was speaking.. It was the strangest thing..

Yeah, you basically just defined what subconscious means.

Def. of Subconscious: Not wholly conscious; partially or imperfectly conscious: subconscious perceptions.

But I was still conscious of my surroundings mostly, only I was asleep at the same time.. o.O;
Edit: I don't think I was in my subconscious mind, because then I wouldn't have been aware, I would have been dreaming instead.. o.o;;

Exactly, it's called a subconscious state.
It's even theorized that dreams are derived from the subconscious.

Edit: You might have been in a hypnoidal state but I doubt it.

I'm confused, slightly..
You're saying I was subconscious..
But I'm saying I was consciously asleep..
>>;

Look...you basically defined subconscious 3 times now with your descriptions of this state you were in. As I said, you might have been in what's called a hypnoidal state, basically a state of hypnosis, does that seem closer to what you're experiencing?

o.o;; Hypnosis?
Isn't hypnosis when the power of suggestion is.. well, most powerful? I was merely asleep but aware..

And I was confused because I thought you cannot really be aware of the fact that you are in your subconscious mind, yet I was entirely conscious of the fact that I was asleep..

I don't know, but I think I'm going to start confusing myself with my own words, getting sleepy.. Lol.

You were conscious that you were asleep? Then you weren't truly asleep or as I've said over and over, you were in a subconscious state. Although, you might have experienced a lucid dream, I doubt this because lucid dreams (real ones) are very rare. Another possibility, you were in a meditative state, which is not easily defined and I don't think that's what you were experiencing.

But I was trying to say, it was very very strange, that I was conscious of the fact that I was asleep.. And time was going by faster.. It was such a strange feeling..

What exactly is a lucid dream? I don't believe I've heard of it before..
Edit: Oh =x I just looked up lucid in a dictionary.. >>;;

Read this for more info on lucid dreams http://www.lucidity.com/SleepAndCognition.html
My friend Will says he has lucid dreams all the time, I think he's on drugs. For all I know, certain drugs may induce lucid dreams.
Your descriptions are a bit redundant, I suggest reading up on the subject and perhaps you can better define your experience.

Well that was rather long to read.. x.x;
That's very interesting though, I should re-read the whole article again, when I am not so sleepy..

I have, once before, realized that I was dreaming while I was dreaming, but it only lasted a moment, I quickly and easily forgot that I was dreaming..
But it's true, at least for me, that you can control your dreams when you know you are dreaming.. o.o;;

What I was experiencing, however, I am pretty sure, was not dreaming, because I was aware of my external surroundings.. I said I could still hear the conversation around me, I could also even understand a little of it, and I could also identify who was speaking.. But yet, I was asleep, I could not move, and time was progressing more rapidly..
=\ I do feel very reiterative though, continuously explaining the same things over again.. But I've heard explaining the same thing different ways helps others to understand what you mean..

Edit: I'm tired now.. going to go try to sleep.. all the talk of sleep and dreams just makes me want to sleep even more..

moonlit, i've had the same thing all my life at different times usually after some life changing experience i get them. I am sleeping but yet I wake up and find myself stuck, I am awake and aware but unable to move.. This happens because of something with the bloodflow to a certain area of your brain in charge of movement that is deactivated during sleep said my neurologist. subliminal message: take shrooms

ok i havat explain this better. too broad.
conscious would only be there when there is a "self" or "someone" there. something too attach that awareness to.
when ill draw there comes a point where there is no me, no thought, nothing but art being done. what is that? it isnt me.

another example is me thinking. theres a self there but its only represented by thought. any atempts to find myself and separate from this thought is more thinking itself. so i find the heavy connection between concepts of self as thinking someting to be noticed. "i think therefore i am".

Alex pooper. very funny guy. are you a comedian?

Absorbtion...
Perhaps you're absorbing everything, and therefore you needn't acknowledge it...its not threatening...pure love/energy perhaps.
You know like a bath towel, depending upon the amount of moisture, you might not even notice that the towel has been used at all.
Man I don't know how to explain what I mean exactly.
I sometimes do get into a "zone", but I kind of fight it, maybe out of fear I dont' know. I know that when I'm creating purely, I get almost euphoric. Also in realtion to comparing yourself to people in history, why not...humans are humans...their thoughts are offspring of others thoughts as well...I mean I don't know, once again it all goes back to a connected energy to me.

Just my thoughts. Smile.

Heh.. Ok, all this conscience, unconscience stuff kinda confused me. But I think I kinda got the idea.

I think what is scariest to me is when i wake up in the middle of the night, er.. well sorta. See I feel awake, yet I feel like i'm still half asleep. Instead of my dreams being more in my imagination, they are kinda real. Like i'm awake, or half awake, or whatever you want to call that state, and i'm seing things in my wall, having visons, like if I were dreaming, but I'm not fully asleep, but I'm not day-dreaming. See those scare me the most because I usually see some of my greatest fears. Clowns in shadow form. I feel things that I don't see. Like I feel something large and smooth, but yet feel small and rough. Its very hard to explain things that feel two different things at the same time, and feel completely opposite, and are opposite. The thing isn't anything in particular, its more of a texture feeling that i feel.

I have no idea if you guys can understand what I'm saying. Its incrediably difficult to explain something like that.

And no, I'm not on any drugs of any kind. ^^

It wasn't that I was sleeping, but then suddenly awoke to find myself unable to move yet aware of my surroundings, instead, I was trying to sleep, I lay my head down on my desk so that I could sleep, but even though I had fallen asleep, couldn't move, and time was going by faster, I could still hear and understand what was going on around me. =\

There are also times when, while fully awake and conscious, I feel like I am not.. in myself, that I am outside of myself, or that everything around me doesn't feel real, everything seems very strange and fake, or doesn't feel right.. And it seems to happen for no reason at all, just every once in a while out of the blue I get that feeling..

I don't know, I think I'm just a wierd person. o-o;

meh, I get that too sometimes.. I was like that for a month, but then again, i was dumb and was doing drugs at the time. After that i refused to do them again. Yeah... ^.^" bad example. Its kinda like being in a daze, its weird. It happens to many people too.

It wasn't sleep paralysis, I could have woken myself up at any time I wanted and then been able to move again, which I eventually did do.. and anyways, I said I didn't wake up to that consciousness.. Rather, it was that I fell asleep yet somehow remained consciously aware of my surroundings the entire time..

The fun part is when you ask a friend of yours a question while s/he is focused and deeply absorbed with something and s/he answers to you a few minutes later, while thinking s/he answered right away. It is something like a brain lag. Computers can make people really absorbed into them.
I also like when one has a dream and wakes up, but the dream is really strong that the person can go back to sleep and continue dreaming.
Sometimes lucid dreams can turn out bad if one realizes that the dream is just his/her imagination and the dream gets dispelled and just ends there. >:)
|XOD|

Aren't you describing it exactly?

MoonlitShadow...we've covered almost every mental state possible you could have experienced and yet none of them fit? None of them are correct?

You posted this strange experience for us to ponder but it never stands up to criticism or logic. I'm not trying to be an ass, I really wanted to get to the bottom of your experience but I feel like you're just stretching the truth or you don't really know what you experienced and thus can't explain it.

HOW does someone fall asleep and remain conscious of their surroundings? OH wait, I have a few answers! But no, none of them are correct, apparently. Your experience is an unspecified phenomena that can only be explained in vague and general terms, because of this, your experience could easily fit the description of many sleeping disorders or different states of mind.

You might as well have told us you have magical powers.

How exactly can you be asleep and aware of your surrounding but not be able to move, and yet be able to wake yourself up and move again whenever you want? That doesn't make sense.

Did you know dolphins never really sleep the same way we do. Only one hemisphere of the dolphin's brain goes into sleep mode at a time, so a dolphin is never technically asleep. Scientists think that when one side of their brain is asleep, the dolphin is in a semi-conscious state that is similar to the period of time right before a person falls asleep.

I think that's all that is, you're just about to fall asleep.

And by the way, lucid dreams are fun. But usually the very few times I become aware that I'm in a dream, I'll immediately wake up.

Xod, you said something that happens to me all the time. I can't really remember exactly what happened, or what it was about, but I rememeber one time when someone was talking to me and I was answering them, or at least I thought. This happened for like 5 minutes... then they yelled at me to answer.. heh ^^'', I said i did answer you, and they said no, you were staring there the whole time.. heh.. i thought i answered them, I really did... Lol.

I do that, like when i listen to music late at night. I feel a break off from myself, it feels like i'm going away or falling off sumthing. i've wanted to experiment with it, like going all the way but i'm afraid i'd never come back. mabe i'll go all the way, if i have nothing to lose.

moonlit, that is sleep paralysis even if you can wake yourself up by exerting yourself or yelling, etc... And that sensation you get about everything seeming fake, kinda sounds like a nightmare mental state, or?
15grifficorn: experiment!
lisaanne:

but I kind of fight it, maybe out of fear

fear is sobriety~~~

you guys are fun, trip out trip out

I expirience it all the time. I'll take a piece of paper and pencil and stare at it while drawing and talking. When I snap out of it I have a picture or scribble and the conversation's over. I zone out a lot and that happens all the time. And every time I wonder what the hell happened. I also block out the person speaking to me, so I pretty much fall asleep subconciously while doing so.

Ok, I’ll try and present you with a metaphor; Imagine you have a 500mb broadband internet connection, and the internet connection speed (500mb) is being shared/distributed between five computers, resulting in 100mb c.s. per comp. If four of the computers were to be switched off, then the one remaining computer would be using the full 500mb connection speed. Which in turn will make web surfing a whole lot easier if not more engrossing. (This type of connection could be referred to as ‘being within the zone’)

Note;
# Each computer represents one of the five human senses.
# And the 500mb c.s. represents the amount of attention available for focusing.

make sense?

If my brain was a computer that whole thing would blow it up.

I do that, like when i listen to music late at night. I feel a break off from myself, it feels like i'm going away or falling off sumthing. i've wanted to experiment with it, like going all the way but i'm afraid i'd never come back. mabe i'll go all the way, if i have nothing to lose.

I believe those sensations is the beginning of what is known as Out of Body Expirience. Usually at night when you're asleep and you feel like you just fell out of bed, or with some people off of something or a couch, then you're having an out of body expirience. Expirement the hell out of it.

The state you describe, solve, is what's known as a form of self-hyponsis. Not only can it be achieved during draw, but also daily activites such as reading, watching TV, etc. The brain is totally focused on the task at hand, becoming self-hyponotized. I think that was already mentioned by Clox, but whatever.

Moonlit, i have experience with the 'sleeping-yet-awake' sensation. I have never induced it by will but i have experienced it at times when i'm sort of just on the border of sleep and consicousness. I can't physically control my body but i could put it that 'just my brain was awake', and i could hear everything in the surrounding, in addition, every sound seemed to be amplified, the slightly squeeky lamp stand beside my bed would become somewhat a pestilating, almost unbearable tapping. A muffled conversation going on in the next room will seem as if it's being conducted beside me. I usually have a cloudy memory of what i heard sometime after waking.
Does this match what you have experienced?

I love the feeling of drifting off to sleep... <:)
|XOD|

Hunter: That's what it is? Well then.

moonlit: Paralysis like that only happens when you're in the REM state of sleep. I doubt it would happen if you're awake. Plus, if you could wake yourself from that state, it's not paralysis. And if you're fast asleep and are aware of everything that's called lucid dreaming.

Eh.. =\ Sorry.. Cloxboy.. that I dismissed all your possible explinations.. But the lucid dreaming didn't say anything of the people being aware of what went on around them in their surroundings, only that they were aware of the fact that they were asleep, and dreaming, and they always remained in their dream world.. It also says that they fall asleep first, then become lucid only once they reach the REM stage, but I was aware the entire time.. I was only trying to explain that it couldn't be lucid dreaming.. if I wasn't dreaming..

That is nearly what I experienced, HunterKiller, I just didn't experience the sound amplification, though..
But instead, I could feel that time was going by faster, I felt like I was in that state for only several seconds, yet when I woke myself up and looked at the clock, I had actually been asleep for a half an hour or so..

I still don't know what it is that I was in. Its confusing actually. I'm just wondering I guess If people can help with that.