Human Development
Sensory deprivation
Description:
The effect of sensory deprivation depends on the level of stimulation the person is normally comfortable with. Deprived of such stimulation, there may be attempts to seek stimulation by moving about or making noises in order for consciousness to have its usual stimulus. When subjected to almost zero sensory input one suffers mental confusion which may lead to hallucinations, temporal disorientation, visions. There is anxiety, restlessness, irritability and boredom. the feeling of disorientation may be beneficial. The result may be the therapeutic release of pent-up emotion. An example is the Tibetan isolation initiation. On spending days in an underground tomb entirely cut off from sensory input, the person communes with his inner self and is purified of karma. This is an initiation process for priesthood and psychic healing. Another example of sensory deprivation is that employed to achieve altered modes of awareness through floating in an isolation tank of concentrated salt solution at body temperature. The feeling of weightlessness and independence from heat and cold is accompanied by deprivation from other sensory input (sight, sound, taste, smell). The experience is conducive to meditation and surfacing of repressed thoughts. Experiments in an isolation tank under the influence of measured doses of LSD have resulted in awareness of birth and expansion of the universe, and of the micro dimensions down through body cells to fundamental particles.Related:
Primal therapyThought reform