'I'm aware of my tongue... It's an awful feeling!
Every now and then I become aware that I have a tongue inside my mouth, and then it starts to feel lumped up...
I can't help it... I can't put it out of my mind...
I keep thinking about where my tongue would be if I weren't thinking about it, and then I can feel it sort of pressing against my teeth...'
- Linus, Peanuts
Recently, more frequently, I have become particularly aware of my physical body in its entirety, the world in its entirety, reality in its entirety. It feels like suddenly waking up from a falling dream, or almost bumping into somebody upon turning a corner, or like you're being chased by a bear even though you are sitting still. It's like the simple fact that I am actually real and breathing suddenly hits me, with the same freshness of an epiphany each time. It leaves me a bit giddy, gets my heart beating a bit faster, produces a slight acidic taste in my mouth and causes a brief surge of clammy, bubbling anxiety, like the initial stages of a panic attack. But I look around and see that everything is actually OK. It doesn't really match up. The moment quickly passes, but leaves me in a sort of confused state.
The thing about such moments of heightened awareness that bothers me isn't so much the dizzying headrush that accompanies them, but the implication that the rest of the time, I might as well be asleep, since I am essentially cruising around on autopilot, scarcely even aware that I am...here.
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