To ask for weird realisations you’ve had about life?

[goergia]

Things about mundane life that you’ve never given much thought but suddenly think “Now I think about it, that’s weird.”

I had one of these today. I live in a mid-terrace, neighbours are nice and quiet and we don’t hear a peep. A few days ago I had a snoop at one of the next-door neighbour’s house on Rightmove after seeing it was for sale, and realised that they have their bed right up against our party wall as I do mine. So even though I sleep in bed alone every night, there’s actually 2 people who I don’t really know just a couple of inches away from me! I don’t know why but for some reason it creeps me out. I’ve realised that in terraced houses you’re actually sharing one building with lots of people, many of whom you will NEVER interact with.

@TeaAndStrumpets

Growing up English with a Scottish Dad, as a child I didn't realise he HAD an accent, if you see what I mean. Only when I was older, chatting on the phone, did I hear him as others did. And he was from Glasgow

Same for me! Grew up in England with a Scottish mother - didn't realise she had an accent until one of my friends pointed it out. I would be 14 or so. Weirdly I knew my aunt (her sister) was Scottish with a strong accent.

MissNowt, snap! All the visiting relatives sounded Scottish, but I couldn't hear it in my lovely Dad!

I agree about school/education.
I may be biased in a way as I home educate my DC, but since turning to unschooling as a concept it has turned everything I thought about schooling and education and curriculum on its head.
I mean who decided that maths and English are the two subjects to be held up in the highest regard?! Why not history and science?!
Why is music or art seen as ‘lesser’ than maths and English?

I’ve started to question everything I was told at school. Not just the academic stuff but also the stuff about being ‘good’ ‘be a good girl’ ‘don’t make a fuss’ ‘work hard and work your way up a career ladder’ ‘always defer to authority at all costs’ ‘do things when we tell you to do them, not when it feels right to you’.

I feel like we’re told how and what to think from a very young age and by the time we get to adulthood we’ve lost touch with our true authentic selves and the ability to listen to our own intuition and own internal wisdom.

Does anyone else understand this? Apart from my fellow unschooling friends I feel a little alone on this :(

[quote Amdone123]@hihellohihello, I always wonder this when I look at Kate and William..do they ever order a Chinese takeaway and what do they have ??![/quote]
I don't know about W&K but I remember a tale of one of the young Royals, possibly Harry who was at a party, where pizza was delivered was mind blown at it coming in a box!

Maps for the UK will show "us" in the centre. A map in NZ would show that country at the centre (and so on....) and the ?Bering Strait between Russia and the US (Alaska) would be very evident. It is about 50 miles.
When I lived in Japan a NZ friend was incensed when she saw a Japanese map of the world that naturally did have Japan in the centre but Australia was upside down snd NZ wasn’t on it 😀

Another one is how the vast majority of what we think, especially about other people, is assumptions we've made ourselves and often (mostly, even?) are completely wrong
I wish someone had told me this (or I had thought it by myself😀) when I was a hold rather than a very empathetic friend telling me this only recently. I always make assumptions and am trying hard now just to ask people-but am so ancient and have wasted years speculating when I should have just asked…

@Fairislefandango

One reason I love MN, you can always have an intelligent conversation!

Amen to that! It's why I spend an embarrassing amount of time on here. It's nice to have interesting, intelligent conversations with someone other than dh and my dc sometimes. I am very much lacking like-minded local friends.

Yes!! Massively grateful!!!

That I will never truly feel like a proper grown up. I am 50 now and still have moments of surprise that I own a house, have children and can drive a car. I still feel like a child a lot of the time and not quite ready for it. I do wonder whether I’ll still feel like this in my 80’s and whether most older people feel this way.

I had my garden gate fixed yesterday snd I thought -that was a grown up thing to do - first time I have thought that snd I am ancient. Was a fleeting moment though..

That’s the countryside as we know it, and as portrayed in paintings, is just the outside part of a food factory. And if we were all vegan, there’s be no sheep or cows.

Me too @JangolinaPitt It's scary when you realise how much of every day thoughts are just our own assumptions! 😳

[quote DrManhattan]@doctorManhattan
Why are you using my user name?[/quote]
Why are you using mine?

Wow. I’m adding that to my collection when I next talk about my horses. Didn’t know that. Thank you 😊

*The realisation that time - the 4th dimension - is a human concept which exists only in our heads. There is no physical manifestation of time and it exists only as a means for humans to chart progress from one event to the next.

Some scientists now think that time doesn’t even exist as a concept; that everything happens all at once and ‘time’ is a means of indexing our memories*

I’ve heard about this theory and it does kind of make sense to me as an explanation of time. In fact it instinctively feel right to me that everything is happening at once, because I often feel like I “remember” future events. Like when I viewed a flat that we ended up buying, I strongly “remembered” the kitchen and knew it was/would be/ somehow “had been” my home. But then that’s another whole can of worms as to how that could happen, but it emotionally makes sense to me.

But what I don’t get is then how do things “happen”. Life/existence isn’t just a series of separate events, but ongoing constant change ie rivers flowing, events overlapping, constant motion of particles. What is “happening” if everything is always happening?

🤯

That there’s no such thing as reality, what we know as reality is just perception and is heavily influenced by our views and experience.

@Cloudhopping

That I will never truly feel like a proper grown up. I am 50 now and still have moments of surprise that I own a house, have children and can drive a car. I still feel like a child a lot of the time and not quite ready for it. I do wonder whether I’ll still feel like this in my 80’s and whether most older people feel this way.

hopping I pretty well feel the same and I am 71. I don't think my sense of "me" has changed since I was a child. When I was a child I actually promised myself I would remember how I felt inside even after I was a grown up. So far I have not changed!

I often think there must be a greater power than humans as after all humans and are not doing a good job. I do not mean a God as such but rather other creatures who are controlling us in a similar way that we control our pets. We decide where they live, what they eat and when they eat etc. I wonder if we are all pieces in a jigsaw/ chess board and others are moving us around. We believe we have free will but we don 't. For example if I wanted to buy a luxury yacht and sail around in any ocean I can't, only 'luxury' players in the game can do that.

Male / Female reproduction fascinates me.
How did Male develop sperm, female develop eggs, womb, fallopian tubes all at the same time to enable reproduction?

I can get my head round evolution in the sense of mammals evolving from other mammals.
But I cannot accept that complicated mammals, with wombs, eggs and sperm evolved from a single cell organisim in a puddle.

Even birds and fish laying eggs, how did that happen for the very first time?

@jjjjjjjjjjjjjjj Yes, I raised an eyebrow at that too. I'm from another country too and it's never occurred to me to think my county is the centre of everything and others are secondary. It really isn't mind blowing to me that other countries have their own cultures and famous people, because it's normal in my country to learn at least 2 foreign languages to near fluency level, and know about their associated cultures. We also get lots of subtitled films on TV from various countries.
But this thread does help to explain some of the odd comments from people when I speak my language or read in ((shock)) a different alphabet that doesn't look like English. They just can't seem to get their heads around it and ask me whether I have to translate it in English in my head (well no, because it's my first language!)

I'm also shocked at how limited western education must be. Literally every concept that is "blowing" people's minds, we learned about in late primary and early secondary school. All the existential thoughts have been the topic of literature and philosophy around the world, for centuries. Many generations of humans before us have had the same realisations and have wondered about the same things.

In evolutionary terms, all those structures werent all developed at the same time, nor more than the first photosensitive structure had a lens and muscles and retina and all the things that a mammalian or octopus'e eye has now. It starts simple then generally small changes happen if they are selected and offer an advantage and are heritable. A poor analogy as the process of natural selection and human design are fundamentally different but the first bicycle didn't have gears and the first car didn't have ABS brakes.

It must be hard living in a country so full of uneducated idiots @LutzClutz . You're brave to battle in 🙄

@SleepingStandingUp

It must be hard living in a country so full of uneducated idiots *@LutzClutz* . You're brave to battle in 🙄

😂 I was trying to think of the right response, but you nailed it!

OP I had this thought years ago and it felt weird to me too! I live in a block of 4 flats and knew the person under me, but never met the people to the side of me despite being there years. I used to think I am sleeping a metre away from you and couldn't pick you out of a line up!

Never said anyone was an idiot. Just surprised the education system doesn't seem to teach people some pretty fundamental concepts, hence all the bafflement. Others have said similar further down the thread, so I'm not the only one thinking this.

To me there's a difference between being taught something and a shift in worldview that makes your brain fizz, though. I remember when I was 14 I was learning about the early events of WWI including the sinking of the Lusitania, and it hit me like a ton of bricks that my grandmother was 14 when it actually happened. I loved history and historical stories from.a very young age but that electric sense of connection with a known fact was new. Maybe 'realisation' is a better word than 'learned'.