So, another one of Wesley's experiments goes awry. I have it on good authority that having a genius around is a serious pain in the ass, and we see this on nearly a weekly basis with everyone's favorite boy wonder.
This time, Beverly gets caught up in a static warp bubble, effectively isolating her in her own private universe. The parameters of this universe are set in motion by the last thoughts she had before she got 'zapped'. To wit: she had been talking with an old friend about the people in their lives they'd lost. Suddenly she finds herself in a situation where her worst fears are realized...everyone she cares about is disappearing.
Not being a physicist, it does take the doctor quite a while to understand what is happening. In fact, she successfully resists two attempts by the 'outside world' to retrieve her, in the form of the vortexes which erupt in front of her. Finally, however, she works it out and places herself in a position to to be ready for the third and final attempt. Time is crucial here because her warp bubble is collapsing and when it's gone, she will be no more.
I chose to take this excellent story as pure allegory and even yielded to the temptation to apply my own understanding of psychology and physics in order to fathom what the writers might have been trying to tall us. The Traveler maintains that time and space and thought are really just differing aspects of the same thing. Coming at this idea from opposite angles, today's psychologists and physicists are rapidly coming to the same conclusion.
You see, each of us is physically trapped in our own skull for the duration of our existence and we each perceive our universe in a slightly different fashion than everybody else. We are on the inside, looking out, effectively creating a mental, emotional and spiritual isolation from all of the other skulls out there very similar to the 'bubble' Beverly was confined to. Our time to figure out the nature of our predicament is limited by our brief and fleeting lifespans. In effect, our 'bubble' is collapsing from the very moment we enter it in birth. The vortexes might represent the attempts of 'other skulls' to reach us and connect. Because of the isolated nature of our minds, this can only happen via the cumbersome and oft misinterpreted medium of language, and like Beverly, we tend to most often fear and resist those attempts when they are manifested to us. Ergo, psyche wise, we don't get out much!
It seems only reasonable to me that my thoughts (perceptions, opinions, choices, etc.) are the building blocks of my personal version of reality, as they were for Beverly, and I find myself wondering if, merely by changing those thoughts, I might place myself in a position to profoundly effect what my world looks like to me. ("I just click my heels together three times and I'm back in Kansas. Can it really be that simple?")
What if I were to begin working on rethinking those mental patterns that I knew were not serving me well? What if I learned to welcome the appearance of the communication vortexes, and made every conceivable effort to catch those elusive glimpses of the next person's world, and to show them mine? Can I be contented to just sit alone in my 'bubble', waiting for it's inevitable collapse, or am I actually able to use my thoughts as real, tangible tools to make my private universe, and those of the people around me, a lot more comfortable?
Dr. Crusher's answer? "Remember me."
Retired clinical psychologist and university professor, happily married, untimate Spock fan
This time, Beverly gets caught up in a static warp bubble, effectively isolating her in her own private universe. The parameters of this universe are set in motion by the last thoughts she had before she got 'zapped'. To wit: she had been talking with an old friend about the people in their lives they'd lost. Suddenly she finds herself in a situation where her worst fears are realized...everyone she cares about is disappearing.
Not being a physicist, it does take the doctor quite a while to understand what is happening. In fact, she successfully resists two attempts by the 'outside world' to retrieve her, in the form of the vortexes which erupt in front of her. Finally, however, she works it out and places herself in a position to to be ready for the third and final attempt. Time is crucial here because her warp bubble is collapsing and when it's gone, she will be no more.
I chose to take this excellent story as pure allegory and even yielded to the temptation to apply my own understanding of psychology and physics in order to fathom what the writers might have been trying to tall us. The Traveler maintains that time and space and thought are really just differing aspects of the same thing. Coming at this idea from opposite angles, today's psychologists and physicists are rapidly coming to the same conclusion.
You see, each of us is physically trapped in our own skull for the duration of our existence and we each perceive our universe in a slightly different fashion than everybody else. We are on the inside, looking out, effectively creating a mental, emotional and spiritual isolation from all of the other skulls out there very similar to the 'bubble' Beverly was confined to. Our time to figure out the nature of our predicament is limited by our brief and fleeting lifespans. In effect, our 'bubble' is collapsing from the very moment we enter it in birth. The vortexes might represent the attempts of 'other skulls' to reach us and connect. Because of the isolated nature of our minds, this can only happen via the cumbersome and oft misinterpreted medium of language, and like Beverly, we tend to most often fear and resist those attempts when they are manifested to us. Ergo, psyche wise, we don't get out much!
It seems only reasonable to me that my thoughts (perceptions, opinions, choices, etc.) are the building blocks of my personal version of reality, as they were for Beverly, and I find myself wondering if, merely by changing those thoughts, I might place myself in a position to profoundly effect what my world looks like to me. ("I just click my heels together three times and I'm back in Kansas. Can it really be that simple?")
What if I were to begin working on rethinking those mental patterns that I knew were not serving me well? What if I learned to welcome the appearance of the communication vortexes, and made every conceivable effort to catch those elusive glimpses of the next person's world, and to show them mine? Can I be contented to just sit alone in my 'bubble', waiting for it's inevitable collapse, or am I actually able to use my thoughts as real, tangible tools to make my private universe, and those of the people around me, a lot more comfortable?
Dr. Crusher's answer? "Remember me."
Retired clinical psychologist and university professor, happily married, untimate Spock fan
