Deja Vu Sydney Silver

DÉJÀ VU

Déjà vu is an experience where you feel like you have experienced the exact same situation before. The first time I had it, I was about four years old, living in Las Vegas with my dad. He had taken me and my brother to a Big Boys restaurant. We sat at the table, and an incredible feeling overtook me that I had been right there, right then, before. “Dad!” I exclaimed. “I’ve been here before! We’ve done this before!”

“You’re having Déjà vu,” he said, not concerned. But I was concerned. I had no clue what Déjà vu meant. I insisted over and over that I remembered being in that exact same spot and time and that it was a very odd feeling. But his words finally made sense to me; this was a common feeling, and one called “Déjà vu.”

There are three Déjà vus I’ve had, besides the first, which stand out and I’d like to describe. The first really strange Déjà vu, occurred when I was in college. I was on the set of a student film laying on the floor and a sun beam hit me in the face. Suddenly, I felt as if a golden tunnel opened up behind me, and in front of me. I felt as if I could see film spotlights and lighting equipment in front of me, behind me, and also in the room I was sitting in. I had the sudden strange and powerful sensation I had been on movie sets many times, and would be on them again many times in the future. This student film set and the light beam had triggered a Déjà vu that didn’t seem normal – I felt as if I could sense the future and past on a big tunnel or string, and yes, I had also been right there at that moment, before.

The second odd Déjà vu, occurred when I was ill in Williston. Could the illness have created a hallucination? Yes, but I am including it here anyway. I was in bed with Bronchitis and facing a crucial moment in my life. I was making some decisions about myself, my life, who I am, and how I will stand up for myself. It was at this moment I had an incredibly strong déjà vu. It was so strong, that I actually had a vision at the same moment. I knew I had been there before, at that moment, making that decision. However, I also felt as if I could see several lives as “me”, perhaps five of them, all slightly different due to different choices, but all converged at this exact same moment in time, which is why I remembered it so well. I couldn’t quite remember or see into those other lives I’d had as me, but I could sense them. In each of those five lives, I had made this same choice, and I felt I knew it was a very important choice that I’d made many times. I popped out of the Déjà vu in shock, wondering how many times I had lived life as me, maybe with different choices or the same choices. I wondered: When we die, can we go back to our favorite lives and re-live them, either the exact same, or with different choices? What was that all about, or was it just a hallucination from being ill? I wondered how many lives I had lived as me WITHOUT that critical choice – perhaps I had gone off in different directions entirely. Is this such a strange concept, if eternity is real?

The third Déjà vu happened recently. I was riding in a car and the déjà vu was so powerful that I stopped speaking. I almost exclaimed “Déjà vu!” but this experience was so vivid, and I remembered it so completely, even into the future a little, that I knew that was what I had done the first time. So I swallowed my words and struggled with myself inside. “Don’t say that!” I thought, “That’s what you said the first time! Try to change it!” I didn’t want to be stuck in some kind of unstoppable loop. So I remained silent a minute, dealing with this experience. Once I knew I had changed it, and was out of the déjà vu, I was able to speak. I explained to the driver that I had just had a déjà vu which I had changed!

To this day, I do not understand my déjà vu’s. They started at a young age, and have gotten more and more powerful and more like visions as I am also remembering and experiencing the Déjà vu. Scientists say that a moment can trigger a memory of a similar moment in our brain, and the memory wires cross with our current experience, thus creating the Déjà vu. I believe this is possible, and it is also possible that some of us may have chosen to live our lives before, possibly over and over if it was a favored life.

Sydney Silver is a radio show co-hostess on the Wild Man Bill Show.