Self-awareness is never a bad thing. After all, it can be most helpful when you want to get to know yourself better and understand your motivations. However, too much of anything can be detrimental. It isn’t the best thing for anyone if you’re excruciating yourself, worrying constantly, and second-guessing everything.
So, are you scared you may have hyper conscious awareness?
Hyper awareness results from extreme awareness of one’s surroundings. They also have a heightened sense of self-awareness. While being extra aware may sound good, unpleasant thoughts soon seem to invade the mind in this state. As a result, you may develop paranoia over the constant feeling of others observing you.
Hyper consciousness isn’t a mental health condition for which you may need to seek interventions unless it’s debilitating. But there are several things you can do to help. This article will tell you everything you need to know. So, keep reading.
Table of Content
What is Hyper Conscious Awareness?
Individuals who believe themselves to be hyper-aware may have increased alertness. When you are overly aware of your surroundings, you may constantly feel like someone is watching you. It can also result in overthinking some hidden dangers that often don’t exist.
It can be tough to live with because it encourages paranoia, being trapped in one’s head, mental exhaustion, and irritability, among other effects. Besides, the impact of hyper-awareness doesn’t end there.
You may sleep poorly, eat less, and feel angry, most of the time. Hyper alertness may be related to anxiety. When we feel anxious, our brain increases our sensitivity to our environment. And so, we feel more aroused and experience hyper-aroused anxiety.
Like most medical conditions, some common triggers may contribute to such episodes. These may include feelings of abandonment, claustrophobia, sudden loud sounds, the anticipation of fear and pain, emotional distress, and past traumas.
Hyper alertness may manifest itself in several forms. So, you’re looking at behavioral, physical, and even emotional symptoms. Physical symptoms look like anxiety most of the time. These may include increased heart rate, shallow breathing, and sweating.
Besides, you may also feel a little jumpy or overreact to loud noise or misunderstandings. Hyper-awareness may make you feel more defensive than usual. Your worrying can soon become persistent, and you may start thinking dichotomously.
Dichotomous thinking means boiling all your thoughts into “either” “or” responses, or black-and-white thinking. In such a scenario, you can either be completely right or wrong. These may lead you to withdraw emotionally and ultimately cause emotional outbursts.
In rare cases, you may also experience depersonalization hyper-awareness. A common trigger for such an episode is hyper-aware anxiety. Depersonalization occurs one feels as if their body and mind are separate entities. It’s when an individual may become overly aware of themselves, to the point where it seems they’re not in their bodies anymore.
Neurotransmitters of the brain seem to fire rapidly, which may trigger depersonalization. It is temporary and typically nothing to worry about once it passes.
What Causes Hyper Awareness?
Hyper self-awareness disorder isn’t a medical diagnosis, but it may show up hand-in-hand with other medical conditions.
The most common cause of hyper-awareness is anxiety. People with generalized anxiety disorder mostly experience hypervigilance in different situations.
In the case of social anxiety, heightened alertness may occur in the presence of others. It may be especially the case when you are around people you may not trust. The anxiety might also cause you to feel hyper-awareness of others and not just yourself.
There seems to be a link between social anxiety and hyper-self-awareness. Severe anxiety regarding social interactions may cause you to feel overly conscious and exacerbate it.
Sometimes people may feel overly aware of themselves, superseding the typical levels of consciousness. So, obsessive rumination may also make you more conscious of yourself sometimes.
Besides, trauma can also make you experience hyper-alertness. Traumatic experiences make us assess our surroundings for potential threats, which seems to increase in people with hyper-awareness. Hence, it is especially the case for people with PTSD.
As I’ve already mentioned, hyper-awareness may cause you to experience paranoia more than usual. Paranoia is also a symptom of schizophrenia.
People with schizophrenia may exhibit the symptoms of hyper-awareness. These people often feel like they’re under constant threat. Hallucinations are also common in schizophrenia cases, which makes hyper-alertness more severe.
There may be other causes for you to feel excessively conscious. It can also result from intrusive OCD thoughts. Spending too much time inside your head will make everything around you seem exaggerated.
Hyper-awareness may also develop when one is overly aware of their existence or body. Heightened awareness of one’s existence may stem from a sudden awareness of our mortality and fragility. Additionally, paying too much attention to bodily sensations or our body image may also lead you to experience extreme self-awareness.
So, there can be several ways and causes that you may feel hyper-awareness. But in the end, it’s important to remember that hyper-awareness may be a symptom of a more significant underlying condition.
Hyper Conscious Awareness Treatment and Coping
You may have asked yourself several questions once you started experiencing episodes of hyper-awareness. Such as, “why am I so aware of everything?” and may have wondered how to stop being too self-aware. Fortunately, there are several ways you can manage it.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)
CBT can often be significantly helpful with anxiety cases. If you feel that your hyper-awareness is triggered by anxiety mostly, you can choose to seek professional help. But you must consult a professional before choosing a definite treatment option.
You may be assigned homework and exercises to help subside your symptoms of hyper-awareness. CBT focuses on changing your unhealthy thoughts into more functional ones. In the therapy sessions, you may speak about your past trauma and get to the root of your problem.
Exposure Therapy
This option is best for people with PTSD. Exposure therapy involves exploring your trauma under controlled and non-threatening circumstances. You’ll learn how to manage your flashbacks, nightmares, and severe cases of anxiety. It may develop over a few months. But exposure therapy is typically very effective.
Medication
You must pay a visit to the doctor’s office before you start taking any medication. But typically, your mental healthcare provider may prescribe some medications like anti-depressants or non-addictive anxiety medications to cope with your condition better.
Coping Strategies
You can consider including a few coping strategies if your hyper-awareness isn’t on a more severe level. These strategies may help you function better in your day-to-day life.
- Exercise regularly. Working out releases hormones that are good for your body and brain. While your physical health improves, you can also expect your mental health to spiral upward.
- Try taking a break. When things get overwhelming, you could dance to some upbeat music or try some yoga. Meditation also helps.
- Practice breathing exercises. These will help you calm your mind and body when experiencing an episode. Deep breaths will also decrease the physiological side effects you may experience.
- Talk your feelings out. Make the best use of your social support system. Consider letting someone you trust know of these episodes. Relying on your support system can be the best form of release during these times.
It can be challenging but remember that you are in control of your situation. You decide where you may direct your attention. When things seem too much in focus, happy thoughts will help.
FAQs
- Can you be overly self-aware?
Yes, you can be overly self-aware at times. Critically evaluating yourself isn’t a bad thing necessarily. It helps you look at things more objectively and give insight. But constantly being too self-aware is common and can, unfortunately, be very unhealthy.
- What is hyper-self awareness?
Hyper self-awareness is when one feels severely aware of themselves and their existence. It also means that one remains preoccupied with thoughts more than usual. Additionally, consistent patterns may lead to other mental health conditions such as anxiety, chronic stress, and other disorders.
- How do I stop being so hyper-conscious?
Hyper-consciousness can be tough to manage but not an impossible task. You may seek professional help or can try coping strategies like breathing exercises, forming a routine, and voicing your concerns out loud.
- What is a hyper-aware person?
A hyper-aware person may look like someone who worries excessively about their surroundings and seems to process them more than others. They may spend too much time in their head, feel anxiety, and notice more detail than a typical individual.
Final Words
Hyper conscious awareness has the potential to make our lives debilitating. However, you may help your case by trying out the key pointers this article previously gave. Remember that you control what you choose to feel and let in.
You decide how long you can spend inside your head and let anxiety take the wheel. So, I hope you are more informed by sticking around till the end.
