A great exercise that opens my mind to a multitude of remembered experiences associated with a wide variety of emotional states.  As I reflect on these memories and try to filter them with label “heightened aliveness” I struggle somewhat with the concept of aliveness itself.  What does it mean to be alive.  What does it feel like.  My only memories are of being alive and with no accessible memories of the alternative it seems unavailable to me other than in some conceptual artificial way.  There is something about duality that greases the wheels of understanding that is not accessible with aliveness.  I understand cold better in contrast to hot.  I understand dark better in contrast to light.  In fact without light, could there be of degrees of darkness.  Circling back I wonder is there are states that are more alive or is it simply increased awareness of my aliveness.
Some of  what I perceive to be my most alive moments happen in the outdoors, watching a sunset, the view from a mountain peak, floating in water.  The connection with a greater universe and a sense of time that is unmeasured; where your awareness is as a bi-product focused on the cusp between present and future, watching the sun slowly move through its phases of sunset.
Other experiences are very much as others have described.  The Adrenaline rush that David refers to brings a different sense of aliveness that seems to change my experience of time colored by an anxiousness of what the future is about to deliver.  I can also very much relate to Caroline description of her Ballroom dancing exam.  When you are performing, trying to achieve some goal, particularly with an audience time seems to take on a completely different feel.
But coming back to the question of defining heightened aliveness.  It is clear that awareness is a key ingredient to a sense of heightened aliveness but I still wonder if being more alive, in a more literal objective way,  is possible and what it might mean.
As always TSK brings me as many questions as insights.
Robert
I appreciate your description, Robert. You raise interesting, thought-provoking questions about awareness and aliveness. Can one exist without the other? Like the raffle ticket that says “must be present to win” perhaps we must be present to be aware but not to be alive (as in sleep, coma, or zoned-out distraction). Is the sense of being alive the bloom on the rose of awareness, most present when we are aware of the preciousness of life. Indifference seems to drag down both awareness and appreciation for life, but blind passion can make us feel quite alive. More questions than answers in my mind this evening (which I read somewhere is a good thing). — Michael
Love this inquiry Robert. Your right what always remains is more inquiry.
David