Like most people, I operate under the heuristic that if a big shiny object is headed toward me at speed, it’s best to wait for it to pass by first. Unless it turns out I’m in a dream, where I may just leap over it. I find this heuristic useful, but it’s not necessarily a reflection of any ultimate “reality.”
These are all good questions, ones that philosophy (natural and otherwise) have been trying to answer for centuries. Lots of interesting theories have been devised, but nothing conclusive so far.