Aphantasia: Seeing the world without a mind's eye | Tamara Alireza | TEDxGoodenoughCollege
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- Опубликовано: 29 июн 2016
- Defining aphantasia
Tamara is half Saudi and half Mexican, born in London and raised in Los Angeles. She has many interests, from travel and cooking at Le Cordon Bleu to singing at weddings. With a double masters of neuroscience from UCL and Université Pierre et Marie Curie Paris, she is currently finishing her neuroscience PhD at Imperial College London, conducting Parkinson’s disease research.
Tamara discovered 9 years ago she had aphantasia and has keenly pursued the topic ever since. With the help of the TEDx platform and its audience, she wishes to spread the word about aphantasia, as it is such a new subject that most people are completely unaware of, in order to determine more about how many people have it and whether any correlations may be drawn between them.
This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at ted.com/tedx
I have total Aphantasia and I've been living my entire life thinking everybody imagined things the same way I did, the image was all black.
Edit: I've always thought that counting sheep was a metaphor. I didn't know that people actually visualised sheep.
Me too
You never dreamed? And I always thought it was a metaphore as well but I can still visualize...
If I thought of an elephant I could put a rough draft of what it would look like on paper, and it wouldn't be a bunch of random scribbles..... and if I can do that I can visualize in my head......
If this type of thing was truly as severe as it sounds a drawing of an elephant would look like a bunch of scribbles... or at best a trunk... 4 legs and a body but not even remotely in the right place, not until all the parts were drawn would the aphantasia person b able to then assemble it from basic knowledge and common sense.
However if you draw a picture of an elephant and all the pieces are in the right place even if it looks like a 2 year old drew it.... you are visualizing...
No one see's perfect vivid images on the back of their eyes lids or even in their head... they're just memories.....
so true !
THE SHEEP ONE ☝️ I LIVED MY WHOLE LIFE A LIE
I DONT EVEN HAVE DREAMS GODDAMMIT. I HAD THEM LIKE 7 YEARS AGO AND THEY WERE STILL FACTUAL. NO IMAGE.
When I learned that Aphantasia was a thing, I was dumbfounded. My entire life, whenever someone said "Picture it in your mind" I always treated it like a figure of speech. You can't actually conjure up an image. Nobody could. Therefore I followed along, never understanding why I couldn't keep up.
Exactly. I always thought the same thing. Like when they would say: "Picture this...."
Same
SAME
SAME!!!
DRockeh can you give me your Facebook ? I really want to talk to you
Am I the only one who actually cried when they heard of this? I want to be able to see things in my mind too.
Juliana Manuel same. Just thinking that I will never be able to do that is just sad.
What do you do when you day dream?????
No you don't :((
Look up "image streaming" invented by Win Wenger, his book has a lot of methods to provoke the images. I was really struggling at first, but that's just the hump you have to get over and then it's pretty easy from there.
@@Ole_Rasmussen So you're saying that you solved your aphantasia and can now visualise?
I'm 32 and I just discovered I had this a few weeks ago. It's not like learning I have a disorder, it's more like discovering that most people have a super power that I don't have.
I'm in highschool and I discovered I had Aphantasia yesterday and I would describe it the exact same way
Same here! I'm 56 and I discovered this after looking deeper into something Jordan Peterson mentioned. Like most people posting here, I didn't see it as a problem - just something I wasn't very good at. I mean, I'm not very good at playing the piano - but there's no special name for that condition, is there :) :)
And I don't dream. At all. I go to bed, think for a while, fall asleep and then later wake up. None of this "I was back at school taking a test and I realized I was wearing no trousers" stuff for me
Ikrr
@@babybat479 thank god atleast I dream
I'm a professional artist with aphantasia. I think in words and concepts and always assumed that people were just exaggerating when they said they saw vivid images in their minds. Now I wonder if I'd be more successful if I could imagine things the way others do. When it comes to work, I cant picture what Im going to make, I think of it as a concept and hope that it works in the end, and I use a lot of reference photos when doing realistic work. I feel like I am good at what I do, but cant get to the point of being really great at it.
I would love to see your work.
Same but i m not professional
I'm also an artist. Just now realizing I have aphantasia. I have a vivid conceptual imagination, but have no mental imagery. I always use reference photos. My work often comes out very different from my imagination. I think its great that we have both challenged ourselves to pursue visionary expression!!
I'm not a professional, but I have a knack for drawing. I have the same problem where I can't visualize what I want to draw. I have to talk out what I think would be interesting to see on the page and then draw it. I often have to use references for things I haven't drawn several times.
Same. Draw a lot.
I’m very angry that people can see things when they close their eyes. I thought when people said to “imagine” that they meant to think what would happen not to imagine it happening. I still have a very good memory though
you don't need to close your eyes to visualize..... noone sees anything on the back of their eyelids unless they're on LSD.
If I told you to remember what red looks like.... would it bother you until you went and found something that was red?
Like trying to remember how a song goes..... it gives you an anxiety until you play it and you say OH YEAHHHH.
If I were to say RED....... and you try to think of red.... would it bother you until you went and saw a picture of somethign that was red? I find that hard to believe. If this was the case it would impede soooo many things in life.
It's not always that great, for example me being uncapable of not imagining things in my head, whenever I read or listen to murder stories or about abuse or any negative stuff, I see very disturbing and vivid images about such story, and cannot unsee them, so as with everything else there are pros and cons.
@upplsuckimcool16 I can't visualize the color red, but I know what it is and can recognize it when I see it. For me, imagining a color is the same as imagining something like air. There is the associaton with the word and what it is, but I don't "see" it. I guess that's how it works for others with Aphantasia too.
upplsuckimcool16 this is completely different. My memory is great but I cannot create an image in my head. Some people can create an almost near real movie reel in their head.
We see it when our eyes are open too, it just overlaps and our attention jumps between both. We can distinguish them as mind images, where schizo are lost in that world. Maybe you still have other sensations like thinking of smells, tastes, or remembering what a pain feels like? Or how about hearing memories in your head, like a song? I feel we are being screwed with because everyone dreams.
Anyone else getting this in their reccs after watching a vid about ppl not having an internal monologue?
yessir
Aye. The wonders of YT's algorithm.
Yes!
My goshhh.. Yes.
Yup
I love to read. It's my absolute favorite thing to do. And when people said to me that when they're reading, it's "like seeing a movie in their heads", I thought they meant metaphorically, like, "it's as fun as watching a movie", or something like that. It took me years to understand that people actually see images in their heads when they're reading a novel. And it makes me feel kinda sad that I don't have that. But I think I just enjoy books differently. For me, it's not the visual aspect of it that matters, but the emotions portrayed. I feel the "atmosphere" of the scenes with much more intensity, because I have to experience the concepts involved in them, rather than just "picture" them in my head. I don't know if this will make any sense for y'all phantastic weirdos, but I'm sure my fellow aphantastics will relate.
Don't feel sad. You're mind just works differently.
I do relate to this. Its like each book gives me a feelings. All of them has different "flavours". The type of feeling i get whsn i go to a beautiful forest. I feel the same thing when im reading about a forest.
don't feel sad. Imagine having to limit your imagination to a simple picture or series of pictures. To me, it seems limiting. If a picture speaks a thousand words, then a picture without a picture tells a life-story.
@@TruthSausage Thanks, Chris! That was a beautiful way of putting it.
Same with movies
Camera movement, lensing, editing don't really affect me, the performance of the actor greatly does
I don’t visually see things in my head, I only hear my brain describing it in words.
Lacee Burke yup
I can visualize things but usually very poorly. It's just not natural to me.
When people say: Visualize an elephant for example I usually just don't and just know that elephants are the new topic.
But I have always imagined sounds, music and language in my head.
Gnuling I wake up with a song in my head almost everyday.
I do both very poorly.
I read that some ppl don't have inner voices 🙈 blew my mind honestly
I don't have aphantasia, and I don't need to close my eyes to imagine things. I can see a lot of images in my mind still with my eyes open. But it's nothing that overshadows your vision while you are still with your eyes open. It's like you can see both at the same time.
Yeah! Especially when I'm listening to music
Ju Hill
I can’t visualize it such that I can see it vividly, but I could kinda imagine it based on my memories. I can visualize it more clearly when my eyes are open as I can use surrounding objects as a base.
Wha how do you all do that im missing soo much ...
@juhill that is called hyperphantasia
@@ximirux2408 you can try to learn drawing or sculpting. You can develop this ability.
When I read a book I can't picture the characters. They are just words on a page. I still would get lost on my college campus after being there three years.
J
me too
to me theyre mostly like an internal monologue. If I make a conciouss effort I can kinda feel the movement and the sounds and stuff
I have a clear visualisation and I experience the exact same thing. The human brain can't produce new faces, hence why all your dreams feature faces you've seen in your real life. As for getting lost though, I think that would indicate a poor spacial imagination rather than a poor visualisation, right? (Which I definitely have lol no engineering career for me I guess.) I find my mind is more inclined to think of things verbally or emotionally or just like the physical feeling of being there, but I can defo be visual if I try. Anyone else feel this?
J
I can’t imagine characters, or really much.
I can read, and I think that I’m visualizing it pretty well, but then ask me what color hair a character has, I wouldn’t know. What are they wearing? I wouldn’t know. But I’m visualizing them, but I don’t know anything about their outward appearance.
@@venomissocute3448
Are you saying that, if i told you to picture a dog, you wouldn't be able to tell me if its small or big? What color? If its a real dog or a dog that you never seen?
Can you create things in your mind? Would you be able to draw your dreamhouse for example? How are your dreams? What do you "see"? How's the experience of reading? It's hard? Do you get lost? Can you create/invent a story?
I'm just trying to understand better how aphantasia works
I'm 47 and it wasn't until last week did I know I have aphantasia. I was listening a CBC's Quirks and Quarks podcast. They way they were describing mental images was completely foreign to me. I was asking my wife about and she (and apparently most people) can actually see visual images when they close their eyes. I can't. The best I get is fleeting vague grey shapes. I do create mental constructs. I can tell you what my teenage bedroom was like. I can draw a map or a picture of it. If I go to Photoshop and can pick out the colour of my bed. But, I can definitely NOT close my eyes and create a visual image of it. Up until last week that is how I thought everybody was.
It blows my mind seeing people in the same boat as me, it was last year when I found out (34 years old), and I actually just told some of my coworkers about this and it blew their minds.
Hi Rob, it is great to have a name for this isn't it! Would you be willing to take a test to see where you rate on the imagery scale? If so send me an email to tamsinash@hotmail.com and I will send you one.
Rob Bradshaw im 38 and have it. only I haven't always been like this. I can remember knowing that I could remember images.
i'm 32 and just found out.
life just gets weirder and weirder
This baffles me to no end. I turned 30 a few months ago and only found out i had this about a month later. How come we had not realized this earlier.
I get so frustrated with my aphantasia. My favorite thing is my imagination, reading, writing, making up scenarios, it’s so hard not being able to actually see those things except in my dreams
That’s how I am too. I spend a lot of time daydreaming but I can’t really see anything
Some people have non-visual dreams as well. I guess at least you have that?
I was 53 when I found out other people actually see things in their mind. I’ve lived 53yrs without it bothering me because I thought everyone was the same. Still doesn’t bother me because I’ve never known any different and along with the good would come the bad, such as seeing all your past failures, traumatic events, embarrassing moments etc etc
I don’t have visual dreams either, or at least extremely rarely, so maybe that makes it easier
I am 61 and just finding out about this. It explains a lot. I loved my parents, but after they passed I felt very little emotion. I could not picture them in my mind. Without their images it's as if their memories have disappeared from my mind. I have to look at pictures to generate the memories.
I could never picture faces but I could describe them. This makes me sad
I'm 26 and lost my entire family this year.. and I'm having the same thing happen. I can't picture them without a photo and it's been destroying me. I carry around so many pictures now
I cannot imagine faces as well. Lucky for us we live in a time in which color photography exists. :)
As i m wth aphntasia i coudnt create imges, some time i feel i m less attached to my relationships, all though i love them, i used to think i m suffering with apathy bt got to knw about aphantasia
But one positive side is i can deal with such instances that i lost everythng, all of my reltnshp, silly things doesnt bother me
@@singhcreation3800 Similar here!
I like imagine things in my head but i dont actually see them? Do y’all actually SEE SEE things? Thats crazy
@banana sugar Yes i have that too, like i feel it and i kinda see it but its not like i can imagine an apple and see it when i close my eyes. Its there but its not actually there
Not see with your eyes like you do when you look around, but like you hold and image in your mind and it’s like you can see it. This is really strange to explain.
just like people say they can "hear" their inner monologue, they dont actually hear it unless they have psychosis or something, people can imagine seeing things, but not actually see them
@@ThatDamnBlonde you want to try meditation while opening ur 3rd eye, blank ur mind, it could take 15 mins or so, dont worry if thoughts come just let them go, u may then get visions that u can see with ur mind, i also cant see things when i normaly close my eyes and also have to think in word form but through meditation i have had some wonderful experiences. try it, i feel that ppl who cant picture things may have more of ability to see visions. gl.
The images are supposed to be near where your thoughts are. Like how your thoughts don't effect your vision at all?? Neither does the "mental image." It's all literally in your head.
The hardest part for me as a child was going to camp for a few weeks and then not remembering what my parents or sister looked like and even after being back with them I still couldn’t remember their faces. It sort of makes you feel a little less connected with people. Especially in bad times when you can’t actually remember what anyone you love looks like. It’s so embarrassing seeing someone who introduced to you recently and then you don’t know their name because you don’t remember their face.
I feel like I can remember that I know I have seen them just can’t retrieve the name instantly I have to talk my self to when and where I could have met them to bring up the conversation in my head
I am pretty sure that is a different disability called face blindness.
@@DerXavia No. I’ve looked into that because I thought it might have been. Face blindness is much more serious and you don’t recognize anyone. Your brain physically can’t recognize people so you have to learn to recognize people situationally and by their voice.
It can also be brought on by brain damage. Where as Aphantasia they believe comes from an underdeveloped part of the brain or from a very mild form of autism.
@@DerXavia That's prosopagnosia. Where damage to the fusiform gyrus of your temporal lobe makes you lose your capacity for recognising faces, but you recognise them my name or their voice..only their face seems unfamiliar.
I found out two days ago that I have Aphantasia and been feeling bummed out for all the things I feel like I've missed in regards of experiencing life. However, "looking" back at all my achievements, I do feel proud of myself for breaking boundaries I wasn't even aware existed; I am an architect :)
Hey I don’t know if you’ll see this but I’m curious. I found out yesterday that I have this… I think. But during the video she mentions it ruling out being an architect right, but as per how mine works and given the fact you’ve succeeded, I do feel it’s possible. Like are you able to build architectural constructs in your mind? It just doesn’t have an image accompanying it? Because I feel like that’s what I do but there doesn’t seem to be any mention of that elsewhere.
That’s excellent, cheers!
I wondered how someone with aphantasia would choose to express themselves in a an art form.
If you don’t mind, what sort of buildings do you work on?
I have synesthesia and was dating a guy with aphantasia. It was really interesting how we both saw the world so differently. Both of us could never picture each other's face, he said he'd look at a photo of me while we talked on the phone, while to me his voice just triggered an orange and green swirl. We went for walks through the park discussing how we'd remember it. And we both hadn't been aware of our "differences" until our early 30s.
I just found out about this today. I didn’t know people could actually visualize things in their mind and really see them. I see total darkness😩. I had such a hard time in school when my teachers told me to visualize the math problem 🤦🏽♀️
omg same!
oof I was luckily pretty good at math naturally, so I didn't run into that conundrum, but that sounds awful.
I don't see anything either when imagining something but I'm good at math. :D
I don't think I have it, but controling imagination ( into visualizing specific things in cue is a different story.) Reading, or listening to descriptions make things into perspective.
I'm at a loss for words. I literally just stumbled across this and now I find out my very textual way of "visualising" is not "normal".. When someone says "picture blar blar" I literally just talk to myself in my head giving the item, place etc a few sentance description. Your visualise the beach question went something like this for me....
"ok she wants me to visualise a beach, ok. well there is sand that's yellowish with a slope down to the water that has some waves. Oh she said picture a chair ok there is a chair wait no now she said towel ok towel it is so I'm on a towel on sand that slopes gently to the water and it's hot... Apparently..and I guess the water can be a nice clear blue like I've seen before but who knows maybe it's an ugly green colour"
Am I really bad or is that just like you?
I saw nothing. I see black.
Ben Clarke haha this really made me laugh (sorry to sound incentive Ben), only because I completely understand your description, exactly 😂
"I see black" haha, I'm the same, you can chat to yourself all day but in the end "I see black" too! How frustrating for us all knowing there's this whole other magical kingdom of fantasy imagery out there, everyone else can see it yet we can't see it! Oh well, we're all we're and wonderful I guess 😊
Chris Atherton I thought I was the only one, black is all in my mind
Same with me. I'm 17 years old and I read about this "condition" (lol) one week ago. Now I understand why i cant see anything during meditations
I'm the exact same way.
Found out I had it too several minutes ago
A beach...a beach...A Beach...A BEach...A BEAch...A BEACh...A BEACH...A BEACH FOR HEAVEN SAKE PLS JUST GIMMI A BEACH!!! T-T
Haha seim
:(
Do you have dreams at night?
My mom will say to herself “I’m at the beach I’m at the beach I’m at the beach” because “if I say it enough eventually it’ll be true”
Awe :(
I have aphantasia. Whenever I try to visualize anything, I end up narrating what is happening with words. I used to get so frustrated with guided meditations because I could never see what they were describing. Also if I close my eyes and imagine a color, like purple for example, I will only hear the word purple and other facts such as purple is made with red and blue. Sometimes in my dreams I’m able to visualize but most of the time it’s like my mind works in audio book format.
So interesting!
Yeah, I would think “purple purple purple “ and just accept the general feeling of purple without seeing it
Finally someone described it the way I “see” it in my head. I can’t visually see things in my head I only hear my brain describing how it should be.
Aphantasia is mostly not being able to voluntarily imagining something. Most who have it can still see in their dreams.
thats insane
I was 23 when I went off in various meditation groups ‘do you all see the images, I can’t see them’. Now I am 53 and finally there is the answer!
Agree, I had the same problem... I tried very hard to imagine in my meditation class.
I think this needs a proper study. In school I was totally left out when asked to visualise something. Everyone was closing their eyes and going through some guided meditation and i opened my eyes because it was like staring at a brick wall with no features. I didn't fuly realise at the time how nobody else had my mental block. Only now at the age of 30 am I actually exploring this fact. I have always had a terrible memory and this explains why i believe. I have to use audio cues and verbal cues to reach specific memories. They talk about visual, audio and kinesthetic learners, about autism and mental disabilities etc. Where was my support when I struggled to remember things? Over a century since this was discovered and only NOW are we getting recognised. After years of being anxious and neurotic because I forgot stuff, like names and faces, do we achknowledge that maybe, just maybe, It's how I'm frigging wired and not because I'm lazy?!?!
I will admit though, i do have auditory imagination, so I don't have it the worst. Still, what I wouls give to be able to SEE in my mind and not hear songs i hate on repeat for hours. Life sucks sometimes when abba won't get out of your head. And I don't mean that figuratively, it's really distracting.
let's not hate on abba :o
And now I have Waterloo blasting in my mind. 😂
It has nothing to do with you not remembering anything. I have a great memory, but I can't recall sound, taste, touch, emotion, or pictures and I was born without a sense of smell. I am sure it didn't help with not being able to remember things. But it has nothing to do with terrible memory over all. First off, people forget like 90% of what they learn, that is normal. But, if you are struggling with trying to remember things, I would look into why. Aphantasia has nothing to do with not remembering things. You just can't voluntarily recall imagines. Unless the only thing you struggle with is just faces and names. With faces, that is a very specific thing called Prosopagnosia.
I think it's funny so many have to close their eyes and "try" to visualize.
It takes zero effort for me, complete reflex, say something, and immediately there is an image in my mind, the more I know about that thing spoken of, the clearer that image becomes. Eyes open the whole time.
It's like I have a 2nd monitor plugged in.
Oh god now my brain is imagining Justin Bieber’s baby
I am 40 and just learned about this today. This 100% describes me and I never realized I was different. I just innocently googled not being able to see images when meditating and now I feel so confused. I truly thought “seeing” something in your mind was a figure of speech. I rely on facts to create the idea of the image but don’t actually “see” the image.
Found this out at 30! Mind blown. I always felt so different and also wondered why I couldn’t do simple guided meditations. Well my aphantasia friends, transcendental meditation is the way. Breath work.
Energy work. I work psychically - it’s not a hinderance at all. 🎉❤
Can you explain more on this., which meditation works.. guided meditation not working.
@@buchibabub1189 breath work, reiki, daydream, nature, transcendental meditation (google it). These are the things you should play with. Let your child mind run free. We didn’t come here to play by their rules, we came here to show them the true human capabilities. X
I got to know that I've got Aphatasia quite some years ago. I described to a friend how I prefer movie adaptions to their original books, because I can see the world described coming to life... well, I was in for a huge surprise when we continued talking and she told me that there really is an image in her mind that she can change however she wants... I then asked my whole family and realized I'm the only one without the ability to imagine clear images... When I try to imagine something, it's like I can see some smudge that looks somewhat like what I wanted to see, but even this smudge is only "visible" for a split second.
65 and never realised i have this.
I have very vivid dreams but i can't picture what people are telling me i need to see it in the tangible.
When i close my eyes i see colour and as i think of a colour the colours change each time to the colour i think of.
Does this explain why ive never have an imaginary friend when i was younger and everyone thought that was weird
same
I have aphantasia, and I have had and still have imaginary friends. It's less about "seeing" them and more about knowing they're there and sensing presences and touch.
Hannah_5634 this is weird because when I was young, I had an imaginary friend, but she was never completely there. I remember always struggling to keep her in the room with me until I eventually gave up and she disappeared. I never thought people had actual imaginary friends like 3D people, I thought they were like me with a slightly clearer picture. After a few months, she faded away and never returned. I think that even back then I didn’t know what she looked like. She was barely an outline to me, and now she’s gone
I had an imaginary friend and I am aphantasic.
I've never had one either yet i can clearly visualise images in my mind.
I am an architect, and I had aphantasia all my life. I "imagine" without an image, I "imagine" concepts, not images of what I am designing.
“...who use an entirely different brain mechanism to accomplish the same task.”
I love this quote and how it frames things
I have Aphantasia. I asked my son if he was the same. This was his reply: "I can picture an apple, I can touch it, taste it, smell it, I can hear the slight hollow sound of tapping on it ". I was blown away! Until a week ago I never knew this existed.
Same here. It's very disconcerting to learn that you have lived your entire life hot knowing you should be able to do something that you can't.
@@tamaracollins176exactly, same here. It’s also very depressing, my whole life I’ve felt very “bored” and now I’ve found out people can imagine, see, taste, smell things in their mind its made me think how much more empty my life really is
@@PIXELGamerzXvlogsSad to hear that 😢. Hope you're doing well
I found out I have Aphantasia when my 3rd grade teacher told everybody to close their eyes and visualize stuff. I was confused at how everyone else was able to see stuff while I wasn't. It took me some years to realize that this is an actual condition.
I have Aphantasia too. But technically I have the other conditions they haven’t named yet where you also don’t recalls sounds, smells, or touch in my mind “ear/nose/skin” either. This one is harder for me to grasp. I remember being in choir and the director saying, “hear the notes in your head before singing...,” similar to the “close your eyes and ...” thinking what in the world are they all talking about. Glad to see so many comments of people who also process the world similarly.
I never knew this was even a thing. It makes me kind of sad because i love being able to visualize things in my head, future events, fictional events, daydream when I’m bored, etc
I can visualize things in my mind, but for some reason they never stay still. I can't picture anything without some kind of movement in it. If I try, the image starts rotating or twisting on its own. I also can't imagine anything in the first person. All of my dreams and daydreams involving myself are always from a vantage point outside my body.
blackkittyfreak me too,100% accuracy
omg me too. I actually don't see in 1st person in my dreams and when I imagine stuff. I see in like 3rd person in my imagination 😂
Same for me with the moving. When I think of like a stack of paper or something, it often falls over.
Estoy en la misma situación
I am also like this. Is there a name for it? For year I've had it and I don't know why it happens
There are people who have no internal dialogue either. The mind is so fascinating.
It must be very painful to lose your ability to lose your mind's eye. Mine is extremely vivid, and I couldn't imagine losing it. From the two people I know who have aphantasia, they have had it all their lives, and it doesn't bother them that much, because they don't miss what they don't know. In fact, the woman I know who has it says that she can watch movies over and over again and never get bored because she retains no visual memory of the movie.
I used to have borderline hyperphantasia until a couple of decades ago. From mental imagery so vivid it was hard to distinguish from reality (complete with minor tactile senses and perfect audio senses; never any tastes or smells), to utter darkness with the inability to even conjure the fuzziest of images.
It's because of this that I can no longer do math of any kind without seriously trying (and still struggling); I used to watch it solve itself in my mind, putting in zero mental effort, faster than people could punch numbers on a calculator.
To say that my life has suffered and felt empty since then would be a drastic understatement.
Any idea what caused this change? Any changes since this post?
damn so you’re telling me as someone who was born with aphantasia that I’m missing out on alot 🫠🫠😃😀
@@alexmack956Mind fog affects it. I had mind fog for almost a week until 3 days ago. It felt like I can't think at all. It's hard to put things in words. It's like going from 100% to 50% real quick in any cognitive ability.
I was today years old when I found out I have Aphantasia.
This is incredible. I had no idea that people could even live without visual imagery. My world is constant pictures and memories of past and present playing like movies in my head. I have severe P.T.S.D. I can only imagine not having to re-live real life recreations of trauma in my mind every hour of every day. I can see, smell, feel and experience the scenes as sure as if I had lived them that morning. I can picture days from my childhood, where I was standing, how the weather was, where other people were standing, what was said, how I felt, just like I was right back there. I had no idea not everyone experienced this.
It sounds like you experience "Hyperphantasia." I'm sure it can be troublesome at times.
It can get better. It did for me. I don't know how it can for you, but for me, writing down things about it, and admitting some things to myself I had been refusing to, did a lot of the work.
I am 61 years old and I only found out that I suffer from aphantasia last year, when I was researching for" autobiographical memory disorders" on the internet, I have very very few souvenirs of my own life and I discovered that it could be a reason... I may have made three quarters of my way through this life, and the book of my memories is made up of 90 % blank pages. It's both very painful and very difficult to explain, the few people I've talked to obviously don't understand what I mean, their answer is: "If you've forgotten, it's because you were not really interested...".
You don't even know how lucky you are...
I can feel, like i know what would it be like if i give my sister a hug, and remember how she walk and can imagine she walking, but I can't picture her face, just remember, and it's still not like I'm looking to a picture of her
Those people re-live traumas and bad memories as well, not being able to imagine is not a gift. Imagination is one of the most wonderful habilities one can have.
You must have hyperphantasia as someone mentioned. When a person can imagine things very vividly. I'm so sorry things are hard for you, and don't take it personally, but as someone with poor imagination abilities I would trade mine with yours in a heartbeat, even if that meant vividly seeing all my traumas.
Imagination is wonderful, not a curse, use it for good and imagine a better life for yourself.
Thanks for publishing this. I was close to 40 when I realized people we not speaking metaphorically when they would say to “visualize” something. I have yet to meet another person who experiences life this way so it was great to see you talk about it so well.
I feel lucky to have found out i have this at the age of 14
Christopher Kim me too ... I’m 16 and I’m having a crisis, but if I was like 25+ I’d probably loss all sense of reality
Haha 13 gotem
Im 12 and this is making me feel horrible, like I have been cheated from some aspect of life hte others can enjoy but I cannot
I'm 20 and just found out a couple days ago... It kinda sucks but also explains a lot 🤷♀️
@@Dylan-dh9ji try to learn drawing/scuplting. This thing should develop
I’m a maladaptive daydreamer, a writer, and generally someone obsessed with creating imaginary worlds inside my head. I have a condition called synesthesia, where things like words, numbers, months, and even music brings up vivid colors inside my brain. I have an amazingly accurate and lengthy photographic memory that allows me to remember visuals well, and I often spend hours of my life in my own mind just reliving my memories in full detail. My mind was absolutely BLOWN when I figured out that Aphantasia existed... because if there’s actually one thing I physically can’t imagine for the life of me, it’s living life without my mental images and creations. They make up so much of my world.
That's so cool, I have aphantesia but I can "hear" sounds in my head so for me daydreaming was playing voices and music to entertain myself. I'm also a writer and reader, words have always been concepts for me so it's weird to think that people connect words to images!
You know what's weird, I technically am a maladaptive day dreamer but I have aphantasia. I listen to music, pace in my room, and think to myself about scenarios. I never realised it was meant to be an image though, I believed it was just a thought or script that I relived and changed over and over again. Weird huh? I didn't know people saw images.
My experience exactly. If I can’t sleep at night I just pick my favorite trail in the mountains snd go for a run. I can see every tree, rock, root, hear every bird, smell the pine air. Just like watching a movie. And March is purple, BTW.
great way to make us aphantasics even more depressed than we already are…
@@quirkworks4076wow… i feel so envious…
As a highly creative, very imaginative person (artist, writer, and avid reader), it is astounding to try to understand how this kind of neurology works. It's amazing and incredible to hear it described so well by someone who doesn't understand the "other" side of things. Fascinating!!
I learned I could not visualize things at the age of 57. I was so confused because I dream all night , very vividly, and some are horrible. So I want to stop the constant dreaming and be one of those people that can visualize while I'm awake.
[EDIT: I wrote this before she talked about it and now I'm blown away...]
I was talking to someone about Harry Potter and they were saying that they disliked the movies because the characters looked so different from what they had imagined. I was very confused since I did not (nor do I now) try to imagine how characters I read about would look. It just didn't occur to me that that was a thing. Then I just forgot about it quickly but now I think there might be more to it...
For the last year or so I also began to realize that I can't imagine my face doing stuff. I can recall my face from memory (from some time I looked in the mirror) for a split-second before it vanishes and if I concentrate really hard I can think of some details but what I can never do is imagine "how does my face look right now". It came from a completely different direction though: I was thinking about my non-existing social skills, especially how I'm incapable of picking up non-verbal language and I thought "I wonder what non-verbal signals I'm sending" and then I realized I had no idea nor could I imagine what my face was doing.
Aww, I feel sorry for you people that have aphantasia. I didn't realize it was so prevalent. Imagination is something I've always taken for granted. I'm very grateful now.
I remember discussing my inability to visualize objects with a friend many years ago, and it is incredible to finally understand that I'm not insane or the only one.
I knew from a fairly young age (8 or so) that other people had images in their head and I didn't, but I was really excited to see there is an actual name for it.
when i first learned about this a while about i was so baffled but everything made sense. i always thought the phrase "a book will transport you" was like a figure of speech. i never knew that people could actually create *images* in their mind, like looking at a picture. but then i felt so sad because i loved to read but it was hard because i would find myself skimming and not exactly knowing what's going on because there was no picture to guide me. i felt so left out when my whole family could see in their head to an extent except me, left in total darkness.
My husband found out he has aphasia just a few months ago. We have been blown away by how much this explains. There's always been something different about the way he processes events, memories, plans. I'm thankful for this.
I can't imagine being unable to hold images in my mind. It's one of the most delightful human skills I possess
This really really explains why I have never ever liked reading books, and why I have never been able to meditate, and how I have never been good at test taking
You don’t need to be able to picture things to meditate. If you have an internal monologue just observe your thoughts and focus on your breath.
Well, it's not necesary like that. I have aphantasia but I love books. it's very hard reading them tho
@@juli3836 what about books with illustrations or comics?
while I was in college studying architecture, i could never understand how people think how the design would look like at the end. I just had to try different variations and see. Then i found out about aphantasia couple weeks ago. I’m devastated that I have no imagination at all.
I just learned about aphantasia and I am in my 70s. There have been times, in books or articles, they talked about a mental image and I just couldn't do it. If I try, it is like there is a slick curved glass wall blocking my brain image mechanism. It is nice to know there is a name for this condition and it explains so much!
Wow reading this comment section I realized that wow I'm not alone, so many people know what it's like and reading it and it's just making me cry lol
I always thought that mind’s eye was a fantastical idea.
maybe you can try to stimulate your pineal gland
Wow. Tamara has just described me to a tee. Especially when she says that she does not recognise people she does not know well, but picks up on their mannerisms.
I don't even have aphantasia and I have the recognition problem. xD
This is a really great explanation. I’ve seen comments where people say if you don’t actually literally see the mental picture. I can definitely visualize imagery very clearly.
I can totally relate when she talked about watching a move made from a book she had read. I was never able to imagine the characters either, but enjoyed the stories and the emotions very much. I also didn't get it when people would talk about the characters being different than they imagined. Wow.
Same
Before I found out I have aphantasia I thought everyone couldn't do it .
so did I :-)
Sadira Reinstar question? Can you imagine smell? I can’t And I want to know if it’s normal
@@MaladyKayjo some people above said they can imagine smell but cant imagine visual content) But I think smell is one of the most exotic abilities.
This is truly fascinating. I'm 35 and have often wondered how other people visually imagine things compared to my own "blank canvas" experience. It's so nice to know that I'm not the only one who thinks like this.
I have quite an interesting observation however. I personally cannot imagine images in my mind, whether they're conjured from my fictional "imagination" or from past experience, yet when I dream; IN the dream I can see clearly the images and movies of that dream. When I wake, I cannot picture them again and they're moved back to how I perceive every other "image" - which is more of a feeling rather than an actual image.
Does anybody else with Aphantasia dream in imagery?
this is common with some aphantasics, they are able to visualise only in dreams. I cannot visualise at all, so we are all different.
I have maybe remembered ten dreams in sixty years..
That's crazy. It's like there's some sort of disconnect happening in the brain. You're brain is clearly capable of generating images, just not when you're conscious.
@@anteconfig5391 I’m going to experiment with my aphantasia I have 0 visualization but I can start visualizing on a 1 out of 10 vividness sometimes hitting a 3 randomly I basically when I go to sleep allow my self to start letting my mind loose. I’ll lay down and let my brain let loose I will think of everything and nothing and allow my brain to just shoot random images then I slow it down and start controlling and think of certain things as I’m falling asleep constantly reminding my self not to fall asleep near the part of unconsciousness I’m able to visualize things I want to see it’s very hard sometimes my eyes try to look and the visualization disappears. I mustn’t move my eyes and stay relax and I can visualize a 2 or 3 in vividness no real color sometimes a flash of the color I can stay in this state of mind until I fall asleep maybe I can exercise it?
@@TheWorldWarrior Nice. It sounds like you're trying to do something called Lucid Dreaming. You should check it out. I hope this helps.
She is me completely! Wow. Thanks for the education!
When I found out people can actually see in their mind and after listening to people say “visualize the life you want” I feel like I’m mourning the loss of something I didn’t know I didn’t have
I didn't know about Aphantasia until this video and realized that I have it (I took the test to be sure) But I've never had any sort of mind's eye and I just thought I wasn't trying hard enough. Thank you for making this TED talk.
Bro I've been trying to figure this out since I was a kid.... I just recently found out the name of this.
Yeah i have a headache after finding out something is wrong
It just recently got a name. When you were a kid, no name was given cause they didn't really know it was really a thing.
I think they just found a name for it in 2015.
@@michelledawn7446 Have you ever watched the disney movie "Fantasia"? I think it was named after that.
I always thought people were just bullshitting me when they said they could imagine 😀
Right. And then when you tell people you can't picture things. It's like they can't understand it. They almost seem to deny it. Very annoying.
Yeah, not enough people realize that most other people do not think the same way as they do. Our minds operate in amazingly different ways. each unique.
Much of the conflict in this world is a lack of an understanding of that fact, and so many people just assuming everyone else's minds operate the same way.
We may not understand HOW another's mind operates, but we have to recognize that it operates differently.
one time i was working on exercises with rubbing my eyes, and one time i saw a forest scene, as if i was laying on my back, gazing at the stars. it was dull, like looking through several pairs of sunglasses, but it was so beautiful. i cried for i dont know how long. it still amazes me, and i keep working to see it again.
Hey Lee, could you improve your imagine creating skills further after this? It sounds so beautiful, I hope I can do it one day...
I am shook! I had no idea that people could actually see things!! I always hated doing meditation and stuff because I never saw the beach and I hated learning techniques like the “mind palace” because I never understood how it helped other than having to memorize two facts - the one I’m trying to learn and where it’s supposed to go. I really cannot get over the fact that people can actually see in their mind! That’s like a crazy superpower!
Ps I totally agree visualizing a book is cheating!
Can't visualize a book with perfect details and information on it unless we remember all the information and how did did it look in the book.
I can't believe that people can actually see an image in their mind, that's such an alien concept to me.
I've got acquired aphantasia which started after hitting the back of my head one day after I slipped. Before then I was able to visualize things when I closed my eyes easily. I remember during days I meditated how I would be asked to visualize the sky and the clouds when I close my eyes and it would literally be there without even trying that hard. I don't know how this will affect my life moving forward but from what I'm reading in the comments i'm more hopeful as it seems that people can get by without this ability. I'm glad that I at least had the chance to experience this amazing ability and that I'm one of the few I guess that experienced both sides of it.
Her description of aphantasia describes my experience. Thank you.
I can’t imagine any visuals
But I can dream, I’m blessed with that.
My grandma never had a dream in her life and I think I got aphantasia from her :/
thats why i really love to sleep, its when i finally can see mental image in my head
Me too I love to dream, but I realised after 29 years that I have aphantasia. Somebody told me to picture something in my mind to learn better. I was like wtf how? He was also schocked ...
I can imagine something so vividly, and when combined with my strong inner voices I could just wandering around with my brain when I was bored. It's basically annoying if I want to have a clear mind because I couldn't.
I can create my own scenarios, movies, stories, universes, all of them in my head. But it requires my brain to be in idle state, rather get myself into a boredom state and not doing anything.
This is why I'm lucid dreaming a lot. It's so baffling to me the fact that some people wanted to have lucid dream experience in their sleep. Meanwhile for me it's like everyday in my sleep.
I stumbled across this Aphantasia phenomenon and just now realized I have it. I am in my 60s. My entire life I sensed I was different from other people in my thought processes and problem solving abilities but I never realized it was because I could not picture images in my mind. As the speaker mentioned I have great difficulty recognizing the faces of people I know only casually. I just can't place them. I know I know the person but I don't know from where or who they are. I can recognize a voice from my childhood but I cannot conjure up a face to go with the voice. I can only visualize loved ones who have passed by looking at photos. I know my brain has compensated for this my entire life. I wonder why I cannot, what brain processes prevent it and how the brain compensates for this inability. I am glad there are ongoing studies to look into Aphantasia because I have so many questions. I am sure others do as well. I finally understand why I have such difficulties with certain tasks others find easy. It is amazing because I am an artist but now understand why I have struggled reproducing images of even the simplest of things. I have zero spatial ability and no, "mind's eye." It all makes sense now. Funny, but it was only through reading about Disney animator Glen Keane who is also affected that I realized my own inability to see images in my brain. As others have reported I always thought the term counting sheep was just a saying. I never realized other people could actually see sheep and count them. It is paradoxically freeing and frightening to suddenly realize this.
I’m mindblown that this is a thing. Obviously we all picture things differently but thats so crazy that some cannot imagine at all.
It makes me so sad.
"Try not to picture a beach"
Me: stares intensely at the sign behind her, visualizing the sign aggressively
"You weren't able to do that, were you?"
YOU UNDERESTIMATE MY POWER >:0
:o a true madlad!
I dont know if I have it. I'm so confused. I am an artist and I always felt like I do visualise what I want to draw or what I want something to look like. however I don't see anything when I close my eyes.. I am really confused as to what this means. do I have it and are the mental images that I have not visual all? or am I just expexting to much of what a visual brain image should look like? someone pls help me this is driving me crazy
some people visualise better with eyes open, other with the eyes closed. That doesn't necessarily mean you are aphantasic. The spectrum is very broad, with people ranging from no visualisation at all (like me) to everything in between, all the way up to extremely strong visualisation and mental manipulation. We are all different, isn't that wonderful :-)
If you would like to see where you are on the spectrum, send me an email to tamsinash@hotmail.com and I will forward you my visualisation questionnaire.
I see things with my eyes opened, but i can't see them whem my eyes closed like I see real things. Just shapes are defined but else is not. I'm an artist too, and I feel what you described.
This is the issue with most people who think they have this issue. They're simply confused by what people mean by "seeing it in your head"
Its like people think other people see a painted picture behind their eyelids.
If you can draw an elephant (no matter how childish the drawing looks) and it's not a mutation of random legs in the wrong places and a trunk stcking out of the foot.... then you can visualize an elephant. If you truly couldn't visualize somethign it would be scriblles that are impossible to discern for anyone.
Peach Panda saame
You don’t have aphantasia no one sees stuff when they close their eyes it’s in your mind it’s like another eye
i've never been able to see images. I thought it was strange that friends of mine would talk about these vivid images & i'd be lost in thoughts as to how they could & I couldnt. I appreciate this video alot.
I have this and thought it was how everyone was until a few years ago. Pictures have always been extremely important to me and I think this is why. I can’t picture something in my mind so I need the physical image to see it.
My friend just sent this to me and said “Alex told me he has this!” That’s her bf. I’ve never heard of this before. I definitely don’t have it. When I daydream intensely, I get so lost in the visual world that it’s very uncomfortable coming back to reality. I’m amazed that some people can’t visualize things in their mind!
I have a somewhat mild form of this where I sometimes can picture things but it's a very dim, faded, fuzzy image. Being told to picture something from scratch, that is, something I haven't seen many times usually results in a near total lack if not a total lack of ability to picture that thing.
This just probably means you fall in the lower end of the spectrum for visualisation. I have a questionnaire if you are willing to take it, just email me at tamsinash@hotmail.com
That is everyone........ everyone visualizes in the exact way you described.... Noone sees vividly images like in a movie they can watch unless they're on acid or schizophrenic..... IMO most people who think they have this are misunderstanding what people mean by "visualize"
If this chick truly was INCAPABLE of visualization then her drawing of an elephant wouldn't look like a child drew it... it owuld be a random mess of scribbles.
If you can't visualize an elephant..... then the trunk of it could look like stereo for all she knows. She would literally have to see it to remember....
And an issue like that would be a crippling disability that would make people incapable of living a normal life.
@@upplsuckimcool16 Youre completely correct. An actual lack of the ability to imagine would ruin your life. You couldnt prepare for certain scenarios and forgot lots of things. This aphantasia thing is not a thing for most of the people that claim to have it.
Edward Alborghetti not being able to imagine and not being able to visualise are different things. you are correct in saying that not being able to imagine would be detrimental to ones functioning. however you are wrong in saying that aphantasia doesn’t exist. people with aphantasia can still remember what things look like, they just think of it in words and not images.
@@upplsuckimcool16 i see vivid images?
Omg the bit about squeezing my eyes until i saw spots, I did that all the time as a kid, sometimes until i would give myself headaches, because it was so fantastical to me the concept of seeing something with my eyes closed
Wow I got aphantasia after cardiac surgery. 4 hours with out a heat beat! Did strange things to my head! Thank you.
Before i found out about Aphantasia I had a class when every Thursday all the students would put their head on the desk and the teacher would read us a mental exercise and 9/10 times it would involve us picturing something and I didn't think she meant literally and just basically listed off things I knew about that image but always got lost when ever she mentioned to move of something when I first saw this I thought about how much this made since after doing more research and confirmed that I had it and told my teacher about it soon after and i didn't have to participate ones that required imagery and instead tried to solidify the blurs that I saw(one way of curing Aphantasia). Granted I haven't had much luck so far but its only been a month so I'm not worried all that much.
Thank you for reading I just wanted to share my story with Aphantasia.
Hey, if you read this, can you tell us, wether you "cured" or at least changed your visualisation skills due to those exercises?
@@lorkhan610 I can't say because I haven't tried sorry
I wonder if psychedelics affect people with aphantasia differently... can one hallucinate?
Yes, but it's quite weird. Regular vision gains hallucinations (as in, patterns emerge and move on surfaces such as carpet / grass / etc.). Other hallucinations that I'd say were more akin to a minds eye hallucination occur, however you don't "see" them rather you experience them. It's like dreaming while away (which, again, has no images if you have aphantasia). So yeah, it's very similar, but also very different and weird.
In my experience when taking LSD, that is the only time when I can see anything behind my eyes. Normally its black, nothingness, when tripping I get geometric patterns, often squiggly lines of color, but never full pictures. The closest thing I've ever gotten to an actual picture behind my eyes was when I took DMT. During that experience I saw a massive 3D red rectangle rotating through space, and it was as real as life. But it only lasted a short time. And then it returned to nothing but black.
Psychedelics are the only time I do have visual images. Otherwise I have a vague memory of what something should look like without seeing it.
Yes, yes we can. The way I would describe it is seeing things in vivid 3D
I've wondered this as well. In my normal life I don't really see images in my mind's eye, but my mind's ear can effortlessly recreate sounds and music in full detail. When I'm tripping, I've had visual distortions like rippling/breathing/patterns (and time-delay trails on LSD) but never geometric patterns, crazy colors, closed eye visuals, or seen things that weren't really there. However, I've had more auditory hallucinations happen, like if there is a white noise source such as a rushing creek I've been able to hear crowds of people, music, etc. and sometimes my mind plays music that I've never heard before but it is detailed and cool sounding.
I wonder if it is also linked to creativity with these senses -- I think my vision is quite accurate/factual. I have good color differentiation, and actually I don't have a dominant eye like most people do. I can line things up, judge sizes, compare closely etc. But I'm not very visually creative. I feel I do have the capacity to be creative auditorally.
And actually I think I'm most creative with words... thoughts, ideas, concepts, intuitions. And this is also what goes the most wild when I'm on mushrooms or whatever. Also, emotions, haha.
Totally memorized entire speech.
I figured out about this at 10. One time, my teacher asked the class to close our eyes and picture something while listening to a song. One thing about me is that I am very creative, but I can't imagine anything. Just darkness. So, in class, we had to draw what we pictured. Since I couldn't picture anything, I made something up. A girl flying across a forest. But I did not know how to draw this girl because I didn't know what she looked like! I didn't think much about this because I thought that it was normal. If you asked me to draw an elephant, it would just look like a big gray blob. 😮
I'm so beyond confused. Do people really see clear images when they close their eyes or is it just a vague idea of what an object might look like?
Do you have aphantasia as well? Yes, there appears to be a spectrum, where everyone falls in a different place. People with aphantasia we could say are at a 0. But there are indeed people who score a 10, with everyone else falling in between. I have found that the 10s are quite rare, but they are able to visualise extremely well. Able to see whole images, as real as life, and manipulate them in their minds. I interviewed a surgeon who was a specialist at diagnosing patients. He could see the internal anatomy so clearly in his mind's eye that he could follow your injury to the source in his head. Fascinating!
For me, the images are not very clear, unless it's small details. It's hard for me to see a large picture with all the little details at once, I have to focus on a small area to be able to see it clearly. For example, when I picture an elephant, I see the wrinkly skin, the eyes, tusks, ears and so on. But I can't seem to see the whole animal at once in great detail, only the wauge idea of an elephant.
I believe I have the same mind eye as the doctor you described. I can see senarios clearly and change anything in that "scene" I'm constantly coming up with senarios and imaging in clear picture what would happen and especially dialogue
I have difficulty memorizing, difficulties in recognizing people whom I know little ... If someone does not have this kind of difficulty, I think that the person visualizes enough not to be qualified as afantasia. I would like to participate in scientific studies on the subject, so that all these terms are better defined and known.
tamsinashify Might sound crazy but I thought everyone could imagine thinks the same level as I do. And from all the comments I read under this video I think I’m “above average” with my imagination. I can literally entertain myself for hours just with my imagination. It doesn’t matter if my eyes are closed or not, it’s kinda like a little cinema up there. As a child I know that I had problems holding an image in my head because it just changed and moved but now I have full control over what I see without it moving or changing. I could literally create a whole fantasy world with many different characters an with a full story in my head and watch all of that as if it’s like a movie.
Very nice talk. I am in my fifties and I realise I am probably on the side of "aphantasiacs" ! I like the way you articulate your presentation in the sense that aphantasy may not necessarily be an impairment. I am absolutely unable to draw, but I have been (and still am) often praised for my ability to conceptualize things beyond their surface appearance : for instance, finding common points between things that apparently look very different at first sight. Should one call people who are unable to do this suffering from "aconceptualisation" ? I do not think so. There are just different approaches from purely figurative to very abstract representation and I believe this is related to multiple ways of (litterally) seeing the world. In the very same way, some people are more athletic and others are more intellectual. Who is impaired ??? Today our civilization is very 'visual' but a century ago it was mostly based on radio (i.e. "aural") and in the nineteenth century, it was based on books ! These are varieties of ways to experience the world. But as you clearly say, no need to make each and everyone of them an impairment. And isn't ultimately semantics the essentials, i.e. the meaning of what we communicate ? Voilà ! Bonne journée.
I most definitely have this. The key aspects that spoke true to me as I was looking into this topic was idea of counting sheep. When I thought more deeply about myself, I realized that my childhood attempts to use this method left me in confusion. Overall, I believe this really impacts the way I think, because all I have is concepts, and that's all I hold onto.
I find it extremely interesting how we develop more and more knowledge about (other) humans thought process.
When I learned people could visualize things in there mind I was like “wait wtf for real you can see stuff when there’s nothing there at will????????”
Look up "image streaming" invented by Win Wenger, his book has a lot of methods to provoke the images. I was really struggling at first, but that's just the hump you have to get over and then it's pretty easy from there.
Its not like you see it clearly its imagination creation based on past memory its not seeing. Unless I have it too and everyone else have perfect photographic memory and no difference between seeing with open eyes and closed eyes. seeing all these comments who found out they cant imagine makes me wonder maybe i have it too
And I am heartbroken that you cannot! I can visualize reality to the extent that they can become intertwined. I don't know how you can truly enjoy life without this magic all around you. I wonder what the advantage of your condition is?
@@pamelabratton2501 first of all I am SO jealous ofc and have a question- when you're seeing stuff in a daydream, is it the same as a normal dream? Bc I can lucid dream and I see everything in extreme detail, have conversations, my head will move and so will the landscape, it's sunny or dark or cold etc. Are you guys legitimately having one of those but you're awake? How does that even work 😭
Secondly the main benefit I can think of is less mental fuckery. Painful or traumatic images don't haunt us, although the memory and feelings will. I don't see a freaky demon face lurking over me after I've watched a horror movie. And a lot of people want the stillness & calm of nothingness from time to time. I've still got plenty of activity ofc, but it's all music and voices & ambient sounds, which can be tuned out with enough effort.
@@tenderpr3y Daydreams I can control what happens, dreams themselves are totally out of my control. All in color with sound. In more lucid type dreams I can touch stuff and move things around in the dream itself. I have never tried to concentrate on dream sounds, perhaps I should!
Finally! Ive always felt so stupid when i could never relate to 'counting sheep' or other examples, but now have an explanation 😂
Yes i always wondered at that analogy!
Em Bibby as i kid i just always counted, no sheep, thought it was just a saying
can you imagine a cube in space?
@@fxstreamer238 nope :)
@@embibby7170 what about movies? can you imagine the pulp fiction famous dance closed eyes? how do you remember it then
Interesting! Thx Tamara for sharing.
I don’t have visual or auditory abilities in my head. Only my thoughts. People would talk about an “inner monologue” or “vivid images” in their heads, I always assumed it was just thoughts like mine.
I’m 27 and just discovered this, it’s honestly an answer I was looking for without realizing I was searching. From what I’ve read, some people with aphantasia only dream by feeling certain emotions or knowing the general concepts. I have extremely vivid dreams, sometimes a continuation of dreams I’ve already had or by linking 4-8 back to back dreams tied together by a small detail in the previous. Really wild to think about, I’m glad this line of study is gaining traction because understanding the way we think as individuals could help us create a better future for ourselves.
I've been having trouble explaining this to people all my life! There's a word for it, hurray!
I have no visual imagery (if I'm very lucky I get a smudged splash of colour for 1/10 of a breath); when I 'don't-visualize' I get a 'living space' (that isn't visual) with 'meanings in it',
I sense/perceive movements (real and conceptual) as subtle changes in tension felt in my inner body sensation (they are sensed directly as 'meanings', close in feeling to an emotion).
... Luckily it (ma' brain) outputs fine into words.
... so, I can also think in words, but it is slow; words are clearly just the glazing on the cake of thinking.
EDIT: Verbal thinking does help check the logical structure and semantics of a thought.
Been havin' trouble explaining this for man-n-n-n-y years now. Found out about it having a name today. Thank you for making this video!
I'd like to ask you (any 'you' with the same quirk): Is there any kind of thinking thinking/processing that you excel in?
Hi Kian. Yes, while memory processing speed and recall is somewhat lagging, I do excel in other things such as problem solving and viewing issues from different perspectives.
Can you elaborate on a 'living space with meanings in it'? Would you be willing to fill out a questionnaire on the vividness of your mental imagery? You can send me an email to tamsinash@hotmail.com
Thanks for watching!
Kian Nielsen Have you heard of audiation? That's the term for when you're able to hear a song in your head without it actually being played. I can hear an entire song from beginning to end in my head and am able to focus on each instrument if I know that song really well. I don't know if this is uncommon
@@tamsinashify It is possible to have aphantasia and still be able to experience, internally, spatial orientation and stuff like that. Like if I asked you "which way is north" some people with aphantasia could point in the proper direction and have an internal sense like they are 'pointing'.
So spatial stuff and visual stuff is different in the brain somehow.
The weirdest part I experience when being ask to “picture myself on a beach” is that I don’t see anything, but I can feel the warmth of the sun or the breeze against my skin. To me it’s almost like reading a book, my brain is likes it’s sandy there would be waves and maybe a little boat out on the sea. I can recall information of what a beach is like I just don’t see it. Maybe like an audiobook description of a beach
I can't even feel the warmth :/
Wow.......Just randomly clicked on this video...in 50+ years I never even thought that people could not visualize things in their heads. This answers so many questions in my life when in came to things like trying to get someone to understand how to make something or trying to explain how something looks or would/should look if it was made, or how to perform a task for e.g. explaining to someone at work how to assemble a group of parts in a package, box it and label it in a specific way and they just stand there completely perplexed. I just thought I was really bad at explaining or describing these things!!!!How about being able to visualize something you are going to make or draw or put together and you can do it in your head? Or imagining an object and turning it around in your mind? Many times when I have to do something I actually imagine that I'm doing it and can usually envision the end result. When my older brother was trying to become an artist he always said "It is impossible to draw something from your mind." He could only drawn what was in front of him and he was actually good at making exact copies of things like photographs but he never created an original drawing or painting. Abstract art was impossible for him to create. When I was a professional cook I could envision making something, the ingredients needed, the steps needed to put it together (what needed to be done before other steps), and pretty much know what it was going to look, smell and taste like. Or while listening to music it creates images in your head OR you can imagine several different ways it could be visually interpreted. Or while reading a book you can envision the action taking place or imagine the places being described, imagining smells, sounds, sensations.
This discussion makes me think of the common experience of talking to total strangers on the phone. Personally, whenever I'm talking to a stranger on the phone for any significant period of time, I conjure up an image of the person -- something like an avatar. This avatar I imagine is influenced by my internal memory of encounters I've had with people. For example, some people talking with someone they perceive as a man with a deep voice conjure up an image of a tall man. And sometimes, the avatar you've been holding on to bears NO resemblance to the actual person.