For anyone who doesn’t know what aphantasia is, it’s not being able to mentally visualise imagery. I only recently found out that 99% of people can actually see things in their minds eye, I can’t, at all! I always thought it was just a figure of speech when people said things like ‘picture this’ or that when people meditated they could actually close their eyes and see beaches and sunsets or whatever. I have never been able to see anything when I close my eyes, just blackness, can’t see my loved ones faces or relive any memories visually. I imagine in concepts and can feel the shape of things and remember details that I can describe in words but not see.
But… here’s my question. I’m an artist, and I can sit down and draw from my imagination pretty much anything I want but why, if you can see things in your minds eye, can’t the 99% of the population that can visualise not sit down and draw things perfectly accurately from memory? My husband is crap at drawing, like if I said, draw a giraffe, he’d draw some god awful looking creature that looks like it should be put out of its misery!
When you imagine imagery in your minds eye, is it complete? Can you see every detail or are there blurry bits to fill in for the details you never quite noticed before?