Aphantasia - I have it and have questions for people who don’t!

[Aphantasia]

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?

I would see an image as clearly as I imagine if that makes sense.

Eg. close up or from a distance. I’m not sure I could imagine something I’ve never actually seen very well though. That would probably be a vague shape or blurry.

@DustyMaiden yes! I have every elaborate and convoluted dreams! When I wake up I can remember the plots but there’s no visual memory of them

I dream in full picture/film despite having it.

I see in my mind's eye much better if I don't actually close my eyes. I just soften my vision a bit and then think about a person or a place.
It can be very handy. I had a long MRI recently and I spent it on the beach in Ibiza 🤣

I can see things in my minds eye but only as much as I can remember what they look like. I wouldn’t necessarily be able to see detail, for example if I had to draw a bicycle I wouldn’t be able to draw from memory the frame and although I can bring up a picture of a bike in my minds eye I can’t pick out the shake of the frame. I can bring up a picture of friends and family but couldn’t pick out details like the colour of their eyes from the picture if I didn’t already know this. It’s not a clear ‘seeing’ like when you see something in real life, as another poster has said it’s more of a flash of the image that doesn’t last and doesn’t always have a lot of detail.

Do you see things when you dream or do you only dream in feelings and sound?

I have no minds eye and couldn't do what you describe. I have no context or anything. Mind you I can't draw full stop so that says nothing!

I don't dream or day dream and I am not a visual learner. The crap part is that I struggle with important childhood memories. I can remember how I felt but not what things or people looked like just by thinking about them.

I don't understand how someone came up with this. No one knows what actually happens in another person's mind. So what I describe as seeing something in my mind, may not be what you assume it would be. Infact, when I think about seeing something I'm not sure I actually do see it in the way you describe. So maybe I have what you have, but wouldn't have ever thought of it like that. Or, maybe everyone has it but we think everyone else see things differently??

I can close me eyes and 'see' things, but not in detail, like a photo you've glanced at. So it's not blurry, but I can't focus in on individual eyelashes if I'm imagining a person for example.

Blinmin heck. I think I have this

Will go off to Google now.

I can't draw anything for what it's worth, have no picture or visual in my head at all to draw from.

Oh my word, I think I might have this too! I thought everyone couldn't actually picture memories and stuff!!

@Hodgehog that’s interesting, I’m a total perfectionist and I wonder if it’s a fail safe in my brain protecting me from the irritation of not being able to visualise every detail in minute detail. Like if I wanted to visualise a cat and had the ability to at least visualise a ‘basic’ cat would it drive me insane that I couldn’t zoom in and see each hair? Like I know that my cat has tiny little bumps on his nose and that they glisten in a certain way in the light so I can see their 3D bumpy shape across the surface of his nose, and I know that the way his fur lies on the bridge of his nose changes direction abs that it catches the light depending… if I tried to visualise that on an imagined cat and couldn’t get the detail right would my implode in irritation?

‘Mind’s eye’ doesn’t mean you close your eyes and see images floating in front of you. It means literally picturing things in your brain. It’s very hard to explain to someone who doesn’t experience it!

Isn't the mind's eye just a word for imagination? When I'm remembering something I'm imagining it too.

I think this has a lot to do with memory and learning. I can’t retain information by reading or audio, but by visuals. I spend all my days visualising stuff in my head (I work in interiors and my education was in art etc). When I can’t sleep I visualise walking in sand and watching waves crash on the shore. The list goes on, I literally do it all the time and in a lot of detail. A client will often ask me to visualise a fabric in a space and I literally visualise it in my mind and respond. It’s quite an intense experience but I love it! I used to get told off for daydreaming when I was younger a lot too! Interestingly, I’ve had clients who come from an art and design background who can’t visualise. It does baffle me a bit. My husband is exactly the same as me, he’s a creative.

@MolkosTeenageAngst omg, that description fried my brain. But if you can ‘see a bicycle how can you not SEE an actual bicycle including the shape of the frame, agh!! I’ve opened a can of worms 😂

Ive manifested all my life, didn't know it was called this though.I can see what I want and it happens, have to work for it though. When I do this I have a scene/picture in my mind. wonder if manifesting and in my minds eye is linked?

Maybe that’s why you are an artist op. So you can put pictures on paper as you can’t in your head. Perhaps it it gives you an advantage in some way. Like losing one of your senses enhances the others.

I’m fascinated of your dreams. My mind short circuits when you described being able to remember them but no visuals. I literally cannot comprehend how !

I could probably visualise a very details cat if I wanted - I’ve seen a lot of cats up close so that’s something I think I could do.

I honestly think that doesn’t exist. Perhaps only someone who was born blind. I just think that you have an over-exaggerated idea of what other people mean by “seeing” things in their mind. They’re not actually “seeing” anything - it’s just a concept. You must have memories of what things looks like or how else would you recognise anything around you from one moment to the next?

@bookworm14

‘Mind’s eye’ doesn’t mean you close your eyes and see images floating in front of you. It means literally picturing things in your brain. It’s very hard to explain to someone who doesn’t experience it!

Yes that's what I mean. Do people who have this condition think they have it because they don't see visual images infront of them when they close their eyes?

Did anyone with aphantasia on this thread feel baffled as a child when people told you to count sheep if you couldn't sleep?!

@billycorn, I would fucking LOVE to be able to do exactly what you just described

I think it needs common ground to untangle this.

I don’t think I have this.

My favourite film is the wizard of Oz. You know the scene, where Dorothy has just set off on the yellow brick road and reaches the first fork, and meets the scarecrow.

I can ‘see’ in my head the scene. The colour of the yellow path with the brick marks. I can see the backdrop of rolling hills. I can see Toto bobbing about in the foreground. I can see/visualise Dorothy’s mannerisms and movements, even if not in exact sequence and when I see them I can also ‘hear’ audio in my head of her voice, roughly. I can also feel how that film makes me feel - happy and warm. It’s multi sensory. I don’t need exact quiet or black to see/hear it, I can do it even with the bloody TV blaring in the background here.

However remembering my newborns face is another matter - which I believe is common. That’s a blur. I can recall the room in hospital, and snatches of thoughts and discussions. I can remember the weird Perspex stand with the hospital menu in. But I can’t remember my baby who is now 9. So weird.

Does none of that sound familiar OP?

aphant do you Dream? (As in visual dreams not as in dreaming of a relaxing holiday!)

Apparently not having a mind's eye is no barrier to being an artist, this article about Pixar is interesting.