To not believe that some people don't have an internal monologue?

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Even though I've just read this:

ryanandrewlangdon.wordpress.com/2020/01/28/today-i-learned-that-not-everyone-has-an-internal-monologue-and-it-has-ruined-my-day/

I can't quite understand if. Hoping some MNs of the non-monologue type can help me out.

Especially with the reading part.

When I'm reading descriptions fast I don't properly say the words in my head, more of a picture forms I guess. But I'm hearing any dialogue words.

And chattering away to myself in my head all day long. Must be nice not to!

This is so interesting and I cant imagine it, ironically considering I have an inner monologue both visually and verbally.
So sometimes you have no thoughts? Like its silent and blank? (I hope that doesnr come across as rude, I'm generally trying to understand what this means). I'm a major overthinker, it's very stressful, how do worries play out for you? Can you have an argument in your head? Can you for example pretend in your head to go on holiday? If you watch tele are you completely focused on that show (when you arent also on a phone for example)

Oh this was a reply to someone but it didnt attach. Anyone can answer then. This is so fascinating and mind blown.

I talk to myself all day long in my head!

IfIi'm watching something on the tv, yes I'm 100%focussed on that tv. I can do all the other things if I choose to but mostly I don't. I just focus on the here and now. Walks are boring unless I have someone to chat to.
I find I need to be doing something, reading, watching tv or on a tablet. I never just sit and be. I was actually replaying something that had happened that day, in my head the other day when I started to watch Tv; I had to stop and rewind 4 times because getting lost in my thoughts meant I hadn't followed the programme that was on.
The most thinking I normally do is in the shower, in the car or when I wake up in the middle of the night worrying about something. Even during sex I am aware of the sensations but I don't fantasise. I envy the ability to do that

My mind is calm and peaceful the majority of the time. I don't get bored because I find things to focus on that I enjoy doing. I never hear music in my head either. I have nice thoughts in my head when I am thinking. My inner voice is kind to me and forgives me if I cock up.

During conversations do people actually rehearse each sentence before they say it? I do sometimes in a big group and I'm waiting my chance to make a point so I don't forget my point but normally it just pops out of my mouth at an appropriate time - no thought involved.

Since reading this thread a few days ago I have at quiet moments tried to make myself have an internal monologue and I find it quite mentally exhausting!

I have also noticed that when I am "daydreaming" sometimes I am not really thinking of anything really. I am just zoned out. It is almost meditative.

When I read, I not only see and 'hear' the words, but I have a 'film' of it happening, too. I also have the film when I am writing and it obligingly plays scenes over and over again until I have it captured by words. I have music pretty much constantly in my head and always have done. (Its currently not playing, which is odd, but I have just taken painkillers, so might have something to do with that.) I can sit and stitch for hours, as I have done today, with no TV or radio on and my internal dialogue runs quite easily.

DD2 is severely dyslexic, so I must try and remember to ask her if she has one when I see her tomorrow.

Years ago, when I read a lot of fiction, I had an internal monologue in the third person which narrated a lot of my life. “‘I’ve had enough!’ John said angrily, before storming out of the office with his wallpaper samples”.

It was very annoying, especially due to the overuse of adverbs. Now that I don’t read much fiction, I don’t hear it very often and if I do, it’s often in the first person.

I have a polylogue of voices. That’s why I’m certified —insane— with schizophrenia. So I can believe that some people have zero internal voices because I know that both monologues and polylogues exist.

Ok my inner voice / conscious thoughts are certainly in language as I know because when I lived in a foreign language and spoke it all the time the language I thought in changed.

But that doesn't stop them being much faster than a voice speaking could be. Just like I can read much faster than a person speaks.

Actually I find it very uncomfortable to focus on my inner voice or thoughts. It feels like thinking too much about my breathing instead of just letting it happen.

Obviously lots of stuff is constantly going on in our brains which we aren't consciously thinking about.

Just read back yesterday's posts and the supermarket thing is interesting for me.
I would be more like bread bread bread BREAD milk milk milk MILK and then in between just noticing everyone around me etc - no thinking about other stuff or having a convo with myself.
I also do the thing where if you have been reading some Jane Austen or whatever then your speech formulations are the same for a bit.

Surely we are all having the same thought processes but some peoples are up front and conscious so you can see the joins and others are like a revelation each time.

Mine probably evolved to cope with a high degree of childhood anxiety - I dont consciously worry now, if I'm really stressed it comes out in physical ways - sleepwalking, cold sores and then I know that I'm stressed but didnt consciously know iyswim.

I've thought more about this in the past few days since reading this thread. I think I'm a mixture of lots of inside head stuff - definite inner voice when reading. I can take in paragraphs without the inner voice but it's skim reading and not deeper processing.

I do have an inner voice but it tends to be more abstract, thoughts, just knowing. E.g on a supermarket just wanting to the places I know I need to go e.g. milk isle. I may then have an internal conversation about whether we need 1 or 2 bottles of milk. I find it hard to voice my thoughts and feelings. How do you put instinct etc into thoughts.

I am a very laid back person and quite often just have quiet moments with little going on. Just being at one, still, calm, content. I find the chatter can arise if I am worried about something. It's particularly unnerving at night when it can stop me sleeping. I find it very easy to meditate and am often in a meditate state without even being aware.

I will appreciate my quiet, calm mind so much more after this!

Even during sex I am aware of the sensations but I don't fantasise.

Oddly, considering I have already mentioned a rich inner fantasy life, I never fantasise when having sex with another person, only ever if alone.

I could not fantasise during sex. Actually it's a struggle to keep my mind on the task at hand... I have been known to start daydreaming or following a train of thought about something totally unrelated. Sometimes it causes me to laugh if I remember something amusing - one of my exes found that really, seriously offputting Luckily DH is good at making sure I can't actually think about anything at all which is quite a skill.

There is defo abstract thought going on as well as chatter but mostly my thoughts are in word form. I think because I have always read a lot.

Interestingly DS1 asked me the other day how I imagine books. He mainly just reads and sometimes has flashes of what he imagines a character, setting or object from the story looks like. If I'm reading something engaging I am totally immersed in the story, not like watching a movie but like a dream, like I'm actually there. For example in Harry Potter I'll sort of mentally assume the position of Hermione if a scene was going on between Harry and Ron, or Ron if it's between Harry and Hermione. Or I'm just an unnamed character who is friends with all the characters in the book at once (not the baddies of course).

I found this thread fascinating, though it took me forever to go through it because it made me way more conscious of my inner voice (!).

I am definitely part of the group that have a constant inner voice, I hear it (at full speed) when I read, right now as I type, constantly throughout the day, sometimes it's fun (imagining scenarios, or ways I could have dealt with a conversation differently), other time it's tiring because that voice can become overpowering, I can't count the amount of time I have had to rewind a movie or reread the last 5 pages of a book or ask someone to repeat themselves because my inner voice has taken control and distracted me from what I was doing.

Sometimes I actually have to mentally ask it to shut up (and sometimes it won't ) the hardest is at night, when I am exhausted and my brain simply won't shut up. Recently I had the strangest dream for about a week where all my dreams had a voice over (my inner voice) detailing everything that was going on, it was exhausting, and gave me such poor quality of sleep it was awful.
I tried sleeping-aid pills for a while and noticed that what they do is shut the voice up for me which allows me to fall asleep more easily, it was actually strange not hearing the voice and trying to have it come back and the pills making it too hard to focus too. I (almost!) missed it.

I think sometimes it would be nice to be able to sit in silence, sometimes internal monologues can be like being forced to socialize when you don't want to. Funny part is when you start an internal monologue about a conversation or argument you imagine could happen and end up offending yourself by coming up in your head with something the other person could tell you to hurt you (or is it just me? )

I've never offended myself @linning however I don't know if anyone else has noticed this but when I am told to clear my mind, that's when mine becomes its noisiest, I try to imagine a black space, but then I have my internal voice saying, "this is a blank empty room... what are we going to fill it with... This is dumb... Are they aware you hate the dark..." etc etc

I came across this article yesterday and it was a massive relief (I've been trying to find a way to explain this for this thread and really struggled!)

It describes the inside of my head best – I'd say I have 90% unsymbolised or 'Feature 5' thinking, only interrupted by verbal thinking when I'm 'rehearsing' something I'm going to say.

Well worth reading the whole thing (it's not too long) to get the whole picture, but a brief excerpt:

I've been saying that this procedure reveals five frequently occurring phenomena of everyday inner experience: inner speech, inner seeing, feelings, sensory awareness, and "Feature 5." I haven't said what Feature 5 is, giving you the opportunity to commit yourself to your speculation. Now I'll describe it: unsymbolized thinking.

Unsymbolized thinking is the experience of an explicit, differentiated thought that does not include the experience of words, images, or any other symbols. For example, if you had been beeped a moment ago, you might have experienced an unsymbolized thought which, if expressed in words, might have been something like "I wonder what Feature 5 is." But if this was an unsymbolized thought, there would have been no experienced words—no experience of the word "wonder" or of "Feature 5." There would have been no experienced images—no seeing of a beeper or of anything else. There would have been no experienced symbols of any kind, and yet you would have directly apprehended ("before the footlights of your consciousness") yourself as thinking that exact thought.

I am in Australia and driving to work early this morning the radio announcers were talking about internal monologue.... wonder where they got their material from

DD is currently studying psychology - she saw this and asked me and DH. We both immediately answered in unison: I said yes and he said no.

I don't have an internal monologue when I'm reading though, and I can distinctly remember the time I switched it off when I was a kid. To start with of course you are taught to read out loud, then one day realised that I didn't have to say the words out loud, I could just say them in my head. After a while, I realised that doing that while reading was slowing me down, so I stopped saying them in my head and just absorbed the meaning instead. I must have been about 10.

It turns out that DH doesn't think in words at all. He tried to describe his though process but DD and I were both baffled by it.

We then all got sidetracked by a conversation on dreams, and whether you 'think' dreams or 'see' them...