| Holy crap, this has blown my mind. I've always thought that "visualizing" something is a metaphor for "think about it" or "list the properties you know". This explains so much, at least for me. How I always skip the long visual descriptions in books since they add nothing to the story; there is no visual component to reading a book. Why meditation is nearly impossible unless I manage to think about nothing, which is extremely hard. How I can recognize faces but not describe them, even those close to me, other then a short list of features that stand out. Or how I can recognize a smell, but I can't tell you what the smell of a hamburger is unless I actually have one in front of me. Why people describe dreams or memories like watching a movie, while it's more a combination of emotions, situation descriptions and something that feels like the echolocation of a bat. What some people mean when they can hear a person speak or have a discussion in their head. It explains why it's so easy to recall emotions and factual information, but nearly impossible to recall anything else. Why my "now" is so strongly affected - emotions experienced in the current moment tend to influence the vague feelings of the past, as if it's always been that way. Why it's always been so difficult to work towards certain goals, unless they're divided up into sub goals that are so close as to be easily attainable. Anything further in the future is nearly incomprehensible. Why it's so easy for me to navigate through bad experiences, but not for others, because beyond needing to process the emotions, the rest will fade away like all other experiences. Some of those might be because of something unrelated. But somehow, reading this article, has answered a ton of questions I didn't even know I had. My mind is truly blown. Though one aspect I don't have: If I think about a song I know well, I can play it in my mind. The experience is almost, but not completely, like hearing the song in reality. So at least there's that. And that also explains why music is so much more "real" then anything else to me. |