IT ISN’T too much for us to close our eyes, much less picture an apple — then prepare to question whether or not our brain is normal.
Let’s start with a little experiment.
Don’t overthink this.
Close your eyes.
Now picture an apple.
A nice, ordinary apple.
Red. Shiny. Sitting on a table.
Got it?
Okay.
Now open your eyes.
Here’s the question:
Did you actually SEE the apple?
Not know what an apple looks like.
Not remember a photograph of one.
I mean, when you closed your eyes, did an actual mental picture appear?
Because here’s where things get interesting.
Some of you just saw an apple.
Some of you saw a vague, fuzzy sort of apple.
And some of you are sitting there thinking:
“What the hell are you talking about? I don’t see anything.”
Congratulations.
You may have just discovered something about your brain that you didn’t know for your entire life.
And no, I’m not talking about brain damage.
I’m talking about aphantasia.
Wait. People can actually SEE things in their heads?
This was my reaction when I first came across the subject.
Apparently, when some people close their eyes and think about an apple, they can actually experience something resembling an image.
They can mentally rotate it.
Change its color.
Imagine it sitting on a plate.
Take a bite out of it.
Put it beside a banana.
Hell, some people can apparently imagine an entire room and mentally walk around it.
Meanwhile, someone with aphantasia may be sitting there thinking:
Apple.
That’s all.
They know what an apple is.
They know it’s round.
They know it’s usually red, green or yellow.
They know exactly what it looks like.
They just don’t see one in their head.
And here’s the part that really messes with you:
They may have thought that’s what everybody meant when they said “picture an apple.”
Because how the hell would they know otherwise?
You’ve never been able to look inside somebody else’s head.
Here’s where it gets creepy.
Think about someone you love.
Your mother.
Your father.
Your spouse.
Your child.
Your best friend.
Now close your eyes and picture their face.
Can you see it?
Their eyes?
Their smile?
The shape of their nose?
Maybe even the little expression they make when they’re annoyed with you?
Now imagine somebody else saying:
“I know exactly what my wife looks like. I just can’t actually picture her face.”
You might think that’s impossible.
It isn’t.
And they might think you’re completely insane when you tell them that you can actually see your wife’s face in your head.
Both of you have the same knowledge.
Both of you recognize her instantly.
Both of you can describe her.
But the experience happening inside your heads may be completely different.
And it gets even weirder.
Think about your childhood home.
Don’t look at a photograph.
Picture the front door.
The living room.
The kitchen.
Your old bedroom.
Can you see the curtains?
The furniture?
The color of the walls?
Can you mentally walk through the house?
Or are you simply accessing a collection of facts?
There was a sofa there.
The kitchen was on the left.
My bedroom was upstairs.
No pictures.
Just information.
If that’s you, you may have spent your entire life assuming that’s what everyone means when they talk about “visualizing.”
Surprise.
Maybe it isn’t.
Now let’s make this even more personal.
When you read a novel, do you see the story?
You know what I mean.
You read:
The old wooden house stood at the end of the road, surrounded by tall grass. One window was broken and the front door hung slightly open.
Does your brain immediately start producing a little movie?
House.
Grass.
Broken window.
Open door.
Maybe even a creepy soundtrack.
Or do you simply process the words and understand what they mean?
Neither is necessarily better.
They’re just different.
And that’s the mind-bending part.
So… is aphantasia a disease?
Not necessarily.
Aphantasia is generally described as an inability or greatly reduced ability to voluntarily create mental imagery.
It’s not the same thing as being stupid.
It doesn’t mean you’re unimaginative.
It doesn’t mean you’re emotionally cold.
And it certainly doesn’t mean you’re broken.
Some extraordinarily creative and successful people report having little or no visual imagery.
Your brain simply may not use pictures in the way another person’s brain does.
Some people think in images.
Some think in words.
Some think in concepts.
Some apparently think in a chaotic combination of everything.
And some of us are just trying to remember where we left our damn glasses.
Here’s the test I really want you to try.
Think of a red apple.
Now imagine it turning green.
Can you see the green apple?
Now imagine cutting it in half.
Can you see the seeds?
Now imagine putting it on a white plate.
Can you see the plate?
If you can, how vivid is it?
Is it almost photographic?
Is it more like a faint picture?
Or is there nothing visual happening whatsoever?
And here’s the important bit:
There isn’t necessarily a right answer.
Visualization appears to exist on a spectrum.
At one end, there are people who experience extremely vivid mental imagery.
At the other end are people who experience little or none.
Most of us are somewhere in between.
Which brings us to the really interesting question.
What else are you assuming everybody experiences the same way you do?
When somebody says:
“I have that song playing in my head.”
Do they actually hear it?
When somebody says:
“I can still see my grandmother’s face.”
Are they literally seeing her?
When somebody says:
“Picture yourself on a beach.”
Are they seeing blue water and white sand?
Or are they simply thinking:
Beach. Ocean. Vacation.
You can’t know.
Because you can’t climb into somebody else’s head.
And that’s the great prank our brains have been playing on us since birth.
We assume our internal experience is universal.
It isn’t.
Your brain may be showing you a movie.
Mine may be giving me bullet points.
Someone else’s may be giving them absolutely nothing visual at all.
And we’ve all been walking around for decades assuming we’re having the same experience.
So tonight, try the apple again.
Close your eyes.
Picture it.
Then ask yourself:
“Am I actually seeing an apple… or do I simply know what an apple looks like?”
And if you suddenly find yourself lying in bed at midnight wondering whether everyone else’s brain works differently from yours…
Don’t blame me.
You started with an apple.