As per title, I am curious. How does your mind / your thoughts work? I only ever experienced my own thoughts, so I’m curious how it works for other people.
I for one feel like my thoughts sometimes are like me talking to myself silently. Sometimes I can even let out a random short sound, which I’ve come to start disguising by laughing kinda quietly or coughing or whatever. Like it was part of something, and not like an inner monologue almost leaking out.
So, how do your thoughts work?
Inner monologue with commercial interruptions… No seriously, random commercial jingles pop into my thoughts randomly while I am going through my thoughts.
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I treat my mind as a big great block. If something is disturbing me, I stop to put everything into place and move “all together” again. It works and I’m more productive this way.
I have no internal monologue but I do have a mind’s eye. Ideas and thoughts appear to me in “splashes” or like a very quick flash. I can detect patterns in behavior and speech very accurately and quickly, and this abilty/quirk also makes me very tired rapidly. I love complicated stuff but get bored easily. Reading is one of my passions but I have to have different books for different times and places.
I hold no capacity for mental imagery, so a 5 on the Aphantasia Scale. When I think of things I do not consciously ask a question or engage in an inner monologue, either internally or externally, but instead become aware of the information that I need. My information is all stored with like information, so if you asked me about a person, then I get all of the information I have on that person including our previous conversation as though no time had passed. This makes people uncomfortable though, so I try not to reference things to specifically.
Similar to another poster here, I also hear voices, which range from background murmuring like a crowded restaurant to focused 1:1 interactions, though these are usually very brief. Additionally, I will ‘hear’ various noises and have gotten pretty good at not reacting to stuff until I gauge other peoples’ response.
I am not particularly creative. I cannot draw or create art, but I can recreate things that are in front of me.
I don’t know if that makes sense, and I am happy to answer questions if I didn’t describe it well.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4538954/
Long read, talks about internal monologue. I have some undiagnosed issue, possibly ADD.
My monologue (sometimes dialog) keeps changing every other week and difficult to keep track of.
I have both voiced and unvoiced thoughts in my head, depending on what “level” the “thinking” is at. Like others in this thread, I heard every word of this comment as I typed it, as well as a few other times as I ideated and rephrased it before typing. However, some things, particularly practiced things, just happen without any “speaking”, and I just get a notion of the end result. This sometimes leads to a weird thing where, when I’m concentrating on something, both the voiced and unvoiced “threads” will do the same thing, but the voiced thoughts move at the speed of speech, and so the unvoiced thoughts get there first, and then have to wait for the voiced thoughts to catch up. I then get to wonder why I just thought the same thing twice, and why I waited for the voiced thread to finish at all when I already knew the outcome. It’s also not always just my own voice (though usually), I’ll set up “straw-men” to represent a certain viewpoint or person if something needs that level of consideration, or I want to prepare for a difficult conversation (or reflect on one that went poorly) - I’ve seen memes about similar things, so I think that’s pretty usual.
Similarly, when reading, I hear every word (not always in my own voice, characters and narrators sometimes get their own), but if I really get into the flow then parts will move into the unvoiced stream and I get much clearer images of what’s going on (I’m a 1-2 on the aphantasia scale depending on concentration and familiarity) - that state is hard to get to, though.
No idea if any of that’s normal or not, I’ve never really thought to talk to anyone about it.
Also, I occasionally have a small part of the inner monologue slip out as whispered speech too, like you said, though I don’t tend to cover it up, if people ask I just say “oh, sorry, just thinking out loud a bit”.
Edit: added more detail
I’m a 1 on the aphantasia scale with maladaptive daydreaming. I am suffering.
I’m in the “inner monologue” camp. Most of what I think materialises as thought words. I don’t have to move anything in my throat to do that unlike OP though, I can think in words without mumbling to myself.
But I know the voice can’t be all. It’s difficult for me to think in words while actively saying something, but I can have new thoughts while speaking. Sometimes, I get interrupted in thinking mid-sentence, but then I return to that sentence to finish it because… it’s just satisfying? It’s not that I learn anything new.
I feel like I don’t have very much imagination any more. Its hard to produce images in my mind, not impossible but I do have to concentrate - remembering images is easier.
Weirdly, way harder to me: imagining a voice. Inner voice is what I sound like to myself, I can remember and replay songs and quotes as I heard them, but having any voice say anything is hard, especially female voices. Went through some examples in my head couldn’t make anyone say anything - until I thought to make different tf2 mercs sing “Oh Canada”, that somehow worked despite me definitely not having heard that before. Brains are weird.
If I’ve been listening to an audio book, or a tv series my inner monologue can take on the voice of the narrator or main character. I’m always afraid I’m going actually speak out loud like them, but it’s never happened.
schizophrenia here, my inner monologue is often conversational, like a string of words I’d speak to a person. and if I listen closely, I hear faintly a man or woman repeating the thought out loud, with emotion like confusion or contempt
What do you think of this? Do you think it applies to your situation?
https://news.stanford.edu/stories/2014/07/voices-culture-luhrmann-071614
I’ve seen this before, but after a re-read, I found this:
In an interview, Luhrmann said that American clinicians “sometimes treat the voices as if they … should be ignored. Our work found that … the way people pay attention to their voices alters what they hear their voices say. That may have clinical implications.”
Yes, definitely. The people I hear are only ever critical or offensive, and “they” have learned what’s most hurtful to me. If I start paying attention to their echoes of financial worry, they get louder and more forceful. There’s something going on in my brain that learns what’s most painful to me, and amplifies it to cause pain.
I wish you the best dealing with this. You seem very introspective and I’m sure that helps.
Yes, as a Westerner I’d agree with the study’s findings. The people I hear are harsh, not mirthful.
And I am struck by this:
the voices were an intrusion and a threat to one’s private world – the voices could not be controlled.
It’s an invasive feeling, like an outsider in your head, digging around for things that hurt and embarrass you, then saying those things aloud. It makes you powerless, all you can do is sit there while someone yells out your most shameful thoughts, and there’s no stopping them.
Fascinating. I hope science can bring relief to this.
For me it is an internal monologue with a silent audience that contributes without a voice.
My internal monologue might say “is this thing I am about to do a good idea?” And a wordless thought will provide a second opinion which my internal monologue would interpret and possibly reply to.
I keep trying to make this comment, then deleting it and trying again because I’m not 100% sure I have a certain behavior, and thinking about thinking is very distracting
So, I have an inner monologue, mind’s eye and I can change my inner monologue’s voice if I want. I find it easier to organize my thoughts by speaking out loud, although I do not do that unless alone. Looking at a fixed point also helps me filter out whatever’s going on outside to focus on my thoughts inside.
Either it’s random flashes of images/videos or certain random memory from a long time ago, a certain tune/music being played on repeat, or inner mind just constantly asking questions. Though I do noticed I can zone out when I’m really focus on something perhaps that’s what it feels like when your not thinking at all.
You ever been in a crowded space with hundreds of people talking all at once? You can hear everyone, but not enough to really make out anything except once in a while when someone gets louder than everyone else.
That’s what my thoughts are like when I am not high on weed.
When I am high, the crowd shuts the fuck up and I can actually focus on a single, complete thought.
~just ADHD things~
A fun conversation starter is always “So do you have an internal monologue?”
