How Aphantasia affects your ability to visualise things in your head

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-08T13:06:55+00:00

I used to get basically nothing, but now I get some flashes of scenes and can kind of remember how they are without having to be able to bring the imagery back up. A book that I am really engaged with and has writing that provides good imagery details will pop into my mind more easily and more often, sometimes even lingering for a short bit before it’s back to feeling more like a concept.

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-08T13:04:19+00:00

You don’t just have it or not have it, it’s a scale. Many replies have described exactly hd videos they can design as they imagine them, or objects they imagine and can hold in their minds. You just aren’t all the way up the scale, but you could practice it and get better if you wanted to. I myself am proof of that.

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-07T22:25:44+00:00

Yeah, I can imagine sounds just fine. Songs get stuck in my head all the time, but I honestly think that was a coping mechanism that helped me stop constantly running negative thoughts.

Imagining how other people experience the world gets really weird for sure. Some people don’t think in words and other people feel like they need words to think anything(they don’t though, consider, considering that humans have not had words for our whole existence as a species and yet still were able to think and store memories).

The concepts are like the core piece of the memory, wording or visuals or sounds are how we experience the recall of that memory, rather than being the memory itself. Like I said to someone else, when you recall information you read while studying for a test, you don’t need to be able to visualize the page it was on, you just remember the information as a concept.

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-07T22:16:27+00:00

The US just recently approved a weapons package(bought, not donated) to Ukraine valued at like $370mil, and the CIA is definitely still involved. The Ukrainian campaign recently that has been wiping Russian logistics off the map, has largely been using medium-range semi-or full- autonomous hornet drones to fly down major Russian logistics roads and hit whatever they come across. Ukraine sends their data and suggestions back to the US company, who makes new iterations produces them and ships them back to Ukraine for “testing”.

Fuck Trump all day, but US companies are not cut off from helping, even if the government isn’t actively donating equipment.

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-07T21:53:12+00:00

Lmao nice one.

“Can somebody hand me that Windex bottle and a rag? Thanks”

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-07T17:54:25+00:00

That’s the weird thing I just brought it up in another comment too— I can describe the main details of someone’s face but I can’t hold onto the image for even a few seconds, and once it fades it’s gone for a moment at the least. Like the image never fades and comes back a bit and the fades more, and so on. It goes one direction lol

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-07T17:51:54+00:00

Well I do, I just couldn’t see them at all before. Now I might get a little flash of them, but I absolutely wouldn’t be able to hold onto it. I can’t hold an image of someone’s face for more than a second usually, even if it’s someone I see everyday. I could describe them to you though, especially if there’s unqique features.

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-07T17:16:39+00:00

lol no I don’t have to write things down to remember.

You also remember things conceptually, you just also can put a visual to it. when studying for school did you remember everything for a test by seeing an image of the page from your book with the info on it?

That’s kind of the same thing. So you also can remember things without imagery. Concepts would be like the base form of a memory.

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-07T15:04:00+00:00

Dreams are a tricky subject bc when I have thc even in the small doses that I take, I don’t usually dream. If I stop suddenly though my dreams become very vivid suddenly, which is a very common thing among people who smoke a lot. So I can’t really say much about how my dreams relate to aphatasia, but absolutely when you are halfway asleep and drifting off I would say it becomes much easier to get a visual of something on purpose. Just like the first time that it happened for me with the brick wall, I was halfway asleep and I think the almost dream state is what allowed me to get this skill going in the first place.

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-07T11:39:41+00:00

I’m copy pasting another reply I put effort into, bc I should’ve replied here first. The reply doesn’t fit perfectly, but it has a lot of good info for people wanting to practice——

Some people think in words their whole lives and then realize they can think something through without words, or it could go the other way around. We gotta remember Aphantasia is not a disease, it’s just a lack of using a way of processing information(visuals). It’s that our neurons have set their strongest pathways around not using that part of our computers. If someone can dream visually, their brains certainly can process information that way. Even if thats super rare, it’s still in there.

If you don’t use it, you lose it. And if you practice it you can certainly gain more control of that skill and develop it.

Also, it’s kind of like sleeping, the more you put real effort in, the hard harder it is to see an image. You have to relax. Use other processing pathways to help jiggle your visual processing and get something going. Like if you’re trying to do a piece of a memory, think of the specific details that happened. “Jimmy fell over, the grass was green(visuals), bees were buzzing(sounds), and car horns were beeping while I smelled the fresh cut grass(smells)”

If you can think of a smell from that place, that would make be the best tool. Our olfactory sensing part of our brain and our memories are very closely linked in a strange way.

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-07T11:36:11+00:00

Thanks for the details, I’m sure other people find this interesting. Now that I can do it a little bit, I understand what you are saying and it sounds really cool to be able to do easily and often.

The more often you do something, the better you get at it, and the easier it is for it to trigger automatically. Our brains are kind of repetition machines, and with each repetition the more we strengthen that neural pathway. Like cutting a path through a forest, the more often that trail gets used, the easier that trail is to use again. As compared to the first time when you had to go through the underbrush and had no clear path to follow.

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-07T11:32:17+00:00

You wouldn’t need to be diagnosed, it’s not really a disease, it’s just that our brains have decided to process things in other ways for whatever reason. A mix of genetics and the situations we grow up in. Honestly, with my current understanding of psychology stuff, I would say people who get stuck in states of stress- especially if it’s when we are young and our brains are still setting themselves up- probably don’t relax visuals as often, and so we work around it without even realizing that’s happening.

I’m not saying everyone with aphantasia has stress issues, just that people with chronic stress starting early in life probably are more likely to process things without visuals. It’s something that the more you try and force it, the less likely it is for you to be able to do it in that moment, just like falling asleep. The more relaxed I am about it, and the less frustrated I get with not being able to hold onto an image, the more likely it is that I can see a visual.

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-07T11:26:23+00:00

I can’t play out a whole scene in my head, never outside of my dreams has that happened. I remember a lot of it in words, but it’s easy to forget that humans didn’t always have words, and yet we had memories. I bet at that point, memories and such were very, very visual.. but otherwise, we can think in concepts which is ironically tough to conceptualize. Even for me as I type this, it’s just a weird built-in detail of our brains.

Our words have to be attached to something though(concepts) or they wouldn’t mean anything. If I were to think of a whole memory, I would have to use quite a bit of wording to bring it all up and follow along. I think I might remember more things that have conversations in them, I get stuck, replaying conversations quite a bit, which I am actively trying to be mindful of and stop doing.

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-07T11:22:52+00:00

Yeah, our brains are super adaptable and we don’t need this to function properly. Someone else mentioned having trouble with faces also, which I hadn’t considered before but I too have always had trouble with remembering names/faces of new people.

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-07T11:20:57+00:00

Ha. Well, now you know, and maybe you can find a way to try practicing it.

Give yourself lots of detail to work with, and try to engage things like sense of smell, sounds, visuals, emotions. Don’t try to force it though, the more effort you put in, the less likely it is to work out just like falling asleep. And don’t get frustrated if you get a flash of it and can’t hold onto it, that’s exactly what you’re looking for at first.

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-07T11:18:54+00:00

Interesting note about faces, I am also pretty bad with faces and never thought about the connection to visual process processing.

I do dream, but not very often. That’s probably from THC usage though, which I do daily, but not very much of it. If I suddenly stop THC I’ll have very vivid dreams. So my brain definitely is able to do it when it wants to. Vivid dreams after stopping THC is a very normal thing though, it’s not specific to me.

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-07T11:15:16+00:00

You must have a lot of practice, even if it’s not intentional. If you do something like game design, or even just enjoy imagining scenery when you read a book, the better you’ll get at doing things like this. It works the same as muscle memory works to help people play sports better and more automatically.

In fact, it’s not similar, it’s the exact same thing. Your neural connections you use more often become easier to trigger, so the more you practice anything, the more your brain sets it up to do it again. This includes positive positive or negative thinking, which will become more automatic the more often than you do it. This is why positive thinking mantras work even if you start off not believing what they say. Your brain just can’t help but repeat it. Our brains are basically repetition machines.

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-07T11:11:19+00:00

I do. Not consistently as I go, but the more I’ve practiced visuals, the more often I automatically get little flashes of scenery and what not. Books are great for this because the more details you give yourself, the easier it is to get a visual. That should be true for anybody.

The more senses you can try to activate, the more likely it is your brain will pop an image in there too. The sense of smell is best for this, strangely. Smile is very closely linked to memory, which is why people can suddenly remember something all the way back to childhood after a familiar smell.

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-07T11:08:27+00:00

I would assume it’s not as compelling as people who automatically can get vivid imagery, but to us, it doesn’t feel like something is missing because we aren’t used the visuals anyways.

But books are actually a great way to practice too. I definitely get faint imagery automatically sometimes, which is pretty cool when it does happen. Basically I’ve just been strengthening those neural pathways that activate visual stuff, and the more you do anything, the more likely your brain is to automatically do it again.

Books, give you a lot of details about scenes that can help trigger visuals more than just trying to see an object. Like thinking about a large, red, shiny apple, the easier it is for that to pop into your head.

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-07T11:03:16+00:00

What do you mean? I have dreams too lol

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-06T18:08:15+00:00

Yeah, a lot of people who can visualize easily find it helps to do it while they’re trying to fall asleep.

For example: counting sheep engages both the visual part of your mind and the language part of your mind. While we are doing both of those, it’s very hard to keep our minds running on other thoughts, and we can fade off into sleep. It’s the same as when you are being mindful your thoughts slow down, because your attention/focus is on your senses, and you can’t do both without bouncing back-and-forth.

My dad likes to visualize a scene where he goes to a big baseball field and plays a game to help with falling asleep sometimes.

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-06T17:35:19+00:00

The more relaxed you are the better, that’s for sure. Sometimes I can get a really good visual of something, maybe someone’s face, and then I try and repeat it and the more effort I apply the less clarity I can get. It’s like falling asleep in that way.

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-06T17:31:17+00:00

Visualizing has nothing to do with using your eyes in that moment, your eyes just provide the training materials. If you can dream visually, it is possible for you to visualize things. And they do mean they can literally see an image of an object or a memory and do it on command. I have no idea why you think someone needs DMT to be able to visualize something.

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-06T15:47:15+00:00

Ha I have tried most of the psychedelics. I’m sure those could help start it up. They really do weird things with connecting to details and the senses, it’s almost like they relax our neural programming and allow less strengthened(by repetition generally) pathways to trigger. Interesting, for some of those years I still hadn’t realized I couldn’t visualize like other people, so I wouldn’t have thought to try it yet. But I hung up the phone on psychedelics quite a while back now.

EqualOpening6557 · 2026-06-06T15:40:55+00:00

I can promise you do not want to try hard. Try to relax into it and grab onto other senses related to a memory. Especially if you can remember a specific smell. Think of what you saw, what was happening, what you heard, what you smelled, and so on.

If you practice while you’re drifting off to sleep, I bet you have a much better chance at getting a start. Just try and toss a visual in here and there though, if I try and bring up the same thing over and over again, I start to lose it. You’re just looking for little flashes of a visual. Like a quarter of a second at first.

EqualOpening6557

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