Things in my head today, I don’t know if I want to share them or not – not because they’re angry or shameful thoughts that potential readers might be offended or shocked by, just because they’re so incoherent, not sure if I can knock them into any sort of shape.
In the last few days I have seen one post on Facebook asking if people ‘hear voices in their heads’ when they think, and another two where you look at images and depending on what you see tells you if you’re predominantly ‘right brain’ or ‘left brain’ To deal with the right/left tests and get that out of the way, the first one told me I was ‘left’ brained and the second that I was ‘right’ – which says more about the kind of tests that get posted on FB than anything important to do with my brain.
The discussion on thinking styles was more interesting, but in the end I stepped away, even though this is something I have given a lot of thought to in recent years, because I could feel myself getting frustrated and irritated. One friend made a very good point about it illustrating how little we are able to understand what goes on in other people’s heads. It’s a few years now since the conversation I had when I told a friend that I don’t ‘see’ things in my head (unless I make a deliberate effort to do so), but that my mind is full of words, a constant narrative. I’d always assumed that that was what ‘thinking’; meant, that it’s about the words and concepts in your head, but he spoke to me as though it was a kind of disability, an affliction that marked me out from the rest of the world.
In the FB exchange there were some contributors who, like me that day, were just shocked at the idea that anyone could think any other way than with words. Others started talking about having multiple voices, ‘hearing’ accents, even linking it to schizophrenia, although to me it’s not about ‘hearing’, it’s not a voice, it’s just more like a voice-over or continuous narrative.
Someone else was sceptical because, she said, the internal narrative couldn’t be ‘continuous’, it’s always possible to stop thinking. I thought about my years of meditation – I won’t say I’ve never had any moments of a completely empty mind – but it takes effort and practice and even then it’s incredibly difficult and frustrating. The same person said she wondered if verbalisers (I hate inventing labels, but don’t know how best to express it) can feel any pleasure in reading fiction if they can’t picture the characters – I wanted to scream, because fiction is all about the story, and what are the building blocks of stories if not words? It made me think perhaps this is why I prefer radio to the telly, and reading to Youtube.
I guess the real lesson is: don’t get caught up in stuff on Facebook.
I see what I want to paint in my head (at least I assume it’s in my head) before I paint it – which usually is not the same as the final picture! but that’s due to my inadequate skills with the brushes.
Also, I thought these words before I wrote them.
Surely that’s the same for everyone?
I don’t ‘see’ anything in my head. I just hear words, in an everlasting stream.
I can only draw by copying something, whether it’s something in the real world (like a bus shelter) or in a picture. And I can’t paint at all – or rather, I suppose I can splash paint around, but I can’t paint anything that looks like anything.
Can you switch your thoughts off? Are you ever able to ‘not think’?
I think we always assume that other people think the same way we do because we can’t imagine any other way.
Yes, I can ‘not think’ – only for about ten or twenty secs or so, then thoughts creep into my ‘non-thinking’ without me noticing. I have to concentrate to ‘not-think’! I determine, about once a month, to practice thinking of nothing more often ‘cos I understand it’s good for the brain – although how anyone might be sure of that I don’t know.
When I consider the percieved benefits of making the mind blank, Budhist monks always come to mind, but then I think of sitting cross legged ‘not-thinking’ for hours and ask myself: what good does that do anyone?
I will continue trying to practice ‘not-thinking’ more frequently because I do believe it’s a good mental exercise.
I think there are neurological studies that show the brains of people who practise ‘not-thinking’ long-term are less prone to stress and anxiety than those who don’t. I watched a Hoizon programme on this about 15 years ago, which inspired me to give it a try.
You might say that I’m not a great advertisement, but I do notice the difference when I do it regularly.
I have the same concerns about whether it can become a way of avoiding engagement rather than working to make the world in general a better place (as do a lot of people I know – especially Buddhists), but I guess it doesn’t do any harm, and increasing the number of well-balanced people in the world must count for something.