Ep. 20: Aphantasia: Navigating Reality without Visualizing

Shoutout to the YouTuber, JAMIErightmeow, whose video on Aphantasia gave me the inspiration to cover today's topic! Now, you may be like me who didn't know until relatively recently that I had been dealing with this my whole life... Aphantasia is defined as the "the inability to form mental images of objects that are not present." Hence, the best way I can describe it is counting sheep... Growing up, I assumed that sheep were a metaphor and that everyone didn't actually visualize sheep in their mind, but I may have been one of the few that couldn't form an image in my mind... This episode is something that I have been meaning to explore as I have struggled my entire life with feeling creative while feeling like an 'imposter' due to my mind's lack of visual imagery. Join me as I navigate reality without visuals and how you can continue to live your best life with or without your mind's eye. Background Music: OneEightFour via Anchor by Spotify Sources: “I have APHANTASIA (and you may too...without realizing it!)” (2018) by JAMIErightmeow via YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ewsGmhAjjjI “What Is Aphantasia? When You Can't See Images in Your Mind” (2022) by Kendra Cherry; Medically reviewed by Shaheen Lakhan, MD, PhD, FAAN via Very Well Mind https://www.verywellmind.com/aphantasia-overview-4178710 Vividness of Visual Imagery Questionnaire via Aphantasia Network https://aphantasia.com/vviq/ “The Art of Aphantasia: How ‘mind blind’ artists create without being able to visualize” (2021) by Matthew MacKisack via Aphantasia Network https://aphantasia.com/the-art-of-aphantasia/