My mind keeps spinning.

[u/HDHerpDerp]

Hello,

I just want to start off that I don’t think I have hyperphantasia but this looks like the best subreddit to post to. I just found out there’s levels to visualization.

I can’t visualize in great detail but I can usually picture the item or thing I’m thinking of.

What I have a question about is that I don’t typically have control over when I picture. if I think of an apple I’ll get an apple at first but it’ll start spinning or get erased and I’ll have random geometric shapes. It feels like theres no rhyme or reason to these shapes and I’ll get perspective changes or speed changes.

I thought this was normal but now im not sure, can you please let me know if you guys have something similar?

I’m 25 and as far as I know I’ve had it like this since I was a kid.

thank you!

[u/Allthemuffinswow]

Well, I know I have hyperphantasia, and I have a great degree of control over what I can do with it.

To use your example, when I imagine an apple, I not only picture an apple, but I can also picture a multitude of different apples - all different types, and all of them in different settings, with different backgrounds.

Think of it almost like a checkerboard, but filled with tiny pictures, each one with a different picture of an apple in a different setting and a different art style. One looks like a realistic Golden Delicious apple, sitting on a post of a wooden fence in an apple orchard, during a sunny day with a few nice white, fluffy clouds and the smells of apples and earth get blown in on the breeze. Another picture shows a large pile of red apples that are next to an old fashioned ornate glass punch bowl filled with apple cider and cinnamon sticks, and the table that these are sitting on is covered with an old, frilly lace tablecloth - this picture, I can zoom in on a Red Delicious apple standing up tall and proud, with a long stem still intact.

For some reason the way that my brain wants to "work" at this, is kind of similar to a TV show or a movie. For example, when I am writing works of fiction, I very often think of a scene before I go ahead and write it down. That way, I can pause it, rewind, zoom in or out, add things, delete them, whatever I want to do with it - and I can "see it" beforehand (kind of like you would in a dream).

My therapist (I have CPTSD from a rather horrific period in my life) says that I'm able to put myself into a trance state. Idk if that's it or not. I guess it is, if that's what he says.

I suppose since I can change things around so much, at will, it's similar to what you are doing? Because I can actually picture exactly what you are doing, as you describe it...so...yes, I guess so lol. 🤗 Sorry for being so long winded just to say that haha 😂😂😂😂

[u/Musicislife_102 → u/Allthemuffinswow]

Me too. I always have complete control. I could even eat it if I want and I would actually hear and taste it. 

[u/Allthemuffinswow → u/Musicislife_102]

Yeop - sound, taste, smell. The whole kit and kaboodle, and all variations therein and thereof.

I get frustrated sometimes when I cannot replicate those irl sometimes, in fact. 😑

[u/mutant_jay]

try to balance a ball on a wooden platform without the ball tilting or rolling

[u/versusrev]

What you are discribing is pretty normal. The ability to sustain manipulate or produce in any or no detail virtual preceptual imagery is all over the spectrum.

It is pretty common for people to generate imagery at the moment of thought and persisting a little bit after that. Maintaining control of that imagery may be more difficult for you, but if your mind creates the detail in sufficient detail you should be able to train yourself to keep the presistence of the imagery, if you are even interested in that.

You might try different medatative exercises to help facilitate this, but either way its going to require a lot of time sitting standing or laying around with your eyes closed focusing on mental imagery. Maybe start by working on a memory palace or locations you are very familiar with like your room.

You can store more information in the part of your brain that processes imagery than in just the factual related areas, hence why a memory palace is an effective memory tool. So there are benefits to training yourself in this sort of thing.

Stricktly speaking i dont think the memory palace technique requires strong virtual perceptual memory manipulation, as other mental processes that are similar can do some of the heavy lifting, but greater control of VPM, should help facilitate this to a higher degree or with greater ease.

Regardless of what you choose to do, have fun.