The Strangest Diseases You've Probably Never Heard Of 

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I have aphantasia. I didn't realize that "see it with your mind's eye" wasn't metaphorical until I was 38. I could fake my ability to "see" things in my mind by simply remembering what they looked like. I thought that's what everyone did, just remembering that, say, your childhood home had a red door with tan shutters. Knowing people can actually "see" that in their own heads blew my mind when I learned about it.

I didn't have aphantasia until after I received a head injury. The easiest way I have found to describe it is that I know a pumpkin is orange but I can't tell you what a pumpkin actually looks like. It was so odd to wake up one day and realize that I could no longer visualize objects or people in my head. Edit: I was once on a medication that caused psychosis and made me hallucinate so it is totally possible to see things that aren't there with aphantasia.

A couple of things. First thing, I love how so many of the things that are a part of the scene in this show have become characters or have been given names. Second thing, Simon has the best editors on the platform. So much of what they do is completely on point, and I love it.

Interestingly, I noticed I was better at imagining things when I was close to falling asleep. Since then, I've tried training my brain's (in)ability to imagine things vividly. For instance, I practiced by imagining chess pieces, which are pretty simple, moving around several turns in advance. I've also tried imagining things like hands on piano or sheet music notes (as I'm playing piano), and over the past 2 years I've noticed I can at least use my skeletal images much more than I used to. For instance, now I can imagine a mario setup of, let's say, kicking a koopa shell around, and "run an experiment" in my head -- maybe I try kicking it higher or lower and "see" what happens. I could hardly ever do this before, so at least some aspects of this are trainable! I used to skip reading descriptive parts of books because they didn't do anything for me -- what was the purpose of all the descriptive imagery if I couldn't imagine it? I couldn't imagine why people liked reading these things. At any rate, I can pinpoint a part of my childhood where I actively suppressed using my visual imagination (due to trauma, sadly), so my suspicion is that those events are what caused me to willingly suppress that aspect of thinking to the point where it was nearly absent but not entirely. I suspect some people may have never used it at all, and thus my training example may not work. At any rate, thanks for the awesome videos :D

I really enjoy how genuinely excited Simon seemed to learn about aphantasia (Even if he was less pleased by Avantasia)

I once had a coworker that had Aphantasia. She described it by saying that she lived with her mom, had known and loved her mom for nearly 3 decades, but she couldn't picture her mom's face in her mind. She recognized her immediately in person obviously, but in no way could she imagine her mother's face when her eyes were closed.

I did medical transcription for 25 years, and I had a co-worker who was a real hypochondriac. One day I was telling a different co-worker about the dictation I'd just transcribed, and Ms. Hypochondriac interrupted and said, "Oh, I had that, and it was terrible." I said, "Really? Your vasectomy reversed itself?" Didn't hear much out of her for the rest of the day.

To add to Simon's bewilderment at that mental imagery disease, there are also people who don't have an internal monologue and they also have no idea they're different from everyone else. A youtuber I watch found out she had mid-video when a description of it came up in whatever she was reacting to and she was like "wait what's an internal monologue? I don't have that! Wait wtf do i have this???" It was quite something to watch her have this massive self realisation in real time

I am 67 years old and only just heard about aphantasia. After reading up on it, my initial reaction, incredulity, upon finding out that others could actually SEE a red ball on a table in their "minds eye" while I saw nothing, no matter how hard I tried, quickly turned into a massive feeling of disappointment at being deprived of what must be a wonderful ability. I'm over my pity party but I am left with a strong sense of longing to be able to "see" in my mind. I wonder, is this ability classified as one of our "senses?" It's Google time!😁

When I've had exploding head syndrome I had a ethereal ghost like scream that reverberated through my skull as if it was shouted directly into my ear. Really scared me. Makes sense how ghost stories are so prevalent when your brain plays tricks like that.

Props to the editor for adding in chair speech bubbles! Those are great! Also, I have Afantasia, it's very weird. I just found out a few years ago that this exists and I thought that everyone was using hyperbole when being asked to 'picture' things throughout my life. I think I'd be constantly be daydreaming if I could see things like 'normal'! Totally weird! (I'm not a scientist but I can do creative writing)

Metalheads are low key taking over Simon's channels, and I'm all for it.

Interesting comment about how doctors die. I audited clinical trials for years. The folks in my office, having seen their share of experimental trials and some being medical professionals as well, all said they'd just do pain management. No trials, no rough medications. It's not worth it to spend the last months or year of your life in the hospital or so sick from meds you can't enjoy the end of your time on earth. For medicine to progress, we need trial participants, and I appreciate them for it, but it won't be me.

3:00 - Mid roll ads 4:50 - Chapter 1 - Persistent genital arousal disorder 9:25 - Chapter 2 - Auto brewery syndrome 13:35 - Chapter 3 - Exploding head syndrome 18:30 - Chapter 4 - Aphantasia

I've spent my life feeling like I was a nymphomaniac. Persistent genital arousal disorder is so much more accurate. And yes, when I tried to talk to my doctor about my feeling that I had a problem, it was dismissed. It also makes reporting a rape very difficult. The body is willing if if I, mentally and emotionally, am not.

19:54 yeah! I have this and always had, when I was a child. My elementary class had a lesson where we all closed our eyes and imagined ourselves on a beach. I was just sitting there like "wow this is boring." I truly believed until I learned about the condition, that the word "imagine" was more like drawing on a piece of paper. I honestly would not be able to imagine a fictional creature described to me unless I attempted to draw it and give myself a physical idea.

I trained to become a certified sterile processing tech (it's a thing and I can add a string of letters after my name because of it thank you very much) and I tell you what, learning about the various types of microbes that can kill you makes you nervous about life in general. If you want to do a great episode to make Simon squirm, do a deep dive into Prions. Nightmare fuel.

I have exploding head syndrome too. It can be incredibly unpleasant and terrifying. It usually sounds like a really loud electric shock sound, like when you half plug in something to a socket and it pops, but much louder

Lorelei knocked it out of the park with his/her (?) editing. Great job, loved the talking chair.

I suffer with exploding head syndrome and at times it can be very scary depending on how loud it is. It can range from anything from being as low a knock on the door to being as loud as an explosion. I've had loud ones so loud to the point where I have actually jumped while in bed. I have had EHS for over 15 years, but I can go years in remission, and then go through months of it, then go back into remission.

"here comes the tangent"... Priceless 👌🏻👌🏻

I miss Sam but Lorelai hitting it out of the park again. The xbox thing was genius 🤌

My wife just discovered that she has Aphantsia (we're 37). She read about it online, realized that it absolutely described the way that she thinks, then spent 20 minutes incredulously questioning me about how my imagination works, having thought visual imagination was more metaphorical, exactly like it's described in the video. She also never remembers dreams, so she also lacks that reference for what imagination is like. She's an avid reader of fiction novels and is very artistic, but obviously has different methods of processing written stories and planning and creating artwork.

I can't imagine having aphantasia.

Hey! Someone finally talking about aphantasia! Thank you!!! :D I'm an artist and a scientist (lol) so hearing you cover this was very cool (and a bit of an 'oh crap, i'm a scientist too' moment). I didn't know I had it until I was in my early 20s, and I grew up genuinely believing that people were bs-ing me when they said they were picturing things in their head. I just always accepted that everyone faked it, and then I found out aphantasia existed, and everything made sense lol

Thomas, best supporting cast member.

I love how the three of them know each other and laugh about and with each other. It's incredibly wholesome and funny at the same time ❤

I genuinely went to the Doctor once with something he didn't know how to deal with, and he cheerfully explained he was going to prescribe some random medicine because there was a chance that it might work to address my symptoms. It didn't, and it was horrible. But bless him for trying and for being honest about just taking a punt.

I've got aphantasia. Didn't realize it was a thing until the early 2010s. I literally can't picture a thing in my mind. I know what things look like and can describe what they look like but I just can't see it in my mind. And as an avid reader, makes total sense why suspense and horror don't hit me that hard and I love history and art books

Wow; Avantasia is a really good group! Thank you for the recomendation.

how have i never heard of avantasia before? probably not the intended take of the video, but im a fan of them now!

Im with Simon. I dont want sugar when I'm drunk, I want steak.

Addicted to this man in all forms.

I discovered I had Aphantasia (although I didn't know the name of it until now) when I was a teenager. My sister and I went to see a Harry Potter movie together and when we came out she was talking about how certain characters were exactly how she pictured them when she was reading the book, I was very confused about what she meant and thought it was something to do with her blindness and how she usually has to fill in the blanks to accomidate for her lack of sight. After talking to my other sisters and my friends I discovered they could all picture things while I don't. It was a weird discovery and yeah, I thought not seeing things in my mind when people tell you to 'picture this' was normal.

Memeology is NEXT LEVEL in this episode!!! 🔥🔥🔥 Not only are there vintage memes, the Randy and Mike Wazowski memes were perfect 👌

I have had a few periods of my life when I have lived with Exploding Head Syndrome. But I only realised it in retrospect after seeing an episode of Doc Martin....and they did happen at periods of intense, persistent and severe stress in our lives. I genuinely believed someone had slammed a huge heavy door and often calling my name at the same time. It was happening 2 or 3 nights each week, for many months but slowly went away. Occasionally it comes back for a brief period, and is a yardstick I use to know just how much stress my brain is under at any one time.

I have narcolepsy and my hypnagogic hallucinations get wild sometimes. Its calmed down recently though to where it sounds like fireworks, dogs barking, bombs, etc in my head (technically exploding head but its not that bad) but at least i dont see spiders anymore. That was a rough phase. But when i go into sleep paralysis it sounds like demonic dial up as loud as can be in my head.

Didn't expect to get a new band recommendation out of a Brain Blaze, but now I've got them on repeat, so thanks Kevin and Lorelei!

Laughed SO HARD at Thomas the Chair, nice one XD Also thanks for the info re: aphantasia because when I try and imagine stuff nothing comes out and then I get paranoid, but books still affect me so I guess I don't have it- Thank you, Brain Blaze MD!

Ive never known the actual term for aphantiasia, but its genuinely affected my life. It makes it hard for me to recognise people if i havent seen them over and over. I can only see things in my brain when im dreaming, or having a panic attack/PTSD episode. I thought i was broken for so long, it feels weirdly comforting seeing so many other people prcisely describing what i 'see', or dont in yhis case, on a daily basis

I definitely have all of these and not hypochondria. Come to think of it i might have hypochondria as well

My GF has aphantasia, and it's something she uses as her "about me" topic when talking to new people, it usually fascinates people to no end, because we who do have a "mind's eye" can't imagine how it is not to imagine things 😂

In a Decoding the Unknown video speculating about the circumstances of Edgar Allan Poe's death, Simon mentioned that a great many people who die of rabies do not have any recollection of being bitten or scratched by an animal, partly because they can go a while without showing symptoms and partly due to memory loss caused by rabies.

I had never heard of Aphantasia, then read about it in the BBC, and it was the first time I realised other people "see" what they're imagining. I never have. I was about 50 at that time. I can visualise abstracts in someway, though it's more a feeling than something physical, I only see what's there.

I wasn't aware of Aphantasia until about 18 months ago during some therapy for depression. We looked I to it further and I seem to be I that 1 to 3 percent of people. It's helped explain some other issues too with memory and faces.

I have that stupid exploding head syndrome too, sadly I seem to have it a couple of times per month. Worst thing is, it’s a sound that could easily be real. It’s 3 quite loud bangs on my front door ( at least that’s how it sounds like) I used to get in arguments with the other half because I didn’t understand why he didn’t wake up from it. It was only after we got a dog, and later a video door bell that I figured out it was in my head. Now if it happens I just check the camera and can go back to sleep. But it did freak me out for the first few weeks.

Aaaaaand I have two (diagnosed) on this list. 🙃 Exploding Head Syndrome and Aphantasia. I also lack an internal monologue which drives my boyfriend absolutely bananas. Thank you for this video, I felt so seen. 🖤💜

What fascinates me is that there is a related condition to aphantasia which is called anaduralia - which is the lack of an inner voice or inner monologue. Whereas those of us who have an inner voice may hear that voice swearing in our heads when we get angry, people with anaduralia hear absolutely nothing. It's totally silent inside their heads. If you were to ask them to think of three words associated with the colour green, they wouldn't hear a voice in their head list out various things that are green like leaves or grass. They can still perfectly answer the question, they just skip the internal discussion entirely. Even stranger to me, as someone _with_ an inner voice, is that those with an inner monologue are actually in the minority, with between 30%-50% having it but 50%-70% who don't (nobody actually knows the true number, but this range seems consistent any time a study is done about this topic).

Most shocking part of this video for me was that it was the first time Simon has heard about aphantasia! Did you also know some people don't have an inner monologue?

Jen needs a raise; the editing was on point!

Aphantasia isn’t a condition, it’s a trait. On the opposite end is hyperphantasia which is characterised by a hyper real imagination and may also be accompanied by visualising thoughts or words automatically without processing them first or vivid imaginations that border on hallucinations. This is why a lot of my intrusive thoughts are visual and I hate that I’ve seen any horror movie before because I can easily see things in the shadows.

I have always had aphantasia and for the longest time just thought that's how everyone was. We have an imagination we just don't see images in our mind's eye. It's blank, and I always thought that when people "pictured" things it was metaphoric. It wasn't until recently that I learned that this is a specific condition. I wouldn't call it a disease, however.

I'm currently fighting imploding head syndrome.

Did you know: Anphantasia can also be accompanied by Anauralia. Anauralia is the phenomenon of an absence of internal monologue. An internal monologue is an inner voice where you "hear" yourself talk in your head. +++++++++++ *What is it like to live without an inner monologue?* Currently, living without an inner voice has no pros or cons. Some reports suggest that having an inner voice can help you organize your thoughts and complete tasks. Conversely, it can also be destructive when our self-talk becomes critical. On the other hand, people who don’t have an inner speech tend to self-report that, in some ways, it’s helpful. They suggest they don’t have as many self-esteem issues and can block out negative thoughts. However, they also tend to complain that they often speak without thinking and lack a “filter.” This leads them to say things in different situations that they shouldn’t be saying.

Lorelei has absolutely knocked it over the Ponsford Stand for six. Peter Jackson's epic Carlton Draught ad, Alestorm's cover of Hangover, Randy, Disenchantment, and I now have another Symphonic Metal band to check out. Phenomenal work

I've had exploding head syndrome before and it's really weird. At the time I thought it was a muscle spasm that occurred in my ear canal as when this did occur I was also experiencing muscle spasms in my leg right before drifting off.

Oh I have heard of exploding head syndrome. Head injury, damage to the trigeminal nerve, and neurological diseases. Got every headache and migraine in the book. Yes I am diagnosed by multiple neurologists and a highly respected rheumatologist.

Thomas is MVP. Thanks to Lorelei for introducing us.

I have always had aphantasia, but for the longest time I didn't know that something was strange. When I was little, if I was having trouble sleeping, my father would tell me to just imagine the last vacation that we went on. I remembered the events but I could not picture them in my mind, so I thought that was all that he meant. The realization came when I thought, "I can hear songs in my mind and smell foods that I love in my mind... why can't I see? I can see when I dream after all."

If you want a really obscure condition, try burning mouth syndrome. I experienced it as random food allergies that would come and go. Others feel like they've just eaten a really hot pepper, all the time. There can be other things, too, around the whole area. I thought I was allergic to strawberries for like 15 years. The first one I ate after the diagnosis was one of the best things I've ever eaten, let me tell you what.

I had exploding head syndrome once. I imagine it was caused by chronic fatigue: I was working overnight with 10 or 12 hr shifts, sometimes more at the time. It was like physically experiencing a modem call: loud electronic claxon accompanied by flashing plaid lights. Uncomfortable, but honestly kind of intriguing, possibly because I’ve heard of the syndrome at that point.

Former alcoholic; When I quit drinking 2 and a half years ago my sugar intake was as much as my drinking was. I gained like 15-20 in the first year bc of it. After dropping my sugar and chocolate intake I starting losing the weight I gained. Now I'm back to a healthy weight and don't have that bad of a sugar craving 🎉🎉

I have PGAD and it brutal had it since I was a young child and obviosuly had no idea what was causing it went through multiple very invasive procedures to work out what was going on and didnt find out until I was in my late 20s, currently medicated off label with Duloxetine which treats it mostly to a certain degree. The doctors who worked on my case think its been caused by nerve damage in my spine, but not certain still. Always live in fear of the drugs no longer working! (sometimes they stop working randomly too). Also have a bunch of other "rare diseases" including being unable to metabolise alcohol completely, which has resulted in me landing in hospital several times from something as innocuous as a sauce with wine in it. So i have to be super careful with all food and medications, also any food with a tendacy to ferment like apple juice. Had my fair share of exploding head syndrome too. I blame my extra chromsome, my life is a wild ride of rare diseases / conditions!

The moment you mentioned seeing bright lights as part of the exploding head syndrome I remembered numinous times growing up and once a few months ago where I’d be in bed and believe a flashlight was put in my face or that all of the lights in the room were turned on. Always wondered about it but usually forgot about it in between experiences. Cool! Now I know!

When I first heard of the persistent arousal disease I thought it sounded unpleasant, but then I got a mild taste of it 2 yrs after I had a baby when I started ovulating again. It sucked. I was a single mom and my toddler slept with me as well as still breastfeeding. I nvr had time to myself to take care of it & it was incredibly frustrating. I literally ended up hooking up with my ex even tho I pretty much hated him at that point. But I was desperate for relief, so I’d drop my baby off with my mom, then leave for work early so I could have a quickie with my ex. Or I’d stay up late so we could hook up, even tho I was desperate for sleep. Fortunately my hormones leveled out after a few months and I went back to my normal, which for me means not having much in the ways of s£xual desire. But I realized how inconvenient and low key a pain in the a.ss it is to be horny all the time. But I did end up developing some empathy for my manwhore friend.

Simon's such a gentleman that even his furniture is polite. Classy bastard

When I first learned of Aphantasia, a few years ago, I was floored. I thought I had it, but upon more reflection, I do not. But I might as well 😅 With great effort, I can see a faded outline of a thing, but it completely lacks detail and I can't hold it. I do, however, have EHS, Musical Ear Syndrome and something called SDAM. With Exploding Head, it feels like a great explosion right behind me. Both EHS and Musical Ear, caffeine consumption and sleep deprivation GREATLY contribute to it. Musical Ear, for me, is like an earworm that is very faintly HEARD as if with ones ears. SDAM is lacking an emotional connection to whatever memories I've managed to hold onto. I can say x, y, and z happened- but it's akin to remembering a story told second or third hand. I think of them as data points. There are blessings with these things. I am never lonely. I don't crave or miss people. Even after my husband, of 20 years, suddenly passed away, I was able to move away from grief so much faster than most because I can't picture his face in my mind. It's not that I forget people or that I loved/love them, they're just much less present in my thoughts. The downsides are: well, that's just sad 😵‍💫Impactful people SHOULD be felt. I also tend toward hoarding. Objects help me remember the data. I also have to have a very hands on approach to anything I want to learn or do. (Having Dyscalculia doesn't help and I've often wondered how my near-aphantasia may have contributed to that). Great video!

Last time I was this early for anything I was born five weeks premature. *Also I, and my kid, have EHS. It's freaking weird man.

I wonder if people with aphantasia also lack a voice inside their head? I learned recently that a lot of people don't have an internal dialogue. Could you do a video on that?

Everytime I think the memes here can't get any more amazing, I'm proven VERY VERY wrong. I love it.

In the USA it is actually against the law to drive drunk on private property. You can even be arrested in your own driveway with your car off but the keys are in ignition. It shows intent that you you have the intent to drive while drunk.

Wait, people can imagine something in their head and then see it? I thought that was some type of synesthesia

2 minutes in I'm still laughing at the mental image of a man duct taping his wood to his leg

As an individual with Aphantasia, it’s absolutely f***ing maddening. It’s usually described as complete inability to imagine things but some can have it and imagining is just highly reduced. Flashes, or only very strong familiarity with something may trigger a small reduced image but that’s it. Best way to describe it is you know what something is. Your mind knows exactly what it wants, but you have little to no way to visually see it. Your brain comes up with other ways to compensate for the lack of imagination. It’s quite fascinating actually. Drugs and other methods may help bridge the gap to help hallucinate and see within the mind, but that’s about all you can do. Perhaps there is a way with particular drugs to increase neuroplasticity and create neuron pathways to help fix imagination but that’s about the only thing I know of. Most that seem to have this condition usually suffered from head trauma in their life at some point.

Similar to that last one, I was surprised to hear that there are people who don't audiate as (without perfect pitch, which is a separate thing and apparently bad as it tend to drift as you get older) I can think of tones and form it into music in my head without needing to hear it first. This is just something I could always do, so I didn't realize there are people who don't. Also, surprising is that there are people who dream only in B&W or don't have sound in their dreams.

I remember years ago I read an article about Exploding Head Syndrome. Thought it was interesting and moved on. One night I heard an extremely loud bang while asleep. I sat up, ruled it as EHS and lay back down when my partner at the time asked "WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?!?!?!?" For some reason, in my half asleep state I said I had EHS. She then asked why in the hell she heard it and why everything was shaking. It finally clicked for me that if I had it, she wouldn't have heard it. So I came up with an alternate theory. The upstairs neighbor had a chair fall over. We lived on the top floor. I am an idiot when half asleep. She kept telling me it was an explosion and I kept saying it was a chair. The next morning, the top news story was a fireworks plant that blew up a few miles away. Needless to say I didn't hear the end to that one for a while.

I have exploding head syndrome. It's mildly annoying and only happens a few times a year. Essentially, once or twice a year when I'm dosing off it'll sound like a civil war cannon has gone off and only I hear it and it's only in my right ear.

I've had two software engineer coworkers with aphantasia. With the first colleague, it randomly came up when discussing Pictionary, and he said he was bad at it. We were crossing the street, and I said, what if I told you to imagine a stoplight. You'd have three circles in a rectangle, right? And you'd put "shine" lines around the one that was glowing, and that's it. And I was blown away that he could not imagine it! I don't think he realized that just about everyone else could. The second colleague, who didn't find out until he was in his 40s, put it this way: "I really have no frame of reference, it's hard to describe the lack of something, especially until recently not even being aware of it not being there. I was completely shocked to find out that seemingly most people have this ability. Memories, thoughts, ideas etc are all just words for me. I have zero mental images. I can, easily recognize things, and describe them, but it's words, nothing actually visual. ...like a computer with out a screen, everything still works, just can't see it." Like many with aphantasia, he said that he thought seeing something in your "mind's eye" was just a metaphor until he learned that it wasn't. I find this so fascinating and want to ask a million questions, but that would get annoying, I'm sure. Another software developer friend has a son who believes he has the condition as well. And a college friend who is in tech as a project manager reports not being able to form mental pictures. She said that it's hard to repeatedly navigate even her own office building back and forth from the restroom, because there is no mental map of the layout of the office. She relies on knowing that when you see an object like a particular water cooler, you need to turn right, etc. When people give presentations with visuals, she can't remember it later, which blows my normal mindset of "a picture is worth a thousand words" out the window. As a designer who relies on mental images for a living, it baffles me that I know 3 or 4 people with this condition. It made me wonder if people with this condition gravitate towards certain occupations, though if 1-3% of people have it, and I know a few hundred people, then this is to be expected across the board. It just feels strange when it applies to actual people who I know.

I have hyperphantasia. I dated someone with aphantasia who was an extremely good artist. I can literally imagine something photorealistically, imagine that thing in whatever art style I am attempting to draw in, then literally see an outline of it very faintly on the actual page through my eyes as if I was very mildly tripping, and then trace that. And I still can't even draw a good stick man. I am however able to basically run solid works a form of 3D CAD software used for engineering in my head and then the actual software is just there to validate my ideas and make them into something usable by others. My woodshop teacher in highschool kept trying to give me bad grades on planning assignments then begrudgingly changing them when I perfectly built the thing I said I was going to build from the plan on my head and list of board lengths I and measurements of the spot it was going in I wrote down.

Exploding Head Syndrome in some form or other is not that uncommon. My first experience with it sounded exactly like a gunshot and I did look around the room to try to understand what was happening. The difference is that the noise from a gun is painful to the ears and this was just the sound. I had a laugh and went back to bed. When I have that, it's when I'm struggling to get to sleep and once it happens I'm sound asleep in minutes. I do have the flashes of light and some images. It's always electrical. Thunder and lightning at the same time. There's a blown transformer outside of my window with a loud noise and bright flash of light. With the light, there's a thousand images that flash in a second. Some people get pretty upset by the condition, but I always found it amusing.

Hi Thomas the Chair! I'm doing well, hope you're good too (and Simon's bionic ass isn't crushing you)

Little funfact for you Simon but people who are do art (animators, for example) are a lot more likely to have a reduced ability to visualise objects or things! I personally do art and I struggle a lot with copying stuff since if I look away, I struggle to picture it and start getting stressed while drawing. I prefer just winging it and drawing whatever feels correct to what I imagine my story characters would look like since I find it almost impossible to visualise/picture stuff in my mind. For me it’s basically just black with a very vague outline of the thing I’m trying to picture but it’s so hard to see properly that I just don’t bother and normally just pretend I’m visualising stuff.

I had never heard of aphantasia until recently, and boy did it explain a LOT

Is Simon ignoring Thomas the chair or does he not know he exists? I suppose it’s possible he might not be able to imagine such a legendary chair…

When I was 23 a friend was telling me about a kid and how neat it was the way he described his memories. He said they were like a video playing in his head. So I was confused about it and asked to clarify. Is he seeing a literal video? Can see she see one to when re remembers things? And that's how I found out I wasn't "normal". I found out many years later that it's called Aphantasia.

I’ve woken up to loud noises usually someone yelling my name, the doorbell or someone knocking on the door, but not when I’m falling asleep

I have Aphantasia. I didn’t understand that’s what I was experiencing (or rather not experiencing) until I was 35. So many things make so much more sense now that I understand my experiences vastly differ from the average person.

I don’t have full Afantasia, but I definitely struggle more than most people I know with imagining. For example, I can’t read a description of a character in a book and see them in my imagination. If I have a visual reference for how they look, I can usually imagine the scene. It’s the same reason I can’t process audible driving directions but I can look at a map and recall it mentally. (Oh, and I do also listen to Avantasia. The Scarecrow is my favorite.)

Your reaction to aphantasia is exactly my reaction to realizing that people can actually see images in their minds (though I can hear things in my mind)

I have had this exploding head syndrome. Ever since I have my hysterectomy, I started having trouble sleeping. I’ve had these episodes 2x since and it scared the crap out of me. Didn’t know there was a word for it.

I swear this is the best channel on RU-vid. But the new ones make me miss Danny and Peter and abused paper scripts 🤣🤣🤣

I had 'Exploding head syndrome' for years along with very strong muscle spasms when falling asleep & it was caused by a drug addiction. My body would need rest but my mind would be going at 100%. I assumed it was disconnect where my body and mind wanted to do different things & this caused all these sleep disorders.

Yep, aphantasia is very real. I always thought people were talking nonsense when they described reading as 'staring at words on a page and hallucinating', or that they could mentally travel around inside a building or in an imagined environment, but apparently people can generate mental images of what they're reading or thinking about. I only found out in recent times that this ability to visualise is what's normal and that my experience of image-free darkness during conscious hours was the unusual one. I can't imagine what it must be like to be able to visualise - and yes, dreaming in sleep is typical and can be quite vivid - and I am curious. How are you certain what's real and what's not if you can see things in your mind like that?

I met someone on line who is aphantasic. He was definitely a science type. Freaked me out that this condition existed. Broke my heart.

Thank you for this video, Simon. I also have aphantasia. And it has been a revelation to me that most of the rest of the world can actually see things in their heads. I just always thought that "picture in your mind" was just a turn of phrase or metaphorical. I know, and can conceptualize, what things should look like, but I cannot "see" it in my mind. I do dream, and occasionally have hallucinated, however they have always been in 2d, like watching an television set. Which is why I've been confused when people tell me they sometimes wake up from sleep and have to take a moment to realize they're awake since their dreams were "so, so real".

I shit you not, i’ve asked quite a number of people throughout my life whether they’ve ever experienced anything like “ your own thoughts shouting at you at a great volume, mostly at times close to falling asleep” and *every* single time i got back a look like “wtf are you talking about? you’re mental” loooool i genuinely started to believe that this is something no one experiences and that i’m probably indeed a bit mental. and here you both - Simon and Kevin - telling that y’all know precisely what this is about based on personal experience. and you know what? *wtf? you’re both mental* but really, i’ve experienced this maybe 3-4 times in total and mostly during childhood and teenage years. but yeah, still remember it very well, quite close to psychedelic trip in terms of disorientation, but very short in duration

I have exploding head syndrome. It's bloody annoying when you're trying to sleep and you hear a massive *BOOOOOOOOOOM*

ChatGPT: "However, it's important to note that-" Simon: "Enough of that." ChatGPT: "THOSE TERMS ARE NO LONGER USED!!!!"

Simon's tendancy to personify objects is spreading to Sam, now the chair is a character in the SCU.