I have a question for you.
Do you have a narrator in your head? A voice that talks to you constantly, and never shuts up?
You can’t even get it to be quiet when you rest or meditate?
Do you have full blown conversations with the voice in your head?
Do you have a narrator in your head? A voice that talks to you constantly, and never shuts up?
You can’t even get it to be quiet when you rest or meditate?
Do you have full blown conversations with the voice in your head?
This conversation absolutely fascinated me, when I first started asking people this question around 10 years ago.
That’s because a significant proportion of the population hears their own internal monologue, or several streams of monologues, or dialogues.
That’s because a significant proportion of the population hears their own internal monologue, or several streams of monologues, or dialogues.
Not deliberate, conscious thought - but a constant stream of conversation, description or narration in their minds, even when they don’t realise or tune into it.
(Those of you who have this will know exactly what I mean!)
(Those of you who have this will know exactly what I mean!)
But even more interesting to me, was the people who don’t have this at all. They can genuinely achieve mental ‘silence’. Nothingness. No voices chattering away. They can meditate. Some of them think visually, in images, rather than with a narrator in their minds.
Instead of thinking in full sentences and with an audible voice, they think in images that appear to them and they interpret those.
Do you know why I’m interested in this phenomenon?
Because no one has yet fully explained it. We don’t understand consciousness.
Do you know why I’m interested in this phenomenon?
Because no one has yet fully explained it. We don’t understand consciousness.
We don’t understand where that voice in our mind comes from, and why some people have one, or many, and some people cannot even imagine a voice in their head.
So why are we so damn confident about what is ‘abnormal’ and ‘normal’?
So why are we so damn confident about what is ‘abnormal’ and ‘normal’?
Why do we ignore that at least 30-50% of people have inner voices? Why do we ignore the latest neuro research that at least 5% of population see hallucinations & hear voices at any time (& that these experiences are more common than people with diagnosed ‘psychiatric disorders)?
What if we have got this all wrong?
What if we are SUPPOSED to be able to see and hear things? What if they have a purpose? What if we’ve been chalking it all up to ‘mental illness’ and stigmatising it for so long that we haven’t even realised what these mechanisms are for.
What if we are SUPPOSED to be able to see and hear things? What if they have a purpose? What if we’ve been chalking it all up to ‘mental illness’ and stigmatising it for so long that we haven’t even realised what these mechanisms are for.
Fascinating, isn’t it?
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