How do you think? (Or: "what do you think *in*?")

i narrate to myself... a lot. sometimes out loud too, although less often if there are people around, or maybe as often except i try to turn it into a series of joking comments instead of just.. talking to myself. notably i don't have my own distinct headcanons for characters' appearances if they're in a text- or audio-only medium. i do tend to have some sort of vague idea of what i think people i talk to online look like if i haven't seen pictures of them, but usually it's based on their icons.
i can't actually imagine reading a book/listening to a podcast/etc and having a unique idea of what the character looks like. same with voices for characters. my hc tends to be "whatever voice actor i hear first, as long as i like their voice."

it's difficult for me to explain any abstract concepts relating to me in words unless i see other people's explanations and go "yes, like that, that is like me." difficult for me to conceptualize things articulately in general, but it's especially noticeable when i'm trying to describe a sensation or the way i do something or feel about something.

 

:D this is one of the questions I like to ask people and then they give me blank stares because I'm asking weird questions.

Me too! I use 'we' all the time for my internal narration. (Sorry I'm quite excited that that's not just me)

I mostly think in words especially if I'm consciously thinking but it's on a decidedly different channel to actually saying anything - there's a definite step I have to take to translate my inner voice into actually speaking.
I can't really visualise anything and my awareness of how 3D objects exist in a space is terrible because I struggle to retain and idea of proportion and shape in my head.
There's also the thoughts that aren't really specific things but are more tactile feelings? I have several craft/present ideas fizzing in the background and none of them are specific words in my head nor are they pictures exactly but they're in there. It seems kind of related to how when you dance it's the muscle memory and music that drives the action rather than any conscious thinking as such. It's also a bit like how feeling anxious and worried can just feel tight and hot and tired is heavy and slow - non-specific type feelings but you sort of know without thinking what they're about.

 

There's a lot of things going on in my head. Um. I narrate in third person, with multiple voices. There's a me-voice, which is when I'm narrating my own actions, experiences, feelings, etc, and it is the only voice I have that doesn't have a mental auditory component. Other voices are the voice of my mother, my father, a "parents" voice, voices of my significant others, character voices, etc. Generally, the things the person-voices say map pretty well to my experiences of what that person is like. (I don't know if I'm explaining this well. I can imagine and interaction between me-voice and my partner's voice, and usually the response of my partner's voice is accurate to my partner's actual response when I later bring it up. The only exception to this is when I'm dreaming.)

Words have a distinctive "taste/feel" to me. Taste isn't quite the right word, because it's not like, oh this word tastes like chocolate, and this word tastes like cherries, it's more like: this word tastes like what it feels like when I put rocks in my mouth; this word tastes like what it feels like when I put a cherry in my mouth. So it's both taste and a feeling. For example, when I think of the word "cherry," it feels like an actual cherry in mouth; "cherry red" however, as a descriptor, feels like the taste of cherry + a flat plastic disk about the size of a dime on my tongue. All words have taste/feels, and they are related to my experience with that word (is it a physical thing I have interacted with), the letters that make up that word, it's length, and my personal feeling/association of the connotation of that word. When I can't remember a word, I can always remember what the word taste/feels like, and I can use that to figure out the word (because it tells me things like connotation, definition, letters and length of word, etc).

I know I think in words, because sometimes I don't, but I always think in taste/feel, so sometimes I can feel my internal narration glitch, but I still have the sensation of the words I want to think/say? Generally only happens when I am overwhelmed and going non-verbal.

When I get tired, my thoughts will come slower, and sometimes my narration will glitch on a word, or repeat itself several times, before continuing.

I have some degree of visualization, but I have to do it with my eyes closed, because visualizing something in my mind's eye while looking at things gives me a headache.

 

I actually tend to think in video clips around my immediate moment, if that makes any sense. Like, that's how I'm able to also think in language and pictures, just not all the way.

Thinking is hard right now. :T