Counting Sheep

A few years ago, the radio tossed me a large dollop of bizarre information that seriously challenged my entire way of being. I was presented with a vast hitherto unknown unknown that applies to a scant 2% of the population - myself brutally included. Apparently, unlike the other lucky 98% of the human race, I somehow function with the rare and probably congenital mental condition of ‘aphantasia’. Self-diagnosis is fast and simple: just close your eyes, and think of an apple, or a purple triangle, maybe Brad Pitt, or your nearest & dearest, and tada! there they are. Or, should you be an aphant, such as I, there they aren’t - just an endless blank and silent blackness. 

This revelation triggered an immediate and overwhelming tsunami of grief, alongside a profound sense of injustice. Infuriating that the majority of people should have a brimming life reference library from which to readily call up and re-view their most cherished faces and places and moments at will. And to add insult to injury, they are all totally unaware of what an astoundingly privileged and mind-boggling superpower they have. They can probably wiggle their ears at the same time, too.

A condition first identified in 1880 by psychologist, Galton, it was re-discovered in 2015 when a British patient complained of the loss of his inner vision after heart surgery. This rapidly led to research at Exeter University by neurologist Prof Zeman, who named it, and declared it to be “an intriguing variation in human experience, rather than a disorder”. There is even a polar opposite to my sensory vacuum, known as hyperphantasia, which incurs extreme sensory overload. The continued study of these conditions is being applied to a better understanding of Parkinson’s and certain types of dementia.

So now there were things I finally understood: not least, why I had always struggled to ‘count sheep’. I would screw my eyes up tight til they watered, and occasionally produced the odd tiny flash in the dark. Then there was my uncool inability to conjure up warm tropical beaches full of blissed out fellow meditators. And those endless colourful reminiscences with friends, where I’d just play along, echoing phrases like “ah, I can see it all now’, ‘in my mind’s eye’ ..” I suppose I had concluded that these were all just throwaway terms, along with the bees knees and the hair of the dog.

In summary, I have no capacity for voluntary imagery, nor, as a total aphant, have I access to any other sensory memories. I do occasionally dream - sometimes vividly, and I have hallucinated. Not that I recall them well, as with films and books, for along with this condition comes a flaky episodic memory. To crown it all, add a considerable degree of ‘prosopagnosia’ - impaired name/facial recognition - explaining my struggle to describe a pair of car thieves to a policeman; my failure to pick out a violent mugger from a line-up, and why I regularly fail to ‘place’ the less familiar face. Such things are obviously manageable. The sadness, after such a long, rich and interesting life, lies with the knowledge that I am denied ready access to so many wonderful places and faces, and to all that I have loved and lost: my mother’s eyes, my baby’s first smiles .. for as long as I can recall, I have suffered a deep ‘melancholia’ when faced with beautiful experiences - obviously ‘knowing’ I was unable to bank them. 

I had to wade through a few weeks of shock and sulky sadness before I could begin to evaluate the significance of my novelty condition. But I soon cheered up when I began to address what was undoubtedly my own Superpower. It seems I just Know Stuff: how things are, what is, what was - like a computer, but without a monitor screen. It would seem our brains store information independently - the visual and the verbal. I can only ‘conceptualise’ my senses, have a powerful ‘semantic’ memory, and a strong selective visual ‘memory’, but absolutely zero visualisation. 

The more I reflect on it, the more fascinated I am by the way in which a divergent brain compensates, using other means of perception and retention. I remember via a plethora of ideas, feelings, auras, details, concepts, a huge bank of essences, and above all, language. I gain access and teleportation via keys and triggers: smells, sounds, textures, music, things, and - thank heavens for photographs. Just about everything is magically connected, contains its own tale, its own essence. A broad emotional spectrum is the foundation of all that I recall, boosted by empathy and intuition, especially through nature. The most subtle shift in birdsong or weather can transport me to specific memories. Music is a vast minefield of triggers, and recordings of wartime sirens will elicit a foetal shudder. Today, pottering about in the garden, I realise how rich a bank it is. Perfumes, colours, buzzings and tweets - all gateways to times and places through the lens of a lifelong love of the natural world. 

One of the bonuses of aphantasia is that I suffer no flashbacks of bad stuff, making it so much easier to ‘move on’. I carry the feelings awhile, but they soon dissolve. Not overly fearful of the dark, I understand now why I am so at ease in a flotation tank, deprived of sensations. Having only the sensory here and now, at least I’m fully tuned to the Buddhist notion of impermanence. 

Firmly anchored in the Now, nothing amuses this aphant more than to go sit in a field and count sheep.

If this subject has been of interest to you, I strongly recommend you check out Aphantasia Network. They have a Facebook page, and if you go to Aphantasia.com you can access plenty of information, and sign up for a great newsletter too.