In recent weeks, I have been fascinated by the articles where people are discovering some people have constant narration internal monologues and some people have no internal monologue whatsoever! The more that I think of it, the more I am convinced that I am not either type of person. As with many things in life, I think most of us are somewhere in the middle. I have a feeling there are as many unique ways of thinking as there are humans in the world. That aside, I do find it very interesting to be able to find where the patterns and similarities between our thinking overlap. I am very interested in finding words to be able to describe what is going on in my mind.
I definitely 100% have an internal monologue. But it is not constant. When I want to think of something, I will most often use words to think of it. I use words a lot when I think. But as I started the process of trying to catch how I think when I am not consciously thinking, I realized… my thoughts are not a constant internal monologue or a constant voice in my head. My thoughts often come in abstract forms, feelings, pictures, or some kind of idea that I can’t get into words quickly. I spend a lot of time trying to translate these thoughts into words, this is often done in my head. But sometimes, the thoughts in my head are too loud for my head and I speak them out loud. Other times, I speak out loud to respond to a thought in my head. Sometimes, I speak out loud to reassure myself or others of my reasoning for doing a certain action. Sometimes I repeat words or phrases to myself to remind myself to do something. It can seem to me that my thoughts are all verbal because when I am consciously thinking I will say things in words. But if I catch myself I am sometimes just taking in an environment without saying what everything is verbally or having sentences in my head.
There are many times that I have something I want to say, but I can’t figure out the right words. I think this may be a reason behind some of the anxiety I experience daily, because I have feelings and thoughts and I have not had time to process them, so it’s just an abstract thought or feeling. When I am feeling more overwhelmed, or I have more sensory things to process, I think the anxiety is higher, and it might be because of the unprocessed thoughts and feelings. I am not great with spontaneous conversation for this reason, because it takes me a lot to take in the information and figure out how to respond.
It is very interesting to think about. I am definitely still trying to discover more about the different ways of thinking and how my thoughts compare. Please feel free to share some of the ways you think and feel free to share a favourite article or blog post about this topic in the comments. 🙂 Have a great day.
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