Guy Finds Out Not Everyone Has An Internal Monologue With Themselves And It Ruins His Day
The human brain is one of the most complex objects on our planet. And while we can’t even tell how well we know it, it’s hard to comprehend the stuff we’ve already learned about it as well. Like the fact that not every person has internal monologues.
When Ryan Langdon found out that not everyone can inwardly talk to themselves, his mind was completely blown. “It intrigued me because [after] I read it, [I] didn’t believe it could be true,” he told Bored Panda. So, he decided to investigate it to the best of his abilities. Afterward, Ryan compiled his findings and wrote a comprehensive text that immediately went viral.
More info: ryanandrewlangdon.wordpress.com
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My day was completely ruined yesterday when I stumbled upon a fun fact that absolutely obliterated my mind. I saw this tweet yesterday that said that not everyone has an internal monologue in their head. All my life, I could hear my voice in my head and speak in full sentences as if I was talking out loud. I thought everyone experienced this, so I did not believe that it could be true at that time. Literally the first person I asked was a classmate of mine who said that she can not “hear” her voice in her mind. I asked her if she could have a conversation with herself in her head and she looked at me funny like I was the weird one in this situation. So I began to become more intrigued. Most people I asked said that they have this internal monologue that is running rampant throughout the day. However, every once in a while, someone would say that they don’t experience this.
My life began to slowly spiral out of control with millions of questions. How do they get through the day? How do they read? How do they make decisions between choice A and choice B? My friend described it as “concept maps” that she sees in her brain. Another friend says that she literally sees the words in her head if she is trying to think about something. I was taking ibuprofen at this point in the day because my brain was literally unable to comprehend this revelation. How have I made it 25 years in life without realizing that people don’t think like me?
I posted a poll on Instagram to get a more accurate assessment of the situation. Currently, 91 people have responded that they have an internal monologue and 18 people reported that they do not have this. I began asking those people questions about the things that they experience and it is quite different from the majority. I would tell them that I could look at myself in the mirror and have a full-blown telepathic conversation with myself without opening my mouth and they responded as if I had schizophrenia. One person even mentioned that when they do voice-overs in movies of people’s thoughts, they “wished that it was real.”
And to their surprise, they did not know that the majority of people do in fact experience that echoey voice in their head that is portrayed in TV and film. Another person said that if they tried to have a conversation with themselves in the mirror, they would have to speak out loud because they can’t physically do it inside of their mind.
I started posting screenshots of these conversations on my Instagram and my inbox started to flood with people responding to my “investigation.” Many people were reassuring me that I was not crazy about having an internal monologue, while others were as absolutely mind blown as I was. People were telling me that I ruined their day and that they now do not understand anything about life. Maybe you are all just a figment of my imagination, but regardless, yesterday made reality seem even more skewed. How do they think? How does this affect their relationships, jobs, experiences, education? How has this not been mentioned to me before? All of these questions started flooding my mind. Can those people without the internal monologue even formulate these questions in their mind? If they can, how does it happen if they don’t “hear” their voice? I mentioned earlier that I was spiraling out of control. Well, as I write this and as I hear my own voice in my head, I am continuing to fall down the rabbit hole.
Whether people just have different definitions of their thoughts, or if people literally don’t have an internal monologue, there is one thing that we do know… you will definitely get a headache if you keep thinking about this. Just trying to wrap my head around it is causing irreversible brain damage. I suggest asking people around you what they experience. If you are one of the few that do not have this internal monologue, please enlighten me, because I still do not understand life anymore. Send help.
“Hundreds have DMed me about this topic,” Langdon said. “[Both] the people who could verbalize their thoughts (team neuroverbal) and the ones that couldn’t (team neurovisual).”
So far, the man doesn’t plan to continue his studies. “I hope real scientists take this thing that I made so many people [can become] aware of [it] and make big changes to how we address mental health.”
Here’s what people said about Ryan’s findings
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This is so interesting. I never really thought about how other people don't think the same. I dream in vivid colour and sound, and I found out some people don't. This is the same. As child I had such vivid imagination, I would just run up and down on the lawn, totally silent, and imagine I was a warrior queen giving a speech to my armies. I would hear my own voice with a fancy accent and then change the voice when the commanders would answers her/me. See it, hear it, get totally caught up in it. The quiet must be nice, but how do people who think differently entertain themselves?
I have whole arguments with people in my head. I wonder if this could be an indication as to what learning styles work best with different people.
Suddenly the whole visual, auditory ect. learner thing does make a little more sense... AND the duck thing, maybe people need a duck to talk to because they can't discuss it with themselve?
i do too!
I did think of that - even ran a small poll! There's apparently a bunch of different ways to think! 1) Internal monologue, 2) internal dialogue 3) interview 4) narration and 5) nonverbal. Personally, I think in dialogue - I imagine telling my thoughts to a different person, who might be someone from my personal life, or a generic stand-in of a certain profession (like a doctor when I think about health problems).
Very interesting, I haven't thought about all those possibilities and suddenly my mind is a bit blown. I'm an interview! I always thought my question/answer sessions in my mind were just a monologue as I process and think through stuff, but really it is more of an interview as I'm almost always answering a question or describing something as a response. The thing is, sometimes I'M asking the question and sometimes I imagine it as a conversation with someone else, either familiar or unfamiliar.
Me too!
We entertain ourself by reading boredpanda.
Very interesting! I also dream in colour, sound, I can even taste food and feel real pain AND I have lucid dreams. I like creating drama scenes for myself before I fall asleep, so in my mind I talk to others and they talk to me. But, unlike you, in everyday life I feel things and see ideas. It's like observing life and people, absorbing the atmosphere while my brain does the whole work extra quickly somewhere deep inside, out of my reach. I just suddenly know things. I often have to think why I know or how to express it with words.
I dream in vivid color also, very complex dreams, and I can remember many of them, sometimes years later.
I dream in full color and surround sound, with tactile special effect. I always wondered what the people's dreams might be like, without all that. I dream full-blown James Bond movies, epic fantasies and weird adventures. Oh, and I also write perfect songs in my dreams, with the lyrics and music and backup singers and orchestra... I only wish I could remember those great hits after I wake up :)
My wife dreams the same way. Full color, can control most of the time and can wake herself up if she's in trouble. Me, I go to sleep and rarely ever dream. I lay down, and then wake up. There's nothing in between. I wish I could dream more. It's kind of creepy that I just go into this black state of nothingness for 5 - 7 hours and then wake up.
Bob, you do dream as well as others only difference is that you don't remember your dreams as vivid as some other people but all of us dream, it is a part of sleeping process (parts of our sleep are dreamless, parts are with dreams it depends on brain state in particular time during sleep).
@ Duska, I see flashes sometimes and when I wake up I remember seeing something but rarely recall anything that happens. I've heard about keeping a journal to help. When I was younger I had dreams. I know because I still remember a lot of them. Always taking the car out of the driveway and hitting something or hanging out with friends.
I dream in silence and monochrome, and no one has a face; I have an indentical twin sister who dreams in colour and can fly, so it's not a genetic thing!
You were clearly, a fabulous child.
Yes! My reaction (and by reaction, I mean, my internal monologue) was “Can my kids learn to think this way?!?!”
Yes yes yes yes yes I love the warrior queen with a fancy accent! I bet she's awesome!
Fascinating
I can create whole "movie" scenes (I can create the story, see the characters, hear the dialogs, ...) in my head while trying to fall asleep
I almost always do that when going to bed, and I get annoyed that I fall asleep without completing the "scene"
Same here, I have literally lived a thousand lives in my mind.
Beautiful thought!
And if its one scene you dont like you just stop it and rewind and redo that scene. Cant wait to hit bed tonight.
Guys I used to do that. I so miss it. I remember it being freeing, relaxing, deeply satisfying
OMG, I thought I was the only one!
Oh my god! I thought I was the only one who did this! I have put myself to sleep every night since 3rd grade this way!
That's sort of HOW I fall asleep. If my brain is really racing, I start to recall to memory a favorite movie that I know the entire plot of. I close my eyes and begin at the opening of, say, Return of the Jedi. I just start replaying the entire movie, in real time, in my head until I doze off. As a bonus, this also makes for some trippy dream sequences!
I do this with movies I've seen a 100 times.I call them head movies. I just know the movie so well I "watch" it before going to bed.
Thank God I'm not the only one
Lol same. I also dream very vividly and constantly have music playing in my head. Glad I'm not the only one.
I'm doing it too! Because, when I'm alone in a quiet place, sometimes I have weird thoughts or I'm just bored. So I do this for fun lol
Did this regularly when I was too ill to read, listen to music, watch tv or converse with people. Months of internal films
Same. Different angles, and what not too.
I think that being able to do this is like lucid dreaming. I found about in the last couple of years. I've been "dreaming" myself to sleep by creating a story in my head since I was about 12 or 13. This was because I have always had trouble falling asleep at night, but now believe I was unknowingly lucid dreaming to fall asleep.
Already at 8 yrs old, I would fall asleep w/ an unfinished dream from the morning. As an adult, I studied dreaming & learned that what I did, trains one to remember one's dream & makes those dreams lucid. However, I try not to control my dreams w/ my conscious brain, since dreams are IMO messages from the subconscious.
me too
This comment has been deleted.
Sorry for the double posts. I replied once and it copied throughout the thread. :(
For as long as I can remember I have to think about a dream/make a dream before I can sleep. These dreams can be the same every night, like when I was younger I had the same ballet dream for a couple of years and almost every night, but it did help me sleep.
You think that's weird? I have aphantasia, so.. blank mind. Nothing. Nada. No voices, no pictures, no visual memories of any kind. Heck, I can't even visualize stuff that I know looks like stuff. "Clear your mind." Dude my mind is as clear as it gets. And yet I can draw and create art. How does that make sense?!?
Maybe it's easier for you to "think" externally. It becomes your art.
So you can't think? How do you know what you are going to write? you don't day dream? If you are trying to figure something out how do I do it? I have so many questions. This is fascinating.
I can think😂 I can also tell you what things and/or people look like. I KNOW what they look like, I just can't visualize any. No I don't daydream. You know how ppl tell you to imagine a thing, let's say a cat, some can see a cat. Either a cat that they know or a general idea of a cat. Or they can think what a cat looks like. I can't do that. I can however tell you what a cat looks like. I didn't even know I had a problem. I just thought that ppl who can visualize or see in text or whatever are geniuses. 😅🙈
How do you think? How did you come up with this comment?
I just do. As I said above, I didn't know I was different untill a person pointed out that it's not normal to be this way. 😅
Wow! I see everything in my mind and I can even almost feel it or smell it! BUT no matter how clear I can see it in my mind's eye something happens between my brain and my hands and I cannot translate it into drawing or painting. I can describe it in extreme detail but if I try to draw or paint it looks like a toddler's wok. Some of the toddlers may be better at it than me come to think of it! lol
Please could you say more about this condition and what you can and can’t do and how you have adapted to cope with it? I’m completely fascinated.
I can think, obviously. I can create art. I can tell you memories. I can describe thing to the detail with ease. However... I can't visualize people or things in my mind. I don't have an inner dialogue. I can't "see" memories even though I know they are there somewhere. I can't think of colors and see them inside my mind even if I know what they look like. I can't visualize music or feelings. When it comes to coping: I didn't even know I had problem before I accidentally heard about this last year.
How unusual. I can hardly imagine not thinking and not daydreaming. Did you try meditation? It would probably be very easy for you since the hardest part for me is to clear my mind. Dou you dream?
I've tried meditation. It is really easy for me. I have dreams occasionally, and they are vivid, with people I know. And for some reason they are always nightmares.
Saara-Elina, I wish I had that.
This is so interesting. I never really thought about how other people don't think the same. I dream in vivid colour and sound, and I found out some people don't. This is the same. As child I had such vivid imagination, I would just run up and down on the lawn, totally silent, and imagine I was a warrior queen giving a speech to my armies. I would hear my own voice with a fancy accent and then change the voice when the commanders would answers her/me. See it, hear it, get totally caught up in it. The quiet must be nice, but how do people who think differently entertain themselves?
I have whole arguments with people in my head. I wonder if this could be an indication as to what learning styles work best with different people.
Suddenly the whole visual, auditory ect. learner thing does make a little more sense... AND the duck thing, maybe people need a duck to talk to because they can't discuss it with themselve?
i do too!
I did think of that - even ran a small poll! There's apparently a bunch of different ways to think! 1) Internal monologue, 2) internal dialogue 3) interview 4) narration and 5) nonverbal. Personally, I think in dialogue - I imagine telling my thoughts to a different person, who might be someone from my personal life, or a generic stand-in of a certain profession (like a doctor when I think about health problems).
Very interesting, I haven't thought about all those possibilities and suddenly my mind is a bit blown. I'm an interview! I always thought my question/answer sessions in my mind were just a monologue as I process and think through stuff, but really it is more of an interview as I'm almost always answering a question or describing something as a response. The thing is, sometimes I'M asking the question and sometimes I imagine it as a conversation with someone else, either familiar or unfamiliar.
Me too!
We entertain ourself by reading boredpanda.
Very interesting! I also dream in colour, sound, I can even taste food and feel real pain AND I have lucid dreams. I like creating drama scenes for myself before I fall asleep, so in my mind I talk to others and they talk to me. But, unlike you, in everyday life I feel things and see ideas. It's like observing life and people, absorbing the atmosphere while my brain does the whole work extra quickly somewhere deep inside, out of my reach. I just suddenly know things. I often have to think why I know or how to express it with words.
I dream in vivid color also, very complex dreams, and I can remember many of them, sometimes years later.
I dream in full color and surround sound, with tactile special effect. I always wondered what the people's dreams might be like, without all that. I dream full-blown James Bond movies, epic fantasies and weird adventures. Oh, and I also write perfect songs in my dreams, with the lyrics and music and backup singers and orchestra... I only wish I could remember those great hits after I wake up :)
My wife dreams the same way. Full color, can control most of the time and can wake herself up if she's in trouble. Me, I go to sleep and rarely ever dream. I lay down, and then wake up. There's nothing in between. I wish I could dream more. It's kind of creepy that I just go into this black state of nothingness for 5 - 7 hours and then wake up.
Bob, you do dream as well as others only difference is that you don't remember your dreams as vivid as some other people but all of us dream, it is a part of sleeping process (parts of our sleep are dreamless, parts are with dreams it depends on brain state in particular time during sleep).
@ Duska, I see flashes sometimes and when I wake up I remember seeing something but rarely recall anything that happens. I've heard about keeping a journal to help. When I was younger I had dreams. I know because I still remember a lot of them. Always taking the car out of the driveway and hitting something or hanging out with friends.
I dream in silence and monochrome, and no one has a face; I have an indentical twin sister who dreams in colour and can fly, so it's not a genetic thing!
You were clearly, a fabulous child.
Yes! My reaction (and by reaction, I mean, my internal monologue) was “Can my kids learn to think this way?!?!”
Yes yes yes yes yes I love the warrior queen with a fancy accent! I bet she's awesome!
Fascinating
I can create whole "movie" scenes (I can create the story, see the characters, hear the dialogs, ...) in my head while trying to fall asleep
I almost always do that when going to bed, and I get annoyed that I fall asleep without completing the "scene"
Same here, I have literally lived a thousand lives in my mind.
Beautiful thought!
And if its one scene you dont like you just stop it and rewind and redo that scene. Cant wait to hit bed tonight.
Guys I used to do that. I so miss it. I remember it being freeing, relaxing, deeply satisfying
OMG, I thought I was the only one!
Oh my god! I thought I was the only one who did this! I have put myself to sleep every night since 3rd grade this way!
That's sort of HOW I fall asleep. If my brain is really racing, I start to recall to memory a favorite movie that I know the entire plot of. I close my eyes and begin at the opening of, say, Return of the Jedi. I just start replaying the entire movie, in real time, in my head until I doze off. As a bonus, this also makes for some trippy dream sequences!
I do this with movies I've seen a 100 times.I call them head movies. I just know the movie so well I "watch" it before going to bed.
Thank God I'm not the only one
Lol same. I also dream very vividly and constantly have music playing in my head. Glad I'm not the only one.
I'm doing it too! Because, when I'm alone in a quiet place, sometimes I have weird thoughts or I'm just bored. So I do this for fun lol
Did this regularly when I was too ill to read, listen to music, watch tv or converse with people. Months of internal films
Same. Different angles, and what not too.
I think that being able to do this is like lucid dreaming. I found about in the last couple of years. I've been "dreaming" myself to sleep by creating a story in my head since I was about 12 or 13. This was because I have always had trouble falling asleep at night, but now believe I was unknowingly lucid dreaming to fall asleep.
Already at 8 yrs old, I would fall asleep w/ an unfinished dream from the morning. As an adult, I studied dreaming & learned that what I did, trains one to remember one's dream & makes those dreams lucid. However, I try not to control my dreams w/ my conscious brain, since dreams are IMO messages from the subconscious.
me too
This comment has been deleted.
Sorry for the double posts. I replied once and it copied throughout the thread. :(
For as long as I can remember I have to think about a dream/make a dream before I can sleep. These dreams can be the same every night, like when I was younger I had the same ballet dream for a couple of years and almost every night, but it did help me sleep.
You think that's weird? I have aphantasia, so.. blank mind. Nothing. Nada. No voices, no pictures, no visual memories of any kind. Heck, I can't even visualize stuff that I know looks like stuff. "Clear your mind." Dude my mind is as clear as it gets. And yet I can draw and create art. How does that make sense?!?
Maybe it's easier for you to "think" externally. It becomes your art.
So you can't think? How do you know what you are going to write? you don't day dream? If you are trying to figure something out how do I do it? I have so many questions. This is fascinating.
I can think😂 I can also tell you what things and/or people look like. I KNOW what they look like, I just can't visualize any. No I don't daydream. You know how ppl tell you to imagine a thing, let's say a cat, some can see a cat. Either a cat that they know or a general idea of a cat. Or they can think what a cat looks like. I can't do that. I can however tell you what a cat looks like. I didn't even know I had a problem. I just thought that ppl who can visualize or see in text or whatever are geniuses. 😅🙈
How do you think? How did you come up with this comment?
I just do. As I said above, I didn't know I was different untill a person pointed out that it's not normal to be this way. 😅
Wow! I see everything in my mind and I can even almost feel it or smell it! BUT no matter how clear I can see it in my mind's eye something happens between my brain and my hands and I cannot translate it into drawing or painting. I can describe it in extreme detail but if I try to draw or paint it looks like a toddler's wok. Some of the toddlers may be better at it than me come to think of it! lol
Please could you say more about this condition and what you can and can’t do and how you have adapted to cope with it? I’m completely fascinated.
I can think, obviously. I can create art. I can tell you memories. I can describe thing to the detail with ease. However... I can't visualize people or things in my mind. I don't have an inner dialogue. I can't "see" memories even though I know they are there somewhere. I can't think of colors and see them inside my mind even if I know what they look like. I can't visualize music or feelings. When it comes to coping: I didn't even know I had problem before I accidentally heard about this last year.
How unusual. I can hardly imagine not thinking and not daydreaming. Did you try meditation? It would probably be very easy for you since the hardest part for me is to clear my mind. Dou you dream?
I've tried meditation. It is really easy for me. I have dreams occasionally, and they are vivid, with people I know. And for some reason they are always nightmares.
Saara-Elina, I wish I had that.