Thinking about repetitive phrases.

[valis2]

The ever-interesting iibnf was mentioning in her LJ that she gets absorbed with phrases sometimes.

I have this theory about people. I think there are three categories of thinking.

Pictorial Thinkers

Textual Thinkers

Pictorial/Textual Thinkers

Most people, I think, fall into the last category. However, I think we all have our own balance within that category.

I definitely lean towards textual. When I think, I think narratively, I think in a flow of words. Images are a little trickier. I've never been able to meditate by focusing on a rose (a technique I read about once) because I cannot sustain the image of a rose for long. (In fact, I usually end up thinking about the cover of a Depeche Mode album, and that leads me off on other tangents immediately, and then I have to try to get back into the rose again, and then I think of my grandmother's roses, and...you get the picture.) It's hard for me to remember exactly what people look like. I often know that they are familiar, but can't place them. When I write I have to draw floorplans to remember the layout of rooms, though eventually I do come up with an inner picture of things. I just can't sustain it for more than a few seconds before I dive right into text again.

I also get phrases stuck in my head. I once read an article about people who repeat phrases endlessly in their heads (what is it called? Primary ruminators or something like that), and I thought, wow! I'm so fortunate that they don't repeat like that. I just think them ten to twelve times a day or so, which can be annoying, but is hardly life-altering. For three years I would think "Deep black (x)", where (x) would be nearly anything from pearls to velvet to fish. There were other phrases too. The most recent one is also the longest running one. It's been going on for about six years. "She pulled three pins out of her arm" is what it sounded like...those who have read tLS will understand where it eventually surfaced. That one is really, really stuck. I also had a character's name stuck in my head for ages, too. That still happens, though now it's "Sarah blah blah blah" or "Severus blah blah blah". Usually it's a pretty stupid thought, but once in a great while it's something interesting. It just always starts with a character's name and moves into some sort of action, like Sarah pulls out her wand, or Severus pulls out his wand (mrowr!), or something.

Anyway, I'm always interested in how people think. I think I already did an entry about this, but it's so fascinating that I figured I'd do it again.

Comments

[iibnf.livejournal.com]

Ha! Amusing, but scary! You're trying to intellectualise my utterly random brain blurts... on the other hand, that kind of sums up my academic career, when I'd intellectualise the most random crap I could come up with, but make it sound all cool with big words and get distinctions! It's so easy to fake it with University professors.

[valis2.livejournal.com]

*focuses on sounding cool with big words*