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Heavy emotions in any situation

I found out more than ten years ago that I am affected by aphantasia. In turn, logic is very strong, which makes me weigh every decision in life beforehand.

I am not able to imagine any pictures or moments, so I live in the here and now.
With the help of photos, I can remember the exact place where the photo was taken, with whom I experienced it plus countless other details like weather conditions, personal feelings and more. Purely mentally, however, it always needs a picture as a trigger.

My memory is very poor in many things, including name memory, other languages (vocabulary), people and much more. I can’t even repeat a spoken sentence or joke.

In terms of my everyday life, it affects emotions very strongly. In nice moments and experiences they are exuberant and I express them very often, how nice it is here, how great the food tastes, how happy I am.
In turn, in the less beautiful moments of life – quarrels, dissatisfaction, negative experiences set very strong negative emotions.
This range of mood swings are very large, which often brings me to the brink of despair.

If I undertake something in such a bad situation, everything else is partly forgotten immediately, but only in this moment of joy. As soon as calm returns, the negative thoughts and feelings immediately come to the fore again. Latest if I am see anything in my life which reminds me to one moment which is linked to any part of the situation.

Since the positive individual moments predominate, almost everyone perceives me as a very cheerful and radiant person.

Does anyone else feel this way, that the feelings are very strong in both directions?
In one moment pure joy, because this moment is present, in the other pure sadness?

Personally, this is a great burden to me, and talking about it only helps temporarily and always catches me up anew. In addition, there is the lack of understanding of the people around me.

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Marcin Kowalski
on November 17, 2022

Reading your post I really felt as having similar “inner expierience”. 
As I neither have a vivid memory nor imagination, I do not live in the past and once a problem of the present or future is resolved it literally disappears. This might make me slightly to forgiving to other people, unless someone tries to trap me in a neverending situation (I am divorced).
Now that I am single again I have long stretches of tranquility, because once an issue is resolved it seaszes to matter. 

I loved drawing as a kid and am still quite good but I could not draw anything from my imagination. Drawing a human I simply start with one eye, then the nose, the 2nd eye, but it never is part of a whole in my mind. It comes together on the paper, for better or worse. I mostly just drew from pictures. 

I also love editing film material, I think I am quit creative, but my creative process does not start in the mind. I “explore and find” stuff while in progress of creation.  

This might be for me also a reason why I love the visual medium. Reading a book is less fun for me. It might be emotional or exiting, but I never understood how other people converted words to pictures. 
I think , that is why I am a massive film fan, who loves beautifull movies, which are able to tell a story by visualls instead of words.

My burden is, that I am awkward socially once a social relationchip goes to far (I think I might be an introvert). I can be logically empathetic. I can understand what others might go through, by I can never know or feel the others expierience. 

Joe Falk
on November 20, 2022

I feel you entirely Marcin, thanks for your reply – for me it’s exactly the same. I tons of photos and I always try to get a beautiful shot.

Im divorced as well – it’s sad to hear.

It’s like you say.

In the actual situation it breaks me.

Amit K
on December 24, 2022

Hi Marcin (lovely name) and Joe,

What I love about this forum is reading (for the very first time in my life) experiences that I can connect to, words that make me say “yes, YES, I have that also). Of course we are all individuals, so not everything connects. For example, I love reading, Marcin and something about the words by themselves, even though I cannot convert the words into pictures. But I think it was more because reading was my way out of loneliness, which I always felt for many of the reasons you both describe.

I especially connected to Marcin’s line about being forgiving and Joe, I too cannot ever recall a sentence someone says with any accuracy. I cannot tell you how this has driven my wife and son completely mad. They consider it a sign that I do not care that I cannot even repeat what they just said to me 5 minutes ago. 

Amit K
on December 24, 2022

This happens to me all the time also: “As soon as calm returns, the negative thoughts and feelings immediately come to the fore again.”

Joe Falk
on December 25, 2022

Sad to hear and read your both posts 😔 thanks for your reply – I wish you some nice Christmas days – take your time!

To find a way out for a short time while reading is a nice thing. Are you able to recall the hole story or only some main points, are you feeling empathetic to the characters? 

Ann Seeley
on January 27, 2023

Hello Joe.

Have you ever come across the Enneagram, especially as taught by the Enneagram Institute dot com? Since discovering it about 15 years ago it has helped me enormously to see and understand more about my own way of seeing and experiencing myself and the world.