this post was submitted on 04 Nov 2025
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I'm towards the hyperphantasic side of the spectrum and I've also noticed that it influences quite a lot of things.
Perhaps the biggest factor is that I don't have the same drive to visit places or people. I could travel to a castle to look at it, or I could do so in my mind. I could meet back up with an old friend, but as I think of them, my desire to see them again is satiated. This does mean I'm terrible at maintaining friendships and socializing in general.
I was almost aphantasic from around 8 to 20.
When I hit 20 I regretted having lost my ability to see things in my mind's eye, and trained myself to visualize again, so now I am closer to hyperphantasic side.
That said, although I can model people in my mind's eye, it only gives me an approximation. I still feel like I need to see people in the flesh, because I can read their body and even their presence and aura if you like, which tells me things I cannot get through modeling.
On the other hand once I know someone for 5 years or longer, there are fewer and fewer surprises. So even if I know my model is not exact, I know I will hear all the old motifs and be disappointed. It is staggering how little growth some people have. Write down their sayings today and check five years later. If nothing has changed, you know what's up.
Of course there are people that do grow, so hang onto those if you can find them.
I don't think visualization is a disincentive to socialization all on its own. If I choose to spend time socially I want an interesting experience. I don't want to hear the same 5 stories for the 406th time. 20 times tops. I can stand some repetition, some stories are very dear, I get it. But my patience is not infinite. So visualization isn't the issue, but being predictable and repetitive to an extreme degree is imo the real issue.
Some people claim telepathy, and that's different from visualization in that talepathy is not a product of modeling. I suppose telepathy could make in person contact unnecessary, but to me that is mostly theoretical. If I want to take the best measure of a person I have to get within two feet of their body still.