Hey all,
Just curious about something. I'm in my 30s and it took me until my early to mid 20s to realize that the cartoon thought bubbles or echoy voiceover thinking in shows and movies was kind of a real thing.
I almost never can visualize, and when I do it's not something I can control. I can't just summon the image of an apple in my head, but apparently everyone else around me can. Even when I can visualize, it's like a thin mist that's hard to pinpoint details and easily blown away.
Similarly, I almost never have an internal monologue. The times I do are short-lived and conversational, like "Wow, you should really wake up, it's past noon". or something.
However, I'm pretty good at playing songs in my head and quietly jamming out to sounds that don't exist.
When I have a puzzle or something I need to think about, my subconscious handles it and just tells me the answer most of the time, without me having to do anything but look at the problem and wait. That's super helpful for most day-to-day stuff, and people think I'm smart. But it means I'm terrible at doing math in my head, and can't think through any kind of complicated issue in my head.
It also doesn't help that my short term and long term memory are both terrible. Any memories older than a couple of weeks are just gone, or they are emotionless fuzzy snapshots with no before or after. If I know something, it comes to mind without effort. If I don't know something, it's probably just gone forever unless I have some kind of visual reminder and get lucky.
Basically, I can't do anything in my head. I have to write it down, or have some other way to externalize the information in order to go over it. This make people think I'm stupid.
Add in the classic "bad at social-anything" and every interaction feels like a disaster.
And don't get me started on how often I forget what I'm doing or how badly I fail to multitask. Makes finding a job I can live on very hard, and the one time I had a decent job, I felt like I constantly had to prove myself. I was always making seemingly basic mistakes and letting everyone down.
Anyway, that's neither here nor there. I wanted to give kind of an overview of how my head works. I was wondering what kinds of brains everyone else is dealing with.
Does anyone else deal with things like visualization, or poor memory, or anything like that? How do you cope with the day-to-day?
I have very good imagination. I often try to use it to predict all possible situations that can occur related to problems I am trying to solve. If I don't miss some important detail - I am usually correct at preparing for situations thanks to this.
My internal monologue is constant and omnipresent, especially if I am alone. It is usually critical of everyone and everything. It can even make me laugh at horrible but grotesque situations, but it allows me to appreciate things and situations that many people consider purely bad because they can't see any depth.
I am 27, not sure if I am autistic but I can relate to a lot of people are saying in their posts/comments about that. I don't like labeling myself because too often, I see people trying to put me in the nearest stereotype known to them.
Things from your post I can relate to:
My subconscious can solve entire problems for me but I can't force it or can miss it easily. It is a subtle feeling to me. Btw. - everything is a problem or a project to me.
My memory is horrible. The only way for me to think and not forget what are my conclusions is to write down, reread, correct, reread, reorganize written text which is better than my memory. I do remember some events which made me learn something important.
Doing even 2 things at once is very frustrating to me.
I can figure out social interactions if I plan them. I am still learning and getting better at it but pain of social rejection is almost physical to me.
I have a great job now because I can do pretty much whatever I want as long as I can get it done, is text based, only mental, managers are very nice to me. My previous jobs were horrible experiences. Just mountains of misery, not only for me. The feeling of powerlessness made these even worse.
I think that's your whole post answered to.
Wow, having a constant voice complaining in your head sounds exhausting. I'd end up treating my subconsious like a whiny kid and telling it to shut up all the time if I had that.
What kind of work do you do? It sounds amazing, to be honest.
My relation with my critical side is symbiotic as long as I am not tired ( maybe kind of like dealing with annoying people IRL :D ). If I am tired I can spiral to the state of being like I would be hurt animal - not allowing anyone near me for any reason or I will bite.
With this job I am never tired, maybe because my critical self washes me in endorphins everytime I think how bad I had it at my previous jobs.
My job is maintenance/updates of corporate linux packages and some minor oddball projects. I have everything set up so I can work only with linux shell, where pretty much everything is text based :) I also need to use english daily for talking with people from around the world - this is another positive aspect. I love english, it is whole separate culture for me to learn about.
I am supposedly not earning that much when comparing to others in this career but I don't spend much on anything. If I really want something - I will make it myself. My critical side also says that I don't belong in this career since I am an electrician and I should appreciate it as long as it lasts and I am earning much more than I ever was.
What kind of work do You do? From quick look at your profile you seem to be interested in linux/programming. I am kind of newish at this IT career thing but supposedly there are many programming jobs available, are these hard to find jobs?
You say it's not much compared to others, but I think you should be proud. That sounds like a cool job!
I am into Linux and general tech stuff. I was an IT operations generalist, a jack of all trades. I did everything from hardware repair, Windows installation, investigation and quarantine for ISOC, license key management for my area, remote assistance, doing on-site or remote system administration and troubleshooting, etc.. I learned a little bit of everything, but wasn't an expert in any one topic. I'm unemployed right now though. Trying to find another job.
But I think your career so far sounds impressive. Don't let your negative side tell you that you don't belong. Sounds like you're doing just fine. :)
UPDATE: I forgot to answer your questions about jobs. I don't know how hard programming jobs are to find, sorry. Tech jobs in general are difficult to get the past year or two.