This page contains all the readers’ comments on the “Emotion-colour/shape/texture/image synesthesia” article, received between 2024 and 2026.
.........Comment by: Anonymous. March 11, 2024 at 9:30 PM
I have emotion-texture synesthesia. Or at least I think I
do. When I have chaotic feeling it's like I can. "Feel"my feelings as
black tar moving and stretching really fast. Calm is a soft white ball. It's
wierd ti explain because it's not a feeling but it is...its like oneness with
that texture.
Reply by: Pau (The Synesthesia Tree author). March 25,
2024 at 2:28 PM
Yes, it certainly sounds like you do. I agree it's difficult
or weird to explain how the sensation feels, it's more than just perceiving a
shape or texture, its proprioceptive so you feel it as being part of you, a
"oneness" as you say is a good way of putting it.
Comment by: Anonymous. July 26, 2024 at 12:28 PM
Does anyone else also experience concepts as textures? like
numbers, IE, prime numbers as marbles, real numbers as blocks of wood. or maybe
specific to me; mathematical proof and computer programs as something like a
rube-goldberg machine of combined textures?
Comment by: Anonymous. December 9, 2024 at 5:46 PM
I hope I'm replying to the right comment. But you asked
about experiencing concepts as textures. Not quite but I experience concepts as
shapes. Not 2d, and maybe not 3d. But like shapes that don't make sense with
how we perceive. The more I understand a concept it feels like I can turn it
around, zoom in, flip it, and if there's a dark spot that can usually be
figured out by asking a question and having it answered. In which case what was
previously "shadowed" on the shape is now visible.
Comment by: Anonymous. May 18, 2024 at 1:38 PM
im tryna figure out if i have synesthesia and idk who to ask
about it so im putting what i feel here.
basically for as long as i can remember, i've been able to
like feel things on my skin and feel strong emotions with them when i look at
certain objects. for example, dead pixels on a phone screen feel like they're
on me and are going to swallow me like a black hole. growing crystals feels
like mushrooms on me that i cant shake off. sandpaper feels like getting put in
a meat grinder and everything is all rough everywhere on my skin and my clothes
dont sit right either.
if someone could assist, that'd be appreciated.
Reply by: Pau (The Synesthesia Tree author). May 24, 2024
at 9:24 PM
Hi! I don't think this is synesthesia. To me it sounds more
like a combination of tactile hyperphantasia (= when you look at textures you
can easily physically recreate them as a real tactile sensation) and some kind
of hypersensitivity/sensory processing issue that unfortunately I'm not
knowledgeable enough about to be able to identify. I hope you find your
answers!
Comment by: Anonymous. September 16, 2024 at 12:25 AM
is it emotion-color synesthesia if strong emotions trigger
like a colored shape sensation thing across your body?? what brought me to ask
the question was that yesterday, i was at a concert and the band went from one
song to the another randomly, and as soon as i processed what song it was, i
got hit with a physical wave of emotion, that was yellow. it started near my
chest and went down to near my feet. i couldn't tell if it was inside or
outside of my body. i only felt it though, i didnt see it physically or
anything. the emotion i felt was very complex as well. it wasn't like happiness
or whatever (because happiness is usually associated with the color yellow) but
i cant exactly describe what the emotion was. another thing, i also have
chromesthesia (associative type) and music-spatial. im 99% sure that the
sensation was because of the emotion, though.
Reply by: Pau (The Synesthesia Tree author). September
26, 2024 at 9:00 PM
The way you experience the colour sensation in response to a
particular emotion certainly sounds synesthetic: it’s perception of a colour,
that can also have a shape, that occurs automatically when you perceive the
emotion it’s connected with, that involves proprioception and a spatial
component (inside or outside your body)… It doesn’t need to be physically
visible in your field of vision: most people’s synesthesia is in the mind’s eye
or just a “feeling”. Of course, if it’s something that only happens once in a
lifetime then it’s unlikely it’s synesthesia, because synesthesia is something
that would gives different specific colours/shapes etc. for a range of
different emotions. But perhaps the strength and specific nature of the emotion
(and already being a synesthete, as you mention) is what has made it so
tangible for you this time, and perhaps you would realise you associate other
specific colour and shape sensations with other emotions if you felt them
strongly or focused on them. Perhaps you do, but just haven’t mentioned them in
your description. Anyway I would certainly say it’s a synesthesia thing you’re
experiencing, yes.
Comment by: Anonymous. October 22, 2024 at 1:35 AM
I’ve had what I call an ability since I can remember. I can
feel and see other peoples emotions. Their emotions are processed by me as if
they were my own. But they look like waves in the air when they come off
people. I can differentiate the emotions by the waves I see. Different emotions
are like different wave patterns and after years I feel like I have developed
another language as I can be quite specific as to someone else’s emotions. I
can also see pain waves coming off bodies to the point where I can go right to
the place on their body and when I touch the place people sometimes are
surprised as they thought their pain was originating somewhere else until I
touched them.
I also see wave or vibrations coming off pretty much
everything. I can feel air moving in the room when people walk in. I walked
past someone with horrific head trauma and I immediately passed out. I am not
afraid of blood. Since I grew up in a family of 9 people I learned at a very
young age to let people have their privacy. And while I can just look and see
emotions I do try to ignore them often with friends and family.
Also I can see shapes in front of me meaning not in my mind
but my minds eye - at least that’s how I explain it. When I took a lot of
college math I could see 4th 5th and 6th dimensional math formulas in my mind.
I would read math and physics books from cover to cover and when I took tests I
would just bring up the entire page in front of me and reread it to pass the
tests.
Also If someone wants help moving I have them take me
through their house pointing out all things they want to put in a truck or car
and I will just know how much space is needed. Then i can pack their car or
truck so that there isn’t one square inch of space leftover anywhere. I can
look at a carrot and know just how much to cut off the side to just ever so
tightly fit into a rectangular space. I can tell if a picture or floor or wall
or whatever is off or slanted by a very small fraction of an inch. Good thing I
do not have a compulsive disorder!
I can also just know time of day.
I have seen what will happen in the near future like it was
actually happening in the present. I am in the future and see in color all the
people and the things they do and say … in the future. And it has happened
exactly as I’ve experienced it. I can see the direction of peoples future and I
think it’s based upon the energy waves they are currently emitting from their
bodies.
Anyway now since I’ve stumbled onto synesthesia I am
wondering if I might have that or even more than one.
I have a lifetime of experiences that others can’t explain.
Please any information would be appreciated.
Reply by: Pau (The Synesthesia Tree author). November 3,
2024 at 12:13 PM
Hi! Of the things you say, the ones where you have a visual
perception of colour in your mind (or physically) would certainly be considered
types of synesthesia. They would be the result of your intuition telling you
something about the various emotions, types and locations of pain, etc.
The maths one, maybe yes maybe no. As you perceive shapes
and not just mathematical formulas, there could be a synesthetic connection
there.
The other things you mention I don’t think so. But if what
you are automatically perceiving are abstract colours and shapes in response to
intuitive thoughts/categorisations/solutions about certain groups of concepts,
then that is what synesthesia is about and so for those things you can
definitely be considered a synesthete.
These are the Tree pages you could take a look at to see if
you identify:
https://www.thesynesthesiatree.com/2021/02/perceived-emotion-to-colour-and-other.html
https://www.thesynesthesiatree.com/2021/03/pain-colour-and-pain-shape-synesthesia.html
(and look at the example “A colour concurrent in response to other people’s
pain”.)
https://www.thesynesthesiatree.com/2021/03/mathematical-synesthesias.html
and perhaps
https://www.thesynesthesiatree.com/2021/02/concept-shape-synesthesia.html
Comment by: Anonymous. February 4, 2025 at 7:30 PM
Hi – wondering for my 17-year-old daughter. For the past two
years, she has been experiencing on and off what we label as colorful people.
If she is feeling really sad, there is in her mind eye a blue little old lady
sitting somewhere in the room near her. if she is feeling bored or restless, it
is a yellow little boy that is running around near her. So on and so on. There
is a dark one - he is a man who stands in the corner and sometimes he will say
dark things to her. She has always had synesthesia where foods taste like
colors, etc. but we are unsure if the colorful people are another form of
synesthesia or something else. She tends to remember the innocuous ones from
when she was little off and on but cannot be sure. She said they seem familiar.
She has OCD as well.
Reply by: Pau (The Synesthesia Tree author). March 5,
2025 at 4:09 PM
I must say I don’t know!
I haven’t heard any accounts quite like this.
It’s a relatively common type of synesthesia to have colour
perceptions from the different emotions felt – but only colours: they don’t
usually take the form of people.
Then there’s the person in the descriptions above where the
emotion is personified in the form of a static image, scene or object or room,
and it might consist of a person or a view of part of a person from a
particular perspective. If it’s always the same scene there’s a good case for
it being considered synesthesia, even if it isn’t exactly abstract. So your
daughter perceiving the image of a person who comes into her mind in a flash,
always the same, could be considered synesthesia, I think.
The idea of them lurking around or even saying “dark things”
to your daughter is what seems different from synesthesia though, as sinister
perceptions or voices saying sentences, especially with relatable meaning, is
not a synesthesia thing. The colours certainly are, but not that. So really I
don’t know.
However, having other types of synesthesia as you say, and
the fact that she remembers them from childhood, would point to a possible
synesthesia connection so I think all in all I would say yes.
Comment by: Anonymous. March 11, 2025 at 6:04 PM
My emotions are colours it’s that I see colours when
experiencing emotions in my head the colours are the emotions. Is that
Synesthesia?
Reply by: Pau (The Synesthesia Tree author). March 18,
2025 at 10:22 AM
Yes, from your description it certainly sounds to me like
it's synesthesia!
Comment by: Anonymous. May 9, 2025 at 9:24 PM
When I am very tired I see blue and red circles in front of
me physically that descend out of sight and then reappear, but not with any
other emotions. Is this synesthesia?
Reply by: Pau (The Synesthesia Tree author). May 14, 2025
at 9:29 PM
What you describe here sounds hypnagogic, rather than
synesthesia. Hypnagogic perceptions happen when they're very tired and about to
fall asleep, they're physically visible with your eyes closed, they take the
form of coloured blobs or lights in patterns and it's typical for them to move,
repeating the same cycle of movement over and over again. Not everybody gets
them. I get these a lot too and I think it's a relaxing experience to be
enjoyed! From your description I'd say it's definitely that.
Comment by: Anonymous. November 16, 2025 at 12:57 PM
hi there, trying to figure out if i have synesthesia,(21F)
occasionally when i feel an emotion i get something like a sharp and prominent
(i have adhd and my brains always running) thought about a certain color and
felt a heavy weight in my chest that it just has to be correct for some reason.
i didnt think much of it until reading something about emotion-color
synesthesia,i was also recently diagnosed with autism but i doubt that has
anything to do with it. any help is appreciated:)
Comment by: Anonymous. January 19, 2026 at 6:05 AM
Can i ask if emotion-image synesthesia *has* to be
consistent images? Like NOTHING changed at all? Because emotion-image
synesthesia sounds all too familiar but when i saw that apparently the images
need to be consistent i said “oh…” to myself. The thing is, its not that the
images change 24/7 but im more saying that multiple images that are continuous
if i feel that certain emotion come up. Honestly the only thing that has the
same image in my head is anxiety, stress, spiraling, etc. But if im happy my
mind has many ways to make a figurative image/scene/sounds in my head. I could
say the patterns/principles of those images are the same but the themes/whats
in the images or scenes can be very different. I guess it also matters that the
happiness can be expressed in different ways like “fluffiness” and such, but
thats my question!
Reply by: Pau (The Synesthesia Tree author). April 26, 2026 at 6:49 PM
Hi! Sorry about the delay in replying - there were some
comments I didn't see at the start of the year and I'm just finding them now.
From what you say, I think that what you are perceiving with emotions could be
considered synesthesia, yes, because you say that some of the more basic ones
are definitely always the same while others might have different images but the
same patterns or principles repeat. Also, as you say yourself, giving the
example of happiness, an emotion that has one name might actually be several or
many different types of specific emotions, which your mind would differentiate
between (even if you don't do it consciously), all under the same umbrella
term. So I would consider this synesthesia. Especially if you have other types
as well, in which case it's clear you're a synesthete.
Some of what you say (a pattern or principle appearing as an image in response
to a certain feeling, even if you haven't perceived that exact image before)
reminds me of "one-shot synesthesia", so you might be interested in
reading about that and see if you feel identified. There's a description and
some examples of it here on the Tree, on this page:
https://www.thesynesthesiatree.com/2021/02/concept-shape-synesthesia.html (look
for it about halfway down the page if you can't find it straight away!)
No comments:
Post a Comment