Synesthete.org is a website that has a series of online tests where you can test yourself for synaesthesia – the condition where senses are crossed so, for example, you might be able to taste shapes or see colours associated with specific numbers.
The site is run by the Eagleman Lab at the Baylor College of Medicine who study links between perception and action, as well as the curious world of synaesthesia.
If you’re a researcher, you can also use the site to test and collect results on your own participants, and the same tests are also available as downloadable software for the Matlab package.
It’s now known that synaesthesia is partly inherited, so if you find that you or one of your family members seems to have the condition, others in the family may also have similar abilities.
Link to synesthete.org.
Mind Hacks 
I’d so like to know how it feels to be synaesthetic!
Unfortunately I never will.
Haha It Actually Is Just A Colorful World For Everyone Who Has Synesthesia! Like Me, And I Don’t Know Anyone Else That Does. I Have The Color Type Synesthesia, Where You See, Hear, Taste, And Smell In Colors! I Don’t Know How It Feels To Be An Un-Synesthetic! 😀
it must be awesome to have synesthesia!
I used to have synesthesia with letters, numbers, music and colors BUT now I have multiple sclerosis and I no longer have synesthesia. It’s cool. I don’t care. I’d rather have MS than synesthesia. Colors are like so totally lame!
How does it feel to have it? o.o what colors do you see, for example, on a TV or a rose? (Normally they’re a deep red)
Is it fun? I have synthesthesia, but I taste voices and feel noises… its pretty cool but I wish my world was more colourful
Haha same!!! I have grapheme synethesia so i see colors when i see letters and numbers. And I have sound taste synethesia which means that when I hear a word I will immediately think of a certain taste. For example, whenever i hear Cassandra, I taste buttermilk 🙂
Me too, I can’t explain it too ppl when they ask me why the heck I automatically assign a colour to everything (mostly music though).
I see words as shapes with colors. It can make reading really hard when I don’t have a real spelling for words.
I always thought everyone was like this. I only found out today that others don’t see color when they hear music like I do.
Idk if this is Synethesia, but when i was little i used to be able to see footprints. Everyones footprints were green. I usually stepped inside of them because i wanted to see how big they were compared to mine. Now i’m 14 a i don’t see any footprints at all.
it’s the most amazing thing! it can be annoying at times,(like in math), but i couldn’t live without it. i wish everyone could experience it!!
Yup! I hav it but for some reason it doesnt affect math or reading. I guess mine is very mild
Same here. I love reading, and I’m one of the best in my class at math. Apparently synesthesia can occur in your minds eye and that’s where mine is
What’s your type?
people do experience it. its called dropping acid
See for me synesthesia comes in shapes and colors. I’m not good at math but I love to read because of the colors.Synesthesia is a gift in my opinion.
Algebra was a nightmare. I knew the answer but, couldn’t explain how to do the written explanation. Tutored 2x a week. Failed every Friday test. Passed on a mercy D-. How do you write numbers down to explain instantanious color answer?
Yeah, I have space-time synesthesia. It’s so cool. I couldn’t be the same without it. I wish everyone could experience it.
Synesthesia is so cool! I think I might have it, when I see a letter I see it black and white, but deep inside I know that it’s a specific color. Ex. T = navy blue with a hint of green
In fact I’m synesthetic my self it feels perfectly normal to. I think your comment of a yellow and the number 7 very eegering emotions intertwined.
My son (who at 14 can play most musical instruments) has just admitted that he sees the notes as different colours – i’m sure this has helped his amazing talent!
You perceive it as normal. I’m 26 and I just found out about synaesthesia yesterday. I am synaesthetic and right now, I can’t thinking about the number 5, which causes me to see all yellow in my mind’s eye and I can’t get rid of the taste of battery in my mouth.
I alao think of the number 5 as yellow! Haha
To me, the Number Five is a sort of forest green. He’s a decent guy. You want him on your team. (My numbers and letters have not only color but personalities and genders as well.)
I feel like my synaesthia is a giant jumble. 3,5,8 and H are all orange. Happiness is a sky blue. Listening to someone play the flute tickles. Orgasms are yellow, the number nine and the violin feel green. Certain chords tickle different body parts, but it will always be the same part for that chord. So when I go to a concert its like my entire body is vibrating because I feel the music.
When I was a little girl, I used to feel ticklish all over when anyone would just touch one of my personal belongings. I outgrew that. Now, as an adult, loud noises cause a split second Celtic pattern behind my closed lids. Always a perfect pattern. But just the other night, a loud noise woke me up with a flash of a bright white arrow pointing in the direction of the noise’s origin. The patterns are always bright white on a black background. Does this sound like synesthesia?
i think everyone has a little bit of Synesthesia in them, For example, I just read on a website for a study on this topic, so what they did is they had a jagged star, and a blob. they asked people what one was blarney and the other tikiki. most people said that tikiki was the jagged one. preety cool right? I read a great book called ”a mango shaped space” read it, you will not regret it.
I love to book “a mango shaped space” ever since I read it I have wanted to have Synethesia.
And I can’t imagine not seeing music.
I can’t imagine never seeing sounds
I love my synesthesia, and I don’t know what my life would be like without it!
A is a ripe-Apple red.
The name Jenny is lime green and is like an ice cold sip of sweet lemonade on a hot,humid day.
5 is a big bully and 6 is his mean sidekick.
I’d love to tell any of you what your names are like if you reply to me!😝 and learn about your synesthesia!
Hey my name is Haley, how do you perceive my name? My synesthesia is kind of odd but I basically smell and taste my feelings or situations, for example when I’m feeling creative I always smell and taste pencil lead, and when I go to work meetings, no natter where they are I get a certain taste and smell that I can’t really describe.
Hi, Haley! Your name is in neat, normal handwriting and it is the color of the letter,A, a pinkish red. You are SO lucky you have that kind of synesthesia!😄 I don’t have any kind like that: seeing, hearing and/or smelling. My name, Hellen, is…white. Yes, I know, it’s kind of sad that my name is only white.(:
Reply back!
Hi, Haley! Your name is in neat, normal handwriting and it is the color of the letter,A, a pinkish red. You are SO lucky you have that kind of synesthesia! 😀 I don’t have any kind like that: seeing, hearing and/or smelling. My name, Hellen, is…white. Yes, I know, it’s kind of sad that my name is only white.:)
Reply back!
No offense but with my synesthesia I can’t stand people who say a is red. To me it’s a pale yellow. Even when I was researching red a was a common example it drives me crazy
Ok so can someone help me? I don’t see letters as colors; black font is always black, but ever since I was little (like 3) I associated certain colors with letters (a=red b=yellow…) I’m 13 now and I can still distinctly remember all of them. I never had any colored letter puzzles to influence me or anything and idk what is going on.
Ok so I don’t see letters as colors, but colors associate with the letters and if I see a letter as a different color I’ll say it’s wrong. I don’t know if it’s synthesia or just a strong feeling that all letters belong with a certain color. If anyone knows anything about this please respond!!!
Hi Madeline!
It sounds lik you’re synesthetic. My sister, who is nine, has the exact same kind as you. 🙂 She took the synesthete.org test (there’s the link to it in the article above) to see if she had it, and I did too. It’s a great and very through test, you should try it! 🙂
I have three names for you if you don’t mind.
Robert
Kathryne
And Kandice
What color is my name, Hellen?
what is my name like to you?
Hey so interesting please could you tell me what my name is in colour? Kalee
Thank you xx
Hi Kalee!
Your name is a dark levender color. 🙂
Hi, my name is Alexa. What does it look like to you? So excited to find out
Hi I’m Maelynne, I have grapheme-color synesthesia, ordinal-linguistic synesthesia, and time-spatial location synesthesia. I also have slight motion-sound. All this is associated, I don’t actually see it but it is clear to me in my head. What color is my name to you? To me its purple with hints of pale pink and spring green. Most names are only one color but mine is longer so it’s more than one. I only found out about synesthesia last year when I read a Mango-Shaped Space by Wendy Mass. I was so shocked when I learned that no one else pictures the months of the year in their head like I do. I’m still sort of confused about that.
@Maelynne:
Hi I’m Eleanor! It’s so awesome how you have so many different types of synesthesia! I found out about it through A Mango Shaped Space as well—love that book. 😀
And (not sure if this is what you meant when you said you pictured months in your head, but:) I picture the months in a certain place in my mind too. Like, December is to my left, January is right above me, etc. 🙂
I dont have synesthesia as I see something or hear something and a color “pops” up, but I do feel something the way back. Colors remind me of sensations and tastes, sometimes smells; for example teals “feel” warm, wet and fresh at the same time? Light browns are warm and cozy, blacks give me a cold steel-like sensation, lilacs are fluffy but smooth, and some dark greens are rough, like if you were touching sand or a rock. The more far the colors are from the red-yellow part of the spectrum, the easier they’re for me to describe. I haven’t find anything related to “color – > sensations” so I don’t really know :c
Hey I’m Lulu, what’s it like to you? For me it’s a cool, light blue with hints of grey.
It is a very unique and hard to explain feeling in fact when you have it you think it is normal and think nothing of it but when I found out it was rare I was shocked I had it EX. 1=red 2=yellow 3=green 4=blue 0=white -39=pink you get the point. When it happens it’s quick you don’t think about it the color just comes to mind. I was shocked when I found out I had it (I know that but that I had it and it was rare) I asked my friends if they had it by explaining what happens and everyone said no. Except my brother.
Hello Daldianus.
It’s (for me) just a matter of “knowing where everything belongs”. I can close my eyes and Friday is ‘over there’, 4:30 a.m. is ‘down there’ while 6 p.m. is ‘up here’. My physics books are just behind me, but the SciFi ones are down on the left.
So “in the real universe” that is where I file them – the physics books ‘should go’ in the shelf behind me and the SciFi ones are in the bottom of the bookshelf to my left as I sit at the computer.
I see these bright jelly bean colors all the time. And sometimes they follow me. I dont unstand why this happens.
I’m not going to lie and say having synesthesia isn’t fun and interesting. But it can be a bit annoying at times. For example if someone’s voice is too neon then my eyes hurt and I’ll get a headache of if a food tastes like triangles, I can’t eat it because it hurts. Another drawback is that most people don’t believe me and it got a bit lonely when I realized I was the only one around me to be like this. But it is truly something different and I’ve learned to like it.
I have number form synesthesia and it’s pretty lame to be honest.
Same, I wish I could see music in colors. Having colored numbers doesn’t do much.
If you experience synaesthesia, based in the uk and want to participate in some research to understand more about the condition, the UCL lab is a great place. You can contact them here
http://www.psychol.ucl.ac.uk/jamie.ward/synaesthesia.htm
Yes, a delicious article. Also worth getting a taste of:
“Blue Cats and Chartreuse Kittens: How Synesthetes Color Their Worlds”
by Patricia Lynne Duffy (Henry Holt & Co 2001)
http://www.bluecats.info
The synesthesia battery is a quite usefull tool. But I’d like to announce that there is a new kind of synaesthesia-tests. This tests are much more shorter and you can test your different synaesthesia seperately. Researchers can also create their own testing tools.
Have a look on it, on http://www.synaesthesia.com
Greetings Synnie83
(P.S: Se encuentra tambien los tests de sinestesia en castellano.)
i went to that website and it said that i had django settings debug=true and it said it needs to be false. i dont know how to do that. do you have any solutions?
i only taste in color….i don’t smell or hear it …..is that odd?
No, the extent of your sensory perception varies. Some sounds remind me of colors and some smells remind me of things that I have touched, but it doesn’t happen all the time.
Yeah i have synesthesia and it seems very strange i am only 12 but i am quite inteligent, i am in the top groups for all subjects.The way i found out i had synesthesia is one day in primary school i was in discussion club and i put my hand up to ask the teacher that somtimes i see numbers certain colours and he said that it was synethisia sooo…i hav synesthisia!!! i will tell you all what colours i see the numbers…
0-Black
1-White
2-Blue
3-Green
4-Red
5-Yellow
6-Orange
7-Brown/Purple
8-Brown/Purple
9-Pink
and then it goes back to that sequence!!!
Jemma x
cool! I’m 12 too! what state are you in?
I am also 12! 😉
i think i have a very mild form of synaesthesia. i see colors when i listen to music if my eyes are closed. facing toward light, i usually see orange and yellow and red and pink. when it’s dark or my eyes are covered, i see greens blues whites and purples. i usually see emerging circles of those colors too. normally those colors emerge or appear out of blackness.
when i look at a light colored solid wall, i can see what looks like “staticky raindrops”. the wall also seems to wave like the ocean.
i don’t see letters and numbers as colors. my friend does though. today in math i wrote the number 20 on the board in black marker and she said it was yellow.
it’s all sort of confusing. can someone explain what’s happening to me here?
That’s exactly the same with me! I thought it was normal..is it not?
I thought that was normal. When I close my eyes, it emerges in patterns like black and white in squares, or red and yellow in intricate designs. I don’t know what that is. Do you ever have visions of forming, dissolving, and reforming clouds? Maybe I’m just nuts.
No worries! It all has to do with the way your brain is wired. Like, the connections in your brain. For example, we feel good when we touch dirt because our brain makes the connection that growing crops feeds us, and our body wants to be fed, so touching soil gives us a positive feeling. For whatever reason, your brain associates a color with a letter. It could go back to an early childhood memory that you’re unaware of.
I think it’s a positive thing:) Everyone is a little different, and it doesn’t effect you negatively at all; I have it. And I know TONS of other people who are synesthetes. Up until now…I don’t know there were people who couldn’t do that…
I see that 2 I have synesthesia so I wouldn’t be able to answer that
I just figured out about synesthesia this week! I was talking to my brother and somehow we got on the topic of music, so I started talking about how when I hear music, I see colors. He thinks I’m making it up, but I’m not. The colors just happen, and for as long as I can remember (I’m 15) I thought this was completely normal, and that everyone knew what colors certain songs were. I thought I was going crazy, but then I told my cousin about this and she told me I probably had synesthesia…so here I am! My favorite is Hey, Soul Sister by Train…it’s the most fantastic spring green and makes me so happy. And when the bell rings at school, it’s steely grey.
Also, I’ve always known that directions have personalities…left and down are sweet and feminine and nice, but right and up are big, burly and mean. I know there’s synesthesia where letters have personalities (for me, only some do…A, K, M and a few others) but has anyone ever heard of directions?
This is so weird, but I’m so glad I’m not really going crazy!!
Oh my god, yes! Xylophones are a silvery-grey to me! And it’s weird, but Bono’s (lead singer of U2) voice usually appears in different shades of blue…like “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” is a magnificent bold teal.
One of the funniest experiences i had was what my mother started playing some old Stevie Wonder disc and I walked out of my room, because the song made me smell chocolate chip cookies! My mom couldn’t stop laughing!
That’s hilarious. 😀
I don’t have Synesthesia, but I think it waould be cool to see what it’s like to have a word of color. The way I found out about Synesthesia is from this book A Mango-Shaped Space by Wendy Mass. I’m about half way done with it and I think it’s an amazing book. I highly recomend it.
I have synesthesia, and its epic! I can’t imagine a world with out it! Color is such a part of my life!
For me…
0 = greyish red … if thats a color! 🙂
1 = yellow
2 = green
3 = pink
4 = orange
5 = light blue
6 = dark green
7 = yellow
8 = royal blue
9 = red
My name is red w/yellow swirled in.
and I looove that book by Wendy Mass!
i agree, best book EVER… it’s a mango shaped space, i learned about synesthesia from it!
I read that book and I love it!😄
do you mean a mango shaped space? I am doing a book report on it
I just read that book! I really wish I had synesthesia because it sound so interestesting and colorful!
I LOVE THAT BOOK!!!🐱😍 I finished it like four months ago and, well, now it’s one of my favorite books! Me and my sister lerned we had synestesia from it!
I have read it too! Its amazing! Also synaethesia, sorry if I misspelled that, sounds SOOO cool!!! I wish I had it. I’m actually also half way through!!! I think seeing colors with letters and numbers would be so amazing! I love ‘A Mango Shaped Space’! I wonder what my name, (Morgan ) would look like. But I guess that’s for synaethesia people. I would wish for synaethesia and trade a lot, if only I could!
I love that book! That’s where I found out about synesthesia. Ever since I read it I have been researching and turns out I have a lot more types of synesthesia than I first thought! Your name is shiny dark purple.
do i have synesthesia if i feel colours? like sometimes white is fear, green is calm and happy, orange is energetic and blue is reserved and thoughtful. is that a type of synesthesia?
Yes, that is a form of synesthesia.
I have that too, but I don’t know if it’s synesthesia. However, I find dark dark blue as fear.
I thought those were just the colors’ connotations. I’m very reserved and thoughtful and blue is my favorite color.
I’m sad that I don’t have color synesthesia. I have some other types though, like the alphabet, the months, days of the week have a place in a space. Days of the week feel different, for example Wednesday is thick and Sunday is thin. Friday is thicker than Sunday but thinner than wednesday.
Whenever people touch something or something touches (or hurts!) them I feel it on my own body. In the new alice in wonderland there’s a scene where alice or somebody’s toe is stabbed with a needle and I could almost feel a white-hot needle stabbing into my cartilagey toe.
Also, does my name (Reina) have a color, anyone?
I have the placement thing, too. I think I have word-color synesthesia, but I’m not sure. I really wish I had sound-color synesthesia, or taste color synesthesia, but I don’t.
Wow. So is your synesthesia really painful sometimes? Lately I’ve been wondering if I have that kind of synesthesia. I only think this cause when some one talks about left or right, for example if I heard someone talking saying “you turn LEFT on…etc.” , I would feel a sort of tingle in my left arm. Or my right arm if they were saying RIGHT instead of left. Do you think that’s synesthesia?
Oh! Your name is a darker red, but not too dark. 🙂
PS: Oops! Sorry! I wish I had taste SOUND synesthesia, not taste color!
The name Reina is foggy lavender to me. The letters are dark purple, light grey, dark metallic, raspberry, and yellow.
I guess I have color synesthesia but I’m not really sure of the different kinds and never really tried to pinpoint exactly how my experience of the world differed from anybody else’s. Just because this is how it’s always been for me! And also the one time I tried to bring it up to someone irl they said it sounded crazy so I dropped it. I think I can explain it after reading about the experiences of others, though.
Letters, numbers, phonemes, and sounds all have colors of varying intensities. Some letters have different colors that are case sensitive or that are influenced by letters around them. I rely on phoneme colors when learning other languages. Complete words and sounds don’t have personalities but they have a texture to them(no taste) and sometimes there is an emotion I associate it with. Btw all this made naming my daughter very difficult, lol. I hope she’s a synesthete too though!
Days of the week’s and months of the year all have their own colors of solid intensity, regardless of it’s phonemes or letters. Wednesday is orange, November is red, January is white. I’m pretty sure there’s nothing spatial going on.
Black and ice blue equals maroon (5+2=7) so I have to rely on math memory to solve an equation without focusing on number colors, but I’m not bad at math.
Music is both a spatial and colorful experience to me. I can play different instruments and even learn a song after hearing it once but can’t read sheet music because the format doesn’t make sense in the same way. Its hard to explain.
I also experience color sensations dependent on varying degrees of intensity. Like, regret is a green against black pang through my right shoulder and collarbobe. Mild regret is a small green whereas deep regret is a sharp big green bolt, like lightning. I feel sensations from others, too.
reina, your name is a deep scarlet with blue on the sides
I also have the type of synesthesia where time units have spatial locations! Your name is a sort of dull violet color. The whole thing is sort of staticky.
I have some weird types of synaesthesia. I don’t see the words as different specific colours, but I do see colourful tracings around the words. And it’s not one colour, it’s like a spectrum. I’ve had it as long as I can remember, but I found out this isn’t normal just recently! I have no idea what it’s classified as, though.
I also see colours in my mind when I hear different musical instruments (chromaphonia). Like a tuba shows brown, cello purple, vioin light indigo, trumpet yellow-green. And I sort of have colours for every month, like I just KNOW September is ultramarine! It’s called chromachronia, I think. Here, I’ll list them out:
Jan- burgundy
Feb- reddish-purple
March- bright blue
April- light green
May- dark green
June- pale yellow
July- red
Aug- light bluish mint green
Sept- ultramarine
Oct- powder pink
Nov- gold
Dec- dark turquoise
Just thinking of the concept of a month makes the colour pop up in my head!
I’ve always had it…I just didn’t know it was considered uncommon.
Oh and @Kreyah: Yeah! It’s called chromesthesia, when you feel emotions as you see colours. If you’re not sure, you can always go on this site: http://www.mixsig.net/about/list.php
I just found out what the name for all of this was some time last year. For as long as I can remember, everything has had a color. Numbers, letters, months, people, days of the week, feelings…everything. Of course I thought it was normal while I was a kid but, as I got older, I realized that no one else I knew had these associations. So I finally decided to google it and found out that there’s actually a name for it! I’m not sure if anyone else feels overprotective of their colors though. For example, I see 3 as pink and 5 as blue but when other people name their color associations, I label them as “wrong” in my head even though I know they’re not. Does anyone else do this?
You’re way off! 3 is golden yellow, 5 is very pale silver! The blue numbers are 2 & 9.
Everyone has different colors though. For me, 2 is black and 9 is forest green. 6 is also green but it’s much lighter, like a grass green.
I had exactly the same, colours with days of the week, colours/numbers, colours/sound, the way I do mathematics in my head (which I visualise in my head as a wave), and much more! I would involuntarily experience pain when I watched someone hurt themselves (which after ALOT of research, I realised was all part of this!) I always was seen of as weird, and after a while would make sure no one noticed it, because I realised no one I knew was the same.
As for colours being “right” or “wrong, I don’t think it’s possible to be wrong, and I’ve learned that even though someone else’s experience differs from mine, that doesn’t mean mine are wrong, nor does it mean that theirs is too!
Just for the satiation of my curiosity, what are your “days of the week/colours”?
Mine are as follows
Monday; Red
Tuesday; Blue
Wednesday; Orange
Thursday; Purple
Friday; Yellow
Saturday; Brown
Sunday; Grey
Also numbers/colours, if relevant to you? Examples of mine are
5; Orange
3; Green
7; Purple
2; Red
6; Pink
The most important thing I’ve learned through life in regards to it, is; NEVER be ashamed of it, in fact it is often seen as a gift, or something people envy!
And, try and use it; do something creative with the connections you make in life, it makes for a much more intriguing life!
Please don’t hesitate to respond if you want to talk about all this 🙂
Take Care,
Deanne.
X
I have very mild synesthesia since even though I see colors and sometimes shapes in words, numbers and letters, it always is only in my head, not affecting for example reading book or doing math. It is a shame, I wish I could see colors of music and taste the words.
Though, my colors I see are (connected to czech words, other languages have different colors)
1 – white
2 – blue
3 – red
4 – green
5 – yellow
6 – orange
7 – orange-brown
8 – purple
9 – yellow-ish beige
10 – black
Sunday – dark yellow
Monday – beige
Tuesday – blue
Wednesday – red
Thursday – green
Friday – yellow
Lol, this reply is 5 years later, but wow, we share a lot of our numbers in common! To me 5 is orange, 3 is green, 6 is pink, Monday’s red, and Tuesday’s blue (with some green).
It’s aight.it doesntsuck it doesn’t rock. I guessitsnormal for me? Like I can’t imagine numbers and words without colors. 6 is hot pink and 8 is a watery purple, 7 is burnt orange, 4 is brick red, 9 is like egg yolk etc. And I have this weird thing with the calendar and days of the week where they are this huge picture..hard to explain. Ya mango shaped space is the best kids book ever..
living my whole life with synaesthesia, I thought it was just normal to see colors when you hear a sound. I get some funny looks when i tell someone what color their voice is, but it is ,overall, uninhibiting, except in math and english
That is what I have too. I hear a sound and then see a color. Another thing it might not be synesthesia but is I have a feeling like worry I see color like worry is yellow.
Really?to me yellow is happy!😄
why does it seem that everyone who has synaesthesia is 12, even though I am as well and at the top of my class.
Ha that’s funny. I’m 12 too. I have
colored letters, numbers, days of week, months, words and personalities.
A little bit of colored hearing but not entirely.
And I can hear movement (that doesn’t already have a sound)
A couple of names, for instance, Cassandra, makes me smell vanilla but the name color is very different from that of the color of vanilla or her personality.
And also I have the kind where numbers’ days of the week, months, years etc. have a place in space. Some times I’ll be looking down like from a high building And see a sequence from upside down. I see how people could lay them out in different ways but not how they couldn’t lay them out at all.
I see months in colors like:
Jan:orange
Feb:navy
March:yellow
April:brown
May: pink
June:blue
July:red
August:black
September:deep red
October:purple
November:green
December:dark green
And numbers too. It’s annoying sometimes like in math.
And i feel colors sometimes.
I thought it was normal…
I don’t have synesthesia but for some months i associate a color, April is light pink and December is light blue.
Agh! June is blue for me too! AND DECEMBER. DECEMBER IS LIKE ALMOST DARKER THAN FOREST BLACKGTYIJHKJ
I thought it was normal too. xfghjkl; cx
Mine is like this:
Jan: Sunny yellow
Feb: light green with darker green tears in it.
March: dark pink
April: Amber colored
May: a pale blue
June: dark blue
July: dark yellow
August: Red an orange. Light relflecting off it.
Sep: misty grayish blue
Oct: Orange that fades into black
Nov: dark, navy blue
Dec: bright red
😊
For me it is:
January- Dark orange
February- tomato red and shint
March: purple
April: black
May: Shiny purple with a pinkish tinge
June: peachy orange
July: thick orange
August: very dark yellow
September: faded yellow
October: dark green
November: forest green
December: midnight blue
Letters and numbers also have color, like 6 is firetruck red, 5 is sunflower yellow, 4 is cornflower blue, K is mint green, etc. It doesn’t bother me in math or reading because I associate the colors rather than actually seeing them. I am actually the best in my grade at math, a very advanced reader, and I love to write. Apparently most synesthetes are women, left-handed, and very creative. I fit all of these.
Is this a type of Synaethsia? I sometimes can feel the colors around me. Orange is energenic, blue is calm and peacful, Red and fiesty, green is joyful, and purple is smooth. I dont actually see numbers and colors and months and days in a color. But when I see it, a color pops in my head like. November is brown, Feburary is orange. The number 2 is red. Letter E is brown. Is the synesthia?
I’m pretty sure that is a type. That kind sounds cool. I see color with sounds. So that’s almost everywhere.
I have “Number Form Synesthesia”. The days of the week, the months of the year, the years within a century, etc… are all laid out in my mind in the form of individual maps. They are all like road maps. If I’m counting numbers, I can see the numbers and where they are located within the straight lines, turns, and zig zags that make up my number map. BUT, if I’m thinking about someone’s age? AGES have their own map. Although ages ARE numbers, I don’t see ages on my regular number map.
The months of the year are all laid out in a sort of oval/circle pattern, and I can view them as if I’m standing in the middle of this circle, turning as needed to look at a particular month. But I can also view the months from outside the circle. I guess I see these maps in 3D, and I can place myself in any position within any area of my map.
I have experienced this my whole life, and just assumed everyone else did too. Just recently, my daughter was having problems studying for a history test. She couldn’t remember the dates. I attempted to explain how my “pattern” of dates look…and proceded to ask her how her patterne is laid out. She looked at me like I was nuts, and now totally believes I’m weird and crazy! I’m in my 40’s and have just found out that I am different. So upon researching this, I see color is a huge part of Synesthesia. For me, I don’t see a color for each letter or number. But I do see the 1950’s as RED, the 1960’s as BLUE, and the 1970’s as YELLOW.
Hi Christine,
I have the exact same thing with months! I usually start out facing June and July and have to turn around in order to see the later months of the year. My birthday, September 7, is always to my right, so you could say the oval (it’s usually an oval for me) goes clockwise.
What do weeks look like to you?
i totally see numbers as a “map” as well. mine is made up of straight lines. that don’t intersect. dates are the same as numbers for me. for the month i think of a square and depending what time of year it is, is where i am in the square, looking at the other months. i can move around it too, if i want to.
i don’t think of things in color, but i do assign genders to everything.. numbers, letters, utensils, etc. always have.
Christine,
I have the same exact experience as you with the maps thing! days of the week, years, months, ages, numbers, the alphabet, calendars, they all have their own map! months map is a circle like yours, but i can stand in it. i can only stand ouside of it. i have never met anyone the same way as me! :^)
This is so weird! I’ve been this way my whole life and figured everyone had their own way of visualizing, so I thought it was normal! I too have a thing with months and days of the week. The months are in a circle form, summer months being on top and winter on bottom. I follow the months like a pawn on a board game. So in November I’m on the bottom right of the circle. Days of week are similar except oval shaped, and Saturday and Sunday on the bottom. I see names in color, and some colors, like magenta bring about nausea.
Also, I don’t know if this is anything, but when someone gets hurt or is in pain, my mutual body part goes completely numb. If I am tending to someone’s pain, my fingers and hands go numb. Making it very difficult to help!
I have this as well! One time we were studying a pie chart of the year in English class and I was very confused because it didn’t look anything like my year! Of all my types of synesthesia, this is the one that surprised me most when I found out it wasn’t normal.
I really think having it is quite a pest… I cant focus on school work because if my whatever its called whenever Im in bed I always see pink when its hot.. when it gets cold my room suddenly goes a bluish tint dude it is so annoying !!!
Um… I was wondering if I have synaesthesia. It’s sort of the way I see words and sentences, particularly in books for some reason. It’s like they have texture and are like a jigsaw – so when the sentences have the right words they are smooth, but when some of the words are wrong the whole thing is messed up and is all jumbled and bumpy. When someone gives me something to read that is had written, like my friend, for example, I view it as something akin to a strange sort of jigsaw, This is why I have a problem reading what I call ‘bad writing’ because I find it highly annoying that the sentences and the words don’t feel right. So because of this, my story writing particularly (and my other writing as well) is very…um..well, it’s cross examined by me, which makes the writing ‘smooth’ and not ‘bumpy’, in my eyes.
Yes, you probably have a form of synesthesia.
I have had synaesthesia my whole life, but only discovered that it had a name about a year ago. My mom knew about it, and when I started dating my husband I told him about it, and he was fascinated by it. He likes to bring it up at dinner parties to see people’s reactions to it. I not only see letters, words and numbers in color, but people also represent a color to me as well. Letters and numbers also have personalities to me. For instance, A is red, a female, attractive and slightly snobbish. Y is yellow, male, and fun.I have never met another person with this condition, but since my husband has helped me to open up about it, I find that so many people are fascinated by it, and jealous that they don’t have it. And a lot of people now come up to me and ask me “So, what color am I?” I do feel more special than the average person. My memory is crazy good, and I have recently found out that this is part of synaesthesia as well.Some people obviously think you’re a wacko or making it up, but who cares about them, anyway? I know who I am, and I know now that there is a name for it.
I would LOVE to have Synesthesia I have been reasearching it and found that not many people have sound/taste and sound/smell and have been told that color/letters,numbers,months,weeks,etc
are the most common! It is a VERY VERY VERY COOL THING 😛
if I do not see colors to go with words, but see them in my mind, like A is a silver green, I just see it in my head, not in real life?
This is called associated synesthesia. You are a synthesthete!
My grand mother, and I have this condition
when I was in first grade at school was very difficult, I was always afraid some one will find out and embarrassed me. If I accidentally hurt myself my pain color is Brown, the sound of the bell at church taste like Pineapple, any sensation I see like jelly beans in color floating in the air, moving slow in one direction, there is a liquorish flavor when I see certain people in the head or the hair. I can smell when a person lie. I can play many musical Instruments, very good with numbers, I am an inventor, I always have this dream or vision of a place that I am from, not from this Earth.
I know, I don’t want people to know (like in school) no one makes fun of me or asks questions and stuff. But I see colors around people and in numbers and letters and words, I hear few colors, and feel the emotions of colors!!!!
That is exactly what I have. Except not the words and numbers. With the emotions I see certain colors when I feel a certain way. Like I see yellows when I’m worried. Green when I’m happy/just normal.
Today, through a friend, I found out about this. I always thought it was normal to “go trough a tunnel of spinning colors” while listening to music. I mentioned this to many friends and the reaction I got was embarrassing. They would look at me like I had 10 heads! “Doesn’t this happen to everyone?”, I thought. Turns out , it’s not normal to give numbers personalities and make them have colors and names and such. It’s also not normal to see words on a screen in my mind as people talk to me. But, although it’s weird, I’m glad that I found out about it 🙂
My Creative Writing teacher mentioned it today… I was like wtf does that mean? And saomeone said it was where you mix up your senses kind of… he gave an example of it and said “Now few of my students have this. There are usually one or two people in each of my class. Like you may assing (in your mind) certain colors to certain letters. Or you might assign a certain sex/gender to a number and I instantly started shaking my head. He asked me if I had done it before and I said yes sir. He gave the example like 21 and I instantly said boy. So I have a form of synesthesia. And honeetly thought everybody did that. And that it was normal. I talked to my mom about it just recently and my Grandmother. And they said no its not normal… But its also not bad either.. Just different.
I am so amazed i am not the only one with syneasthesia. Im 13 but i realized i had syneasthesia(sorry cant spell) 2 years ago when i really embarressed myself infront of my friends when i started talking about colours of letters numbers names moods rooms etc… And everyone was staring at me. Ahhhh!!!!! Now everyones used to it although it still creeps my mum out when i tell her the colour of a resturant or song!!!!!
I have synesthesia. When I hear anything I smell something different. My mums name smells like wine and my dads name smells like cupcakes. Or music has a certain smell. I wonder what in it like to be un-synesthesic?
I have synaesthesia and I think its an amazing things to have. I wouldn’t trade it for all the tea in china! I didn’t realize I was different until I started talking to my friends about it and embarrassed myself. I love watching music, however and I think its had its effect of my musical talent.
To grace that sounds really cool. I never really have it with smell
i had this accident with my eyes awhile back and it caused damage to my brain so now i have it too. When i read, i see colors but mainly only gold and red, but its not only with certain letter, the colors follow along as i read which makes it harder for me. I also see colors when i close my eyes and hear music. Some are bright and some are dark depending on the genre. I guess i can say my imagination is different than a lot of others too. It all starts out with color combinations for me in my mind which is why i consider myself good at art..However sometimes ill just be walking and all of a sudden, i see black and purple “tingly lines” and it can be hard to see which makes me wonder if its a gift or not?
Hi! I have synesthesia where letters will stand for colors, for example: A= a bright crisp orange with fizzy bursts of lemon. I also have it where certain noises will overwhelm me. For example: When I scrape a fork on a plate, sharp dark green thunderbolts strike me like falling piano keys! It is so weird. I also have it related to smell & taste. For example: when I drink milk, I see white, blurry, fuzzy clouds,and it smells like burnt toast. It is so cool to have, and I am so thankful. I also see sharp and rough triangles, squares, and diamonds of a rainbow spectrum in my head when I close my eyes. When I read, it is so overpowering I have to take a break because all the colors and shapes build up, and are tingling my head,and sometimes I wanna scream. People who don’t have it, what color is this text? BTW: If you tell me your name, I can tell you what I see. My name is Faith. It is a hot pink with sharp needle-like flecks of gold with an orange burst at the end. How do you see Faith? (people with synesthesia of course). Thanks!
The text is black.Boring right? I wish i had synesthesia… it sounds like the world is so much more- idk- open? By the way, my name is NataliA, with an a at the end :), not Natalie. 🙂
Ur name to me is a pastel orange with light pink flecks. Wats my name? (Alexa)
For me It’s red at the start with a hint of green near the middle. No like Christmas colors though. The red is super bright and the green not and vibrant but still unmistakably green. (Alexa is your name to be clear that I’m explaining the name Alexa.)
I see Faith light baby blue with a hint of purplish pink. 🙂
What is my name? Abigail. I think it is a hot purplish pinkish with an outline of lemon fizz. I have lots of different kinds of symptoms. If I am at a train station or something loud I get overwhelmed by the noise. One time with my brother he kept calling me names. All I heard was clinging bells at a high pitch, and I saw red floating. I started screamed.. ( which, by the way, is red/green) I think it makes me unique, but i don’t ever go around saying I have it. That I keep to myself. I also have colors for the days of the week. i taste in color and smell in taste. Good luck, synesthetic!!!
I’ve got synesthesia but I can tell that the text is black. Actually seeing there is an outline of color for me but in my minds eye I can see them in full color.
Hi!
Your synesthesia sounds really cool. I have synesthesia too. For me the months, and days of the week have a certain place in space like in my mind’s eye January is to the direct left of December. This is by far the most prominent one, but I have a few others like name-color synesthesia.
Oh! The text in your comment is just plain old black. My sister sees it more the way you do though. When she reads she sees different colored steps leading up to the words, highlights, dots and squiggles surrounding the letters, etc. 🙂
Your name is a light baby-blue mixed with turquoise. What color is my first name, Kiki, to you?
Faith is bright orange with a fuzzy outline! Could you tell me how you see my name? (Maelynne)
do i have synesthesia? words, numbers, some sounds, and names all make a color pop in my head.
Yes you do
http://synesthesia-test.com/img/synesthesia-test-grapheme-color-numbers.jpg look at this to see if you have this
btw i wanted to add that, natalia, your name is yellowey orange to me. haha.
i always have the sense of smell! sometime i smell something that other wouldn’t smell it! i don’t know what it is. i can smell people from just seeing them. sometime i almost event have orgasm with those smell! but sometime those smell i smell, just warn me how terrible that person would be! sometime it just make me feel sick! english is my third language, i don’t understand what is exactly you guys talking about, but people around me always said that i think by myself, and being like a dog. till i heard about this things by accident search on the internet
I wish i had it with smell and taste! I wondered wat it would b like… I hav it- letters numbers names and sounds hav colors
I don’t know if I have the gift/condition. I have a reaction to music that involves panoramic views of “landscape”. This landscape is more of a kaleidescope effect but with purpose. Instead of shapes and colours cascading in sequence, I see it as a complex “EQ”. Instead of bars going up and down for bass and treble, the “bars” are colours for intensity and emotion.
I have found myself overwhelmed at times to the point that if I am driving, I become so …. caught up with it, that I have pulled the car over to the side of the road until it passes.
Music is the strongest, I tend to find that I feel it “impairs” my senses, however, I thought it a quirk on how I associated days of the week, months, letters, etc with different tastes or colours.
This….sensation…. I don’t know how others without it cope. It’s as if most are born numb, but those that can Sysnesth have found out how to truly….’FEEL’
Last paragraph- DEFINATLEY!!!!!!!! Perfect wording:) like, i cant imagine a world with out this condition
i wanted to give you guys all something to look forward to. what i like to do, (for all of you guys that see shapes/numbers in color in the air or behind your eyes)is run a hot bath with bubbles, turn all the lights off, and play classical music. its amazing!!!!! everything is just, oh, its just wonderful! have fun! 😀
I would love to have Synesthesia; as an aspiring artist having the world in more color would be helpful to me. I would like to know more though, like when a color or feeling arrives, does it gently fade in, or does it hit you hard? Or does it depend on what you’re experiencing? Sorry, just very curious!
I would help but i cant sorry! I have it but bery mild. Like how most people with it have trouble with math and/or reading. I dont at all though… Its weird. But when someone says, lets say, the letter A. I think of the color red. For me, its like i picture the letter in my mind in the color it is for me. Its like that for alot of things, like numbers and names. For names, they even hav textures to them. So i guess it all depends on what kind the person has or how strong it is. You should keep researching, its a very interesting topic. Try reading A Mango Shaped Space, too
I can sort of tell u what it’s like but I only have it with noise and it can be like my emotions for me when I hear a noise a color appears and fades away. So if someone is next to me and breathing(yeah sort of weird)a green rectangle usually appears and then fades away. It doesn’t really hit me hard though it might with some people. Colors for me depend on the sound. I hope that sort of helps you.
Wow that’s really cool! Does it ever make it hard to see?
It’s more just there to answer your question Caroline. It’s not hard or super gentle either. Imagine looking at a table that’s blue. The color doesn’t fade in or hit hard. It’s just there. Don’t know if that helps. Hope so!
Is this synaesthesia: I can feel some sounds like a scratching noise will make me feel like there is sand paper in my mouth. Beeping noises make me have a swishing feeling
I also hear sounds in specific locations near me. Softer sounds are to the left in front of me. Thunder is directly to my right. When I hear music the sounds bounce in different places near me
Okay; Well black I hate black mostly because when I see blacks OR grey I smell and taste digusting ciggarettes. My mum thought I was crazy one time, A loud gunshot sounded outside he house I suddenly saw a purple line with a C-Shape going thorugh it. I taste marshmellows when I hear clapping. And when Im walking I see squiggly transparent lines each time I take a step.
That’s SO AMAZING!!! I would love to have that kind of synesthesia. 😊
I never knew this was a condition until today ;p
I dunno, for me, only certain things get associated with color. Like when I think of a number or letter, i just get the feeling of what color it is. I don’t actually SEE the colors, but I KNOW that 7 is green. Or R is dark purple. More often than not, it’s a sort of color combination, like W fluctuates from shades of gray to pale stormy-blue or to white. Quite pretty.
Sometimes it’s an entire word, like how the word “darling” is a pale yellowy-gold color.
I always just assumed it was normal. Like, doesn’t everyone do this to some extent? lol
I have synesthesia to. It’s fun matching up colours and letters/numbers in my mind. Like, since most guys haves O’s in their names and O’s are black so that gives many names a black tinge, but the name Phillip is a purplish-pink. I only have coloured letters and numbers but sometimes, if I close my eyes music has a colour too. I know many people with synesthesia have trouble in math but I’ve figured out a way to match up coloured numbers in my mind. Like, the sandy-orange of 2 matches with the dark purple of 7 to make a dark green 9. Is that normal? FYI: To those who have read A Mango-Shaped Space (awesome book) you really need to read the Secret Series as well.
Omg i thought everyone saw letters numbers sounds and names with the the color that i do and i didnt no not even evryone didnt see colors for those stuff… Untill i read that book!
My daughter seems to have synaethesia. Pls forward some info for me if possible. Kind regards Lisa
You should probably ask her about it like how does she experience it. As in numbers, letters, sounds, words, etc.
So unlike how you might see the world she sees so much more. Colors or how ever she experiences it are just there. Like how you would look at a blue table and blue is just there. It’s sort of like that. It’s a good thing to help remember dates like 1776 for me is dark blue and green but 1783 is green then yellowish-orange then red. It’s useful but can get in the way of math sometimes.
I love having syesthesia! I’ve had it my whole life, and I’ve never even been aware of it most of the time…it’s like, when you’re explaining a memory to someone, and you can see certain details so clearly, that you leave them out in your explanation because they seem like such a given. That’s what it feels like. There’s nothing bad or different about it-if anything, it explains my freakishly good memory. I’m able to use it to create songs and writing, because certain colors just go together. It’s a very colorful world:) It also effects who I gravitate towards, I love colorful people.
I didnt think it was a disorder, I just thought everyone had it! Its pretty cool, make me feel like a superhero, but sometimes pretty annoying.
I see colours when I listen to music, mostly greens, yellows, whites and blacks…also if I hear/read the name of someone im close too, I see the colour red, and if its someine im not close too, I see blue. Also days of the week are coloured and numbered…the only negative aspect is that when I see/hear/feel something that worries me, I Have the most collosal headaches at a single point at the back of my head… I still cant beleive that not everyome jas it, it feels so normal!
Oh fun fact, at the cinemas or concerts I thoght the ligjts went down so you could see the colours better xD
I don’t really think of it as a disorder–More like a gift!
I have it. And last year in school, during reading, we came across a page where the author describes the music litterally flashing colors that correspond with the sound(it was a fantasy book). So she did something with the class. She took songs and asked wat color they think it is. She and everyone else thought of all the happy ones yellow, girly ones pink, and sad ones blue. And im just sitting there like “…..” Because they were trying to match colors up when they dont really see them in there head. They just guessed. And i had complete different answers. I was just like,”wow.”
What was the name of that fantasy book? I have been looking for the name of a book for a couple Years now. Its about a person who learns this strange instrument on an alien world that when played correctly paints a picture with colors that plays along with the music.
I have synesthesia and i cant imagine not having it! I can oftefeel sound, not the vibrations. If you drop a book in the other room i feel a tap on my back. When i play the violin I get a weird feeling in my fingers. Also some words have colors for me. The words/names Welsh, Shawn, Robyn, Erika, Ellie, Book, all have colors. Many other words have colors also. Some ,usic also has shapes. One song is circular and another is wavy. Thunder is a wavy circle. I have others forms of synesthesia but i cant always remeber them. It feels natural to me. I am not sire if this is a result of synesthesia but when i watch movies i get a huge headache. Is that related to my synesthesia?
I can also see color with music. The colors dance around the room and when a not is perfectly in tune it rings in my ear. I also see time not in colors, but in a grid. I also see days as a color.
Colors of the week:
Sunday-yellow
Monday-red
Tuseday-green
Wednesday-Orange
Thursday-Purple
Friday-blue
Saturday-black
I have that sort of synesthesia too. I also have personalities for the days. Monday is a blonde lady with a bob. She’s a tough-talking business woman who always has a cigarette in her hand, for example.
I have hearing,thinking-colors, music- colors, instrument-colors. I have no problem reading.(people often say I’m obsessed… I am) And I’m awesome at math (I just hate it). I love my synthesia, but I hate it to. There just is no “off” switch. I hate that. I was on my school’s classical music team (Music and Memory) I hated it classical music just gives me a headache from sensory over lode. I’m 11 and learned about my synthesia through Wendy Mass’s “A Mango Shaped Space”. The only person that I’ve told about it is my Mom and she thought I was crazy.
I have Taste-touch and touch-taste synesthesia. So things like the necklace around my neck at the moment tastes like chocolate and headaches tastes like copper and so on.
But at the same time, things like eating pizza feels like running my hands over a rough brick surface and eating ice-cream feels like dipping my hands in cold water and so on.
And I don’t consider it a disorder or a condition because to me the words just seem so negative! I see them as an a part of me that I just can’t imagine life without it! I’ve grown up with it and it makes the world so much more interesting!
I don’t see colors, when looking at numbers, but I hear sounds when looking at colors. I know that may sound odd, but it’s been going on as far back as I can remember. Mostly it’s just tones – different pitches – high or low depending on the color. dark tones seem to have lower tones, while warmer colors tend to have higher tones, and bright colors have irritating grating tones.
Classical art is usually okay for me to view – those colors are usually muted into soft browns and the like, nothing bright, so the tones are kind of low and normal like. But Modern Art – those museums I stay away from, usually can’t go in at all. When I view Modern Art it’s just unbearable on my senses. The color/sound combinations overwhelm me in a cacophony of colorful off-key tones.
This synthesia has limited my life in many ways. The interior of my home is decorated in muted tones of brown, tans, and dark blues. Those color combinations tend to affect me the least. For rugs I use your so-call oriental carpets – again they’re mostly muted maroon, blue, tans, and the like. Lower type soothing colors/tones are everywhere in my home. Nothing bright, nothing jarring.
The outside, I do love gardening, and I do want to plant flowers because others like them so much. Here again I try to keep to tones that affect me the least – blue and purple flowers, lots of greenery; nothing bright like red or yellow or orange – their colors tend to bring forth high irritating tones in my head.
I’m in my mid-fifties now, been living with this a long time. Most of my family and friends still don’t know about it (they’d think I was crazy – am I?), but they do know that I don’t like fiery colors, bright colors, and they know what colors I like.
Do I mind this? Sometimes – Someday I would like to go into an Art Museum and not be assaulted by all this noise inside my head; I’d rather it be quiet so I can contemplate the great works of art in front of me, in person.
I’ve never seen color, I’ve never heard it, but I can taste it. For example I taste the word unusual, hamburgers, yum! And light tastes like red beets, gross, but I will tell you one thing, your not missing much. The condition I have is like an ever lasting cold, with no cure.
Would you even want a cure? I wouldn’t even though it’s hard to get through math problems. But it opens up your world in a way only a few people see it
I’m doing a big research project on synesthesia. I dont have it but i think it’s really cool:) I need a casual interview and I was wondering if someone would be interested?
I have synesthesia and I’m a teen
I see 4 as green and 8 as purple and 3,5, & 7 make me think of red, yellow, and blue, but not as powerful as 4 and 8
About every time i close my eyes or spent too much tine in the dark i see random colors mostly red, yellow, orange, pink, violet
the colors mostly take random shapes like splashes and circles and the colors transform and move randomly(a red circle to pink splash moving in the dark, a yellow splash get divided)
and i have certain colors and shapes and personalities associated to a few numbers (0, 1, 2, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9) do i have synaesthesia
This may or may not be a form of synaesthesia, but certain number patterns, word sounds and names, colours, letters, and shapes have genuine personalities. For example, I did a thing when I was younger where I’d gather up small pieces (game pieces, buttons, marbles, glass stones, ect.) and have them live in a fully rounded ecosystem and ‘play God’, and I’d know who each one was and their past and personality and everything even with only minor details being different among the same types of items. This has also met me up when I meet people who have names that trigger this: while watching Doctor Who, it seemed intrinsically /wrong/ that Melody could also be River – River is strong, confrontational, with many sides and a complex history and future, and it’s hard to blur the line between the two, but a Melody is reclusive, inventive, quiet, and utterly genius. It seemed impossible to me for her to be both.
This is a really bad summary of what I experience, but is it possible that I have some form of synaesthesia, or does anyone else experience this or something like this?
My sister does. She see’s her number’s as having personallitys an stuff. and yes; it sounds like you do have synethesia. 😉
Hi guys 🙂 I’m currently writing a story about a man who has this, and I’m doing a little research. Sooooo I have a question: have you ever asked anyone, professional or otherwise, for a diagnosis on this and gotten an answer other than synesthesia? like an actual diagnosis? any answers would be greatly appreciated 🙂
P.s. this sounds like it would be sooooo cool to have 🙂
it is a cool thing to have. hello, mak! i have synesthesia, although i believe that there is no cure. i am no doctor, so i just want to say that in my synesthetic world, your name is a robins egg blue with little brown dots.
I actually think if something tragic happens
To u can actually lose your synesthia……
But after a couple of days it comes back!😀
But that’s not really a cure…
I beleive I have synaesthesia- especially as a child and even today, I’ve associated colors with individual letters, numbers, and whole words. The thing is, is that I was born with a visual impairment and at times it is difficult for me ti discern colors (especially color contrasts). So its at times very hard to articulate the exact color that I perceive. Sometimes…it’s a confusing blend between a color and a emotion or mood…the same way music note gives of a unique ‘feel’. I would describe it as “warm” and “cold”, “bright/light”, or “dark/dull”, “pleasant/dissonant.” Maybe this has to do with the way I think a word “feels” by its sound? For some reason, i’ve always felt bad for the number 9… He just sounds so stressed…even if he’s a bright orange color~
I sometimes wonder if these perceptions I’ve always had affect the way I feel at given times, or if the information I learn about a subject affects the way I perceive the word’s color and feel. “Wednesday” is a light grey-blue color that is soft and appealing to me even though its the middle of the week. Same thing with “February”- it is ivory-green and attractive also (even feminine) despite it being in the dead of a Minnesota winter. Friedrich (grass-green) Nietzsche (bold, dark orange) however is a guy I first heard of in college and he’s also a guy I don’t like, so his last name especially feels ‘heavy’.
I think the emotional part is just feelings we personally attach to words (symbols, essentially) as we learn them).
I have synesthesia and I try to explain to my friends about how they have colors and the smells I hear but they think im crazy and want me to talk to a counselor. It’s really annoying to me because I want them to be able to have the experience I have but try wont listen
Yeah, I think mine is pretty rare, and I only found out about it very recently. I’m 20. I get physical sensations when I listen to certain parts of certain songs. A lot of trance music to me seems wet and cold. ‘Cloudlight’ is sticky, and I love it because it’s the only sticky song I’ve heard. Now that I know this isn’t normal, I understand why people wouldn’t understand what I meant when I talked about music, like I’d say things like ‘that song sounds like an ice cube’ and people just wouldn’t get what I was on about at all.
Often people just thought I was being metaphorical, which is why no one really commented, I guess?
Hi i was wondering if I have synaesthesia. I see colored shapes float around sometimes and I can control where they go and sometimes their size, but I don’t think It’s when I like hear things or anything. I have a REALLY good memory and I’m in top groups in all school classes. I can do math mentally but can’t explain how I do it. some numbers have colors at times. 7 is yellow and HATES other numbers. I can’t even do simple adding and stuff with it sometimes! My name is also yellow.i see color when looking at light and when I look at things a see like “static” on it. if I look hard at things a colored outline appears. Please tell me if that is synaesthesia or not someone! Thx for reading this long boring comment 🙂
Definitely! I wish I had that type of synesthesia, where it’s actually useful and memorable and helps to do math!
It sounds like you do have it! Your name for me is a perfect cloud-less sky-blue, BTW. 🙂 And mine (Kiki) is a bright emerald green for me.
i think i MIGHT have synesthesia…
if i see some tipe of food, scent, sound online, i will be able to hear, smell, or taste it… same goes for reading
also, when i’m eating, every food seems to taste like a color, for instance, melatonin tastes purple, and barbiqued chicken tastes red and purple…. are these normal syndromes?
Yeah liliana, that’s definitely synesthesia. I see colors when I hear music(We Are Young by Fun is a deep red). Once I heard a song by Greenday and it was dark grey. 2nd time I heard it, it was still dark grey, but 3rd and 4th time it was black. Is that normal synesthesia? Letters and numbers have color (3=yellow)but the first time I tried imagining colors for #’s to see if i had grapheme synesthesia, I had to think before i thought of the colors. Before, the colors were never really there unless I thought about it, unlike songs on the radio, which had colors when I was in preschool. Does this mean I have mild number/letter synesthesia?
if you have to think about the colors then no… that is not synesthesia. i had to do the same thing with numbers. to see if i had it or not with numbers, i wrote down the colors one day that i saw with numbers. the next day i did the same thing. they did not match up correctly. so i know i do not have synesthesia with numbers\colors. although numbers do have genders and attitudes for me.
1-girl
2-girl, nice laidback
3-girl
4-guy
I have synesthesia also. I thought I was just crazy until I red the book “A Mango Shaped Space”. I have colors for every day of the week except Thursday. It tastes like chocolate (wierd enough)
Monday- yellow
Tuesday- teal
Wednesday- mucky green
Thursday- taste/chocolate
Friday-baby blue
Saturday- navy
Sunday- pink
A lot of people tell me “I bet your making it up” or “your just kidding. That doesn’t exist!” But obviously it does.is it normal for two numbers/letters to be the same color? I think of 3 red, and 9 red. I think of A yellow. B blue. C green. They seem to match my weekdays. Is that normal? Except D doesn’t taste like chocolate. It looks like pinkish purplish color. Good luck all you synesthetics!!! 😀
No. It’s completely normal. (At least from my point of view.) For me, x and z almost the same shade of a goldish, yellowish, orangish colour.
I just found out my 10 year old daughter has this. She started telling me that people were colors. She also experiences numbers,letters and music in color. I have been doing a lot of research on it and read the “auras” associated with people were less common. I wanted to find out if anyone out there has this form of synesthesia?
I have the same sort of aoura thing as well, although I’ve seen that for me it gets stronger after getting to know what a person is truly like and it’s usually quite weak for strangers. I believe it’s probably a personality -> colour variation of synesthesisia for me. I’m interested to here more on your daughter’s type.
My daughter has made a list of people in her life that she connects a color to. I noticed that some she does not care for has a light color and a dark color. She says when I get mad my color gets very dark. She has also said when people walk they actually have a footprint in that color.
Wow! That’s a bit different from mine (the colours never change, and the footstep thing isn’t something I share, though that’s absolutely incredible!), but it’s still cool to know that I’m not the only one with something like that. 😀
Thanks for your response. She feels better knowing someone out there shares the same experience. I know this is nothing new to her but it is to me. I find synesthesia very interesting and I can tell she enjoys what some people consider a gift.
I also have a variety on this form of synaesthesia , I think it’s a type of personality-colour synaesthesia . For a long time this only happened for me in dreams or memories but it’s slowly drifting into the real world . I’m 14 and have only recently found out that seeing these things isn’t ‘ normal’ . If your daughter is still worried I suggest she reads a book called ‘ The Name of this book is secret’ . It’s not directly about synaesthesia but one of it’s main characters has it so it’s referenced a lot . It’s a great book and it might make her feel better and more comfortable with it . Hope this helps 🙂
Really? I have something like that! Ask her if when she sees colors she thinks emotions like when she sees blue she think or feels happy. Like that!!
Your doughter should read the book ‘A Mango Shaped Space’, it’s REALLY good and it’s all about this girl with synethesia. She even has the kind your doughter has for a short time in the book! Hope this helps! 🙂
I havea question: does everyone see colors when they see light/brightness or is it just my synaesthesia???
it very much could be related to your synesthesia. i have the same thing go on. do you enjoy your synesthesia? i wouldn’t give it up for all the money in the world! it makes me unique. 😉
Of course! Ur name is bright red. Mine is yellow.
Oh and Joma, what kind do u have and do u have any idea what I have?
I’m sure you have a type of synesthesia, I just don’t know what it’s called because your synesthesia (seeing colors when you taste food) is probably more rare than my kind. I see colors when I hear music or random noises like static and clapping, which is (according to Wikipedia)chromesthesia. you’ll probably find your type of synesthesia on Wikipedia, too.
Whoops. Forget that other comment.You have grapheme color synesthesia because you associate colors with letters. I was thinking of someone else when I posted the other comment.
I love telling all my friends their name’s colors. Every letter has it’s own color. And different words, depending of the letters, has it’s own color as well!! Same with numbers… I have it for months and days as well. I have it a bit with music where hearing a high key is a white and a low key is black. It’s weird to think about how people view the world in such different ways! I made a chart showing all the letters and colors so that maybe my family would understand *sigh*
Most things have color for me to! Ur name is light pink and mine is yellow. What color is yours and mine to you?
I love it too! Your name is bright yellow, BTW! 😉
is tHis synesthesia?
when i listen to music i feel it in my back. every beat has a place…. but it is always behind me. sometimes in my head. if i turn around it goes with me. when it is sharp music the beats come and go almost immediatley. if it is a sad song, for say, with slow beats, they come and go slower.
i have a bunch of forms of synesthesia! sadly, though, everyone thinks i am making it up! i read a book, started studying synesthesia, took a test, and now i realize i have it! my brother and my dad think i am making this all up! only i know i am not and thats that! :^)
i have:
colored weekdays
colored shapes
music has “PLACES” (if it is synesthesia)
peoples voices have “PLACES” (again, if its synesthesia)
names have colors
attitudes\feelings have colors
Pain has colors
numbers have genders-some have feelings
things that arent moving move (it might just be an illusion)
if i smell food i can taste it too (Only sometimes)
etc. etc. etc.
all of those that i mentioned are a form of synesthesia right?
i have drawn so many pictures of colors to represent synesthesia. some i am proud of, some i am not so proud of. you should try drawing a picture of synesthesia. it sounds hard, but for those of you with it, honestly it is quite simple.
have fun!
Wow! That is a lot of synesthesia!! AWESOME! I’d LOVE to have all that!!! 😉
Yes, that is auditory-tactile synesthesia. I have it too! It is one of the most rare forms, and it is so hard to find others like this. My friend sees colors when she hears sounds, so we hang out and talk about sounds and music, describing them to each other. For me, high pitched sounds I feel higher up and towards the front, moving in that direction as the frequency increases, and lower pitched sounds go down and behind me. But I get it with accents too. European accents and ones from the East Coast (in America) I feel in my mouth, nose, and like the top, back part of my throat, but then feel like a stuffy nose to me. My favorite voices are deeper ones. Not all, but most I feel in the space around my ribs, this is also where I feel string instruments. I don’t like certain words because they make my mouth feel full or heavy, kinda like I need to spit. The more relaxed I am, the stronger I feel them, and sometimes I feel the sounds better when I remember them (I also happen to remember things better when I hear them because I can relate the sounds to physical feelings. I have had it for as long as I can remember (I’m 18 now), but I the first time I remember feeling it like, really really strongly, was when I was watching The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, right after it came out, and the song Secrets came on. The strings were so beautiful, and the music just moved soooo much. It would be in my stomach, and my chest, and my shoulders, and my legs. It was everywhere. I’m gonna stop here, because I could go on and on forever. I hope you find the sounds you love the feelings of. Those are the ones to remember, because I find when I’m just down, anxious, or just am not feeling like myself, those are the sounds I crave. You know, I never thought about it being synesthesia, but I also taste food when I smell it, I use it to decide it I should actually try something or not.
i forgot to mention that i also:
see words on a screen in my head
light has static on it
that is synesthesia too right?
I don’t know I was wondering about the static I have it and I’m not sure if it’s cause of syNaesthesia
Hey everyone! I’m Rosalie and I experience grapheme – color synesthesia. Like the studies show I experience color with letters, numbers, a teeny bit of both touch & taste. I believed everyone saw the world this way & I discovered I had synesthesia actually by my middle school librarian. I was sitting next to a friend of mine & she wrote down her name. Her name was the prettiest shade of cream sickle orange I ever saw. I told her that I loved the color of her name. She seemed shocked! She was like Rosalie, my name doesn’t have color! And she went on and on a bout the ” Gray ” words on her paper.
Another time at school the lights went out. People were screaming and slamming locker doors and yelling to other people. It. Drove. Me. Insane. I had a major headache from all the colors and shapes around me. locker doors create little tan colored rings in my vision, along with each person’s unique color of a scream and on top of that, the fire alarm went off. I was in shock and the colors took over me kinda. My friend had to practically drag me out of the building.
Thanks for reading! Trust me there are a lot more stories, if I told them all, it would take up three pages. Sometimes being a synesthete is good and sometimes annoying and bad.
ur name is light pink ish orange with light blue 🙂 cooool name mines just plain old yellow
Hey! Rosalie is pinkish orange for me too! And yours is also yellow me! 😀
I do believe that the screen thing is a form of synesthesia. One time when i was, like, 3 or 4 i went up to my mom and said, “i love how when people talk, every word they say, is on a screen in my head! dont you like that, mommy?” she just stared at me, then she turned back to my brother in amazement. My brother, nor my mom, had what i had.
at school i am known for being a really good speller. i have been able to spell forever. once i was in 1st grade, i was bumped up to 2nd grade spelling time. the teacher in second grade told us to spell perpendicular. i was the only one in the class to spell it correctly!!! and i was a first grader!!! i only knew how to spell it because when she said the word i saw it in my head and just wrote down what i saw.
my point, is that, not everybody has the screen thing. i think it could very possibly, have to do with my synesthesia.
Kindest regards,
Catinya
I was adopted so I will never know!
I recently found out that I have emotion-colour , music pitch- colour, music chord- colour , sound- colour and smell- taste synaesthesia . I’m 14 and am grade 8 on several instruments , I think part of this is down to the synaesthesia. I guess it’s helped me . Does anyone else find it helps with revision . For example , if I need to remember a key word I’ll say it to myself then remember the colour . I don’t know why it just works I guess . Also does anyone else find that their synaesthesia is stronger when dreaming or in a memory?
I do realize that my synesthesia is more clear when I am reviewing what they said. When someone says Monday, i immediately see\think yellow. But when someone says a name, i have to spell out the name in my head, (which happens naturally) and then think of their personality, and then i automatically have a color.
I’m quite curious, as I never experienced color-number association when I was younger, but after reading a brilliant book called Ultraviolet, about synaesthesia, if I think about numbers, letters and words, they have colors, e.g. 1 gray, 2 red, 3 yellow, D and B dark blue and 4. When I read them though, I don’t physically see and colour, I just think it. Is this synaesthesia, or just me subconciasly making it up after reading about it? I’m really curious.
I’m kinda like that too. I never really thought about numbers as colors when I didn’t know what synesthesia was, but once I heard about it, I decided to see think about what colors letters and numbers would be if I did have synesthesia. Surprisingly,almost all the numbers and letters I thought of had a color. I think this is just a more mild form of synesthesia, where the sensory mix up is so slight you don’t notice it until you think about it. Five and h are both orangeish and I get them mixed up in algebra problems, solving for the variable. Four and f are green, 2 and n are red and I get those mixed up.
Like elena
Ethers and numbers have color but only when I think about them. Since kindergarten when I pictured them in my head (I do math in my head) there are a certain color. And 7 is yellow and I can’t add any thing that makes it very well and I cant multiply and stuff with it well. Is any of that synesisthesia?
please help ! i dont know if i have synaesthesia or not? i seem to but im not sure. when i think of letters, they have colours. only A seems to switch between red and yellow ?
Also, triangles are orange for me. squares are blue. circles yellow, octagons purple. always have been …
normal or not ?? ^_^
please help!
Hi :)Not being sure myself if I have synaesthesia, I can’t be sure if you have, but what you have said sounds exactly how things are for me. With the switching colour thing, I also have that, as 6 is both grey and orange, but isn’t both at the same time. It’s quite hard to explain. Occasionally for me, seeing letters and numbers actually trigger colours, for example, in maths, I saw z/4 in algebra, and not thinking of synaesthesia, I thought it was such a nice metallic teal colour, but I didn’t really SEE it, I can’t explain what it was like, even to myself. The brain is a very confusing thing… Anyway, hope this helped,
Elena 🙂
Hello,
I have lexical-gustatory synaesthesia.Cetain words have specific taste for me. My mother tongue is Greek and I speak English fluently. I,also, speak Spanish. This phenomenon happens to all these languages. I had read in an article that this type of synesthesia has to do with the phonemes of the language as well as with the combination of different sounds. It’s absolutely marvellous. I feel very privileged. I wouldn’t trade this ability for anything in the world.
i have this really weird thing about the number 9. for me it is a red that reminds me of a barn but it is darker than a barn. it’s kind of brownish. whenever i see anything that colour it really bugs me because i hate the number 9! it isn’t this bad for other numbers though. also if someone’s name is a really gross colour i don’t like saying their name. it’s kind of awkward to tell them though… 😦 i’m glad that there are other people who have this too so i don’t feel as weird. anyway, what’s it like to have taste or smell synesthesia?
My qs are purple, and my os are orange. But it only happens on those letters. Is that normal?
I have the number form version and after reading all the fantastic comments about colour feel mine is a bit dull in comparison. I’m 43 and only found out yesterday that my visions are synesthesia. Like others, I had casually mentioned to a couple of people how I see things and their response put me off mentioning it ever again until this week I watched a tv program about the earth’s orbit. The diagrams of the years orbit were exactly how I saw it. So I googled seeing things in shapes and came across all this amazing info about synesthesia. It’s nice to finally have an explanation for it and know that there are so many people that have it too. Love reading about all the experiences.
So I just found out about thistonight becausw my friend said she hears colours! I was so jealous and full of doubt…caus
e common that sounds too good to be true! But I its not! So I instantly started researching it! I’ve read about half these comments and well…. I totally give numbers genders, and vague personalities…but only a few..like 5 has always been a boy, cute or attractive. 9 also a boy, somewhat a badass and 7 is female and kinda edgy. I also had a vivid dream a long time ago ..about why I hated the number 8 (female) so much. However I failed to writebit down and could not remember the next morning….
What do you guys make out of this?
God, I should have read every comment first before asking!
Yeah, I had the same thing to with numbers and alphabets having gender and personalities. Mostly occur in numbers. I still remember them as it is back in my early childhood.
The most disturbing numbers was 4 and 9
To me 4 and 9 are very jealous girls but 9 is much sinister.
When this two numbers pair, the whole equation feels sinister and that’s why I hated maths until now
Also since I never would have thought about this, what’s a good way to test for it??
Wow! After 62 years I can finally put a name to my condition. Number Form Synesthesia. People have always told me I was crazy when I describe my experience. For as long as I remember I have had a vision of a yearly calendar in my head. While a few people here have described their calendar as being oval shaped, mine is a square pattern with all of the months being in smaller squares inside of the bigger square. The months Jan. thru Aug. are on the top of the square running left to right. The last four months, Sept. thru Dec., are on the bottom of the square running right to left under the Jan. thru Aug. squares. The lower months are in larger squares than the upper months so as to make the bigger square the correct shape.
I also visualize the decades from the year 1800 through the current decade in line form. From 1800-1899 the line is vertical. From 1900-1949 all decades are in a horizontal line. Starting at the year 1950 all of the decades alternate between vertical and horizontal with the 50’s being vertical, the 60’s being horizontal etc. Strangely, (as if any of this stuff is not strange enough as it is!)the 90’s decade goes off in a sort of slight left angle. The 2000’s are vertical and 2010’s is horizontal. I remember looking forward to each new decade on New Years Eve to see which way it would go.
Does anyone else here have any of the visions that I have?
I’ve always been fascinated by synesthesia. Could someone tell me what my name sounds/smells (I know it depends on the type you have) like?
It’s Natalie. 🙂
Dark brownish red. Like a brownish maroon color.
Orange.
Whew! For years I wondered if others “saw” words, phrases, people, moods, words, numbers in color. I always have. I’m an artist so I’ve always used it to guide me in my work.
Once I tried describing how the number 67 reminds me of cola or how the number 42 is pink, I got a crazy stair…So glad I’m not alone! I also can remember people by their “aura” color…when my twin daughters were born, I always saw one as yellow and the other as pink…It turns out their personalities match to me. HA! I’m not crazy!!! Amzaing that there’s a name for it. 🙂
I pretty much notice that most synesthesia are grapheme-color related, but for me, all of the numbers and alphabets have genders and personality. I wonder if this is categorize as synesthesia too, cause it still remain in me ever since childhood.
Yeah it is, but I don’t know which type. I have that one too. 😌
Is this synesthesia?
I see colors when there is sounds. Also emotions have color like if I’m worried about something I see a bright yellow with a slight orange tint. With noise when breathing I see a green blue rectangle. If the house is quiet but is making sounds from a heater I see a large black rectangle. Tapping looks like a pink violet organic shape.
Maybe, to me it sounds like Sound-Colour senesthesia.
I think I have synesthia…but I’m not sure.my
Numbers have personallitys and my dates,letters,words,names and numbers all are in color to me.somtimes when I am reading the words are highlighted but they’re all different
Like somtimes there is like little colored lines leading down from the word.it’s cool but makes it a little hard to read.Songs and stuff make me remember an image.crystina is like glass and Jamie is hard and blocky.some words are in fants.not much.my sister,Kiki, has it too.do u think I do?
Yeah I think u have synesthia!😉
I have synesthesia! awesome
I think my daughter has it, but she sees color with emotions. She just happened to mention it out of the blue. She is 12 and she was telling me how happy she was about something and how she liked the colors that came with being happy. After questioning her and researching on the internet, I found synesthesia. I am going to have her take the test. I asked her what angry was, she said red fading to black fading to red. I find it very interesting.
I have synaesthesia 🙂 I grew up believing everyone saw letters, numbers etc the way I did, I couldn’t imagine not having it. It’s in my minds eye primarily, for instance the days of the week are in a wheel and each day has its own specific colour and size. And numbers have an order in my head I couldn’t even begin to describe but it goes backwards and up and down and even swirls around by the time you get to 500 and each individual number has a colour, but when I look at all the numbers in their order in my head they have colour groups in multiples of 10. Music and words have colours and tastes and sometimes smells, but that one is mainly when I share a strong emotion with it. When I ask my friends etc what they see (I’m always trying to find someone who knows what I’m talking about!) It sounds so boring not to have synaesthesia, I feel lucky 🙂
i dont know if i have this or something else but i see colors but dont taste them or hear them. I only see them in patterns and shapes or things like animals.
Are u artistic?left handed?please reply!
I’m 10, I have Grapheme Colour Synestesia. It’s a little different to most peoples, it’s a kind of… Mild synestesia. I think of letters, numbers, days and months in colours. I never knew what this was, I thought everyone saw them like that. Well, I say “see”. It’s more of a feeling, it’s not like if you write down a sentence in black it’s all colourful! It’s still black. It’s quite annoying, I think of A as yellow, so say if someone draws it red, I actually get mad. I can’t look at it. It’s a kind of controlling condition, really. I can also “hear” colours. When I’m playing piano, let’s just say a C sounds like yellow. I quite like having synestesia, I can’t imagine my life without it.
I am pretty sure i experienced this from a young age and assumed it was the same for everyone i soon found out differently when telling others about the word/name and food connection. Mostly i am reminded of foods but there are also a lot of textures in there as well i will give some examples as well as how i see/taste the words given above. ‘Monday’ is Mcdonalds ice cream sundae with dripping chocolate sauce. ‘Moon’ is the soft nougat from a milky way chocolate bar but it is cold, it also invokes images of teeth biting onto cold tin foil. Question is more a texture or feeling than a taste and i dont know how to describe it other than it is heavy like a digestive biscuit dropping into milk, question is enjoyable to pronounce. Love: doesn’t remind me of anything but “Lovely” reminds me of soft meringue whip on top of lemon meringue pie. Lodge: is very heavy and reminds me of fudge. Mountain: doesn’t remind me of anything. I will list some words and their tastes/textures. Six is a sliced apple, but particularly the core and pips. George is fudge not chocolate but golden dense and heavy. Todd is heavy fudgy toffee. Sarah is sliced carrot sticks. Lisa is like an edible shoelace mixed with chewing gum. Brenda is sour, the squeezing of lemon with pips while Linda is sweet with passionfruit pulp and pips. Carla is chopped coleslaw. Wendy is gingerbread (the cake not the biscuit) Jamie/James & Martin are tinned spaghetti, Peter is the mashed potato topping a cottage pie. Renee & Natalia is lasagna, Lavinia is a little bit lasagne but also chopped liver with tinfoil and silverbeet, Renee is carrot sticks with lasagna. Derek is hard in texture like chopped carrot but mostly a milky oaty muesli with a little coconut. Christine/Christina/Christian is the soft airy coconut icing that tops a boston bun. Philip is very salty french fries, Steven is not very pleasant for me it is a drill bit. Rachel is a nectarine mostly the fleshy stone after eating. Kate is dried apricots , Cory is dense not pleasant and is like a root vegetable, Darren is soft iced carrot cake, Nicola is picked onions, Nicole is unpleasant and is bleach, Glen are bodily glands – groin (unpleasant) Maria – grapes on their own but also peeld grapes in fruit salad. Patrick is a wad of material but also the smell of the old “Spaceman” kids cigarette candy. Brian is brown shoe polish. Natasha is crushed “sparkles” lollies we have here in New Zealand (boiled coloured glassy sweets) Maryanne is like a cake with cream& halved strawberries on top, Mary strawberrys dropped into cream, Joanne is passion fruit pulp but also passion fruit perfume but on a soft padded body duster. Judi is heavy but chewy, very very unpleasant, purple, perhaps grapey or beetrooty. Tim is hard biscuits with overbaked raisons, Rita – is grating cheese into macaroni cheese, Ashley – crushed potato chips, Sharon is sliced carrot, Karen is cream cheese frosting on carrot cake, Tracy is sour blackberries, Kelly is chopped lettuce salad in a frankfurter bun, Julia is a string of beads pulled from a mouth between the teeth, Adam is mushroom on a pizza, Carolyn/ Whitney/Whitley is liquid cake batter being drizzled, Fred is fish paste on a sandwich. Rhonda is passionfruit cheesecake, Lydia -herby lasagna, Kym/Kim is soft lipstick, Claire/ Clara is sweet heavy cream/Mock cream, the word ‘Mom’ is gravy on top of sliced roast chicken (moist), Zoe is stewed feijoas. Hannah is show polish with the brush, Burt is a corn cob. The name Chloe i absolutely detest saying, its like the soft inner of a jellybean once the hard sugary coating has been eaten and it glows like jewels in a cave. List goes on and on. So interesting to read others experiences.
This is cool, as for me words have textures as well as tastes….well, most but not all.Names are the worst for me as some people I meet I like but hate the taste of their names.. like the name Brian has a horrible taste of metal and cold fish.It was interesting that you also just have a feeling or texture about certain words as that is also how it is for me. Here are a few of mine: country is melted chocolate, short is a sickly sweet wafer biscuit, sky is an ice lolly with a fruity taste, fright is sausages that are overcooked and going crispy, stretch is liquorice flavoured concrete!! The list is endless. So glad to hear I am not the only one who tastes words.
My sister thinks she has number, letter,and word color synesthesia, but I don’t know about myself. Most of my words have colors, some don’t, and the word ‘Love’ (ONLY the word Love) changes depending on my mood.
In my mind’s eye, the calendar has a certain location like January is to the direct left of December, and each month has a color.
When I listen to music, I get a certain picture in my mind–it can be a pic of a place I’ve been, or it can be something more abstract, like a bunch of colored 3-D shapes aranged in a sort of obstacle-course. It’s the same with trying to memorize a peace of writing. When i think of the time I picture a clock in my mind’s eye.
I’m very good at memorizing certain locations in time, like what chair EXACTLY I sat in at the zoo cafeteria 2 years ago.
I’m VERY artistic. I’m left-handed. I would REALLY like to know if I’m a synesthete or not. If someone has anything at all to say about it, please reply–it would mean a lot to me.
Thanks!
KD
I think I have synesthesia because I see names,letters,words and numbers in color,and when I’m reading as I read along (for example)the are bouncy or fluffy.my numbers have personalitys,and when I’m reading the words are highlighted with for example pink.🎨
Also some of my names have smells.doug is brown.ryan is Amber colored with dark patches.
Also, if a word on paper or typed in a computer has a color next to it or it is highlighted, I find it hard to picture the color of that particular color, like my mind’s eye is wearing tinted sunglasses,making a pink ‘Door’ look blue.:)
Simple things like The, It, and I are always pale yellow.
Could someone tell me what color, smell, shape, etc. my first name (Kiki) is to them? 😛
To me Kiki is the rice chocolate squares for kids
here is an image if you dont know what i mean http://www.chocablog.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/rice-krispie-squares-chocolate-2.jpg?f62287
It does sound as though you do have Synesthesia. Quite an interesting form also, especially how you mentioned you remembered placement.
Really goes to show how expressive the brain is, and so very personalized when it comes to perception – to me an name is so obviously what i see, like when you see burnt toast and you can conjure up exactly how it smells, thats how names are in regard to their tastes/textures for me.
When people are speaking i can sometimes become transfixed on certain words that i realize the conversation was lost of me
Really? It’s a bright emerald green for me. And Opiumpicnic is bright red with tiny white spots. 🙂
Thanks for telling me what you think. It makes me happy at the thought that Im a synesthete! 😊
🙂 For me if I hear someone talking the individual colors of the words spoken don’t immediatly pop up in my head. It more like I just listen normally, no colors, and then if I want to know what a color of one of the words spoken is out of curiosity of bordom or something, i might think, well, say the person speaking said “I love dogs”, than I might think “what color is dogs?”, and bright red will pop up in my head. 😜
I have the gratheme coulor synesthesia and when I see the pattern triangle I’ll think it looks green or the number 5 is blue square or circle is red but I think it kinda might be sound aswell cause the letter sss sounds like red and circle isn’t a sss maybe every letter has a colour for me that’s why I think triangles green cause t looks green to me or the sound one cause s looks and sounds red to me but circle. Is a c and c looks yellow but sounds red i don’t know it’s wierd but I’ve always thought that since I was old enough like 5 I remember telling my family members that a triangle looked green an I was tryna explain it but they just thought I was wierd I was like 8 and that’s when I new it was different but I generally thought everyone had the same thing as me until then
Hi!
So, I’m not sure whether this is actually synesthesia or whether I’m just making it up, but I see music as colours, and months, too. Well, it’s not really seeing, I just get very strong impressions in my mind. For instance, the month of January is a very smoky, dark colour, February is much lighter, March is light pink, April is light green, and so on and so forth. I’m actually very dependent on this.
Could someone please tell me if they think this is synesthesia?
Yeah, I have this weird thing (I’ve had it since I was a child) where I feel my thoughts. So if someone says something, sometimes if I think about what they said, I can feel the thoughts like they are physical things. But it’s not like having hands or your body; I feel it with something strange inside my body. It’s not a body part, but it still feels like I’m being touched by the thoughts. It’s so hard to explain. However, it only happens if I see a picture in my head. If I think normally, I usually get some weird ‘map’ of the thoughts in my head, and I can feel them. It gets more extreme in my dreams, when I see weird things that aren’t in the real world, and I can feel them with unknown body parts (although sometimes I dream about REAL life)
The second thing I have is when I see something, and I hear a sound. If there is a .gif image, for example, as the animation starts to loop over and over again, I start to hear weird sounds in my head, associated with the actions in the looping animation. Sudden actions sound more like a hard note, or a pop, but gradual motions sound like a synth or a sliding sound. This ends up making a weird sequence of notes playing in my head, until I stop looking at the animation. It happens with flashing lights (that have no sound). When the light turns on, I hear a high-pitched note. Then when it turns off, I hear a lower note. Is anyone else like this?
When I was younger I use to dream of a black oval and flurecent green around it every night 4 years and it use to scare me to go to sleep now I’ve grown up I was wondering what this really means if somebody knows can you help me to find out please would be so apreciated to know
Does anybody know
I have a different feeling like if I see a certain color or pattern I get all tingly and my spine shivers I’ve looked everywhere but I can’t find anything about this someone please help I need to know if I have this or if I’m just going crazy.
I still haven’t found out mine yet if I find out yours I’ll let you know and if you find out mine can you let me know all the best daniel
I’ve had a very clear number-color synesthesia for most of my life. In my late 20’s and early 30’s, it expanded into letter-color and sound-color synesthesia. The sound-color bit was pretty short-lived. I’m 42 now, and am just beginning to realize that I’m no longer actively experiencing any of it – I have *memory* of numbers associated with colors, but the actual *experience* has faded. It’s really depressing. I miss it.
I have a weird thing but I don’t know if it qualifies. I feel textures when I hear sounds, but it’s usually confined to my ears and head unless the sound is especially loud (in which case due to my autism I’m too overwhelmed to comprehend exactly what I feel). For example, most dubstep bass drops feel like rough sandpaper and that feeling when you run your finger along a comb, but in my ear and inside my head. Violin feels smooth. Piano feels somewhat fuzzy. Are my ears just sensitive or do I actually have synesthesia?
I have identified the days if the week by name but also in colour since the age of two !
Friends can’t believe it and as a child I have a vague memory of my parents taking me over the reasons I referred to days as being red days or yellow days etc . Friends have fun at first with the idea of it ( when I explain it ) and relentlessly take me through the days of the week in succession , followed by random muddling of the sequence of days of the week but unwavering the answers are always the same !!
Here is what I actually ” think of ” when I refer to the days of the week :
1) Monday = a black colour
2) Tuesday = red
3) Wednesday = Yellow
4) Thursday = Navy blue
5) Friday = White
6) Saturday = red
7) Sunday = white
As a very small child I actually referred to events taking place on certain days by suggesting they were happening eg. on “red Tuesday or yellow Wednesday ” etc !!!! It doesn’t affect anything else really just the days of the week , with the possible exception of when I think of the word water which is always presented in my mind as an evaporating ( sorry bad pun ) grey / white mist !!!
I had an above average IQ as a child and excelled academically .
It’s not something I think about now but can sometimes have fun with it , as it is a good talking point round the dinner table !!!
A very strange thing happened to me recently. I am not a crackpot, just a person with a puzzling question.
During the evening last November 5th 2015, I was laying down trying to fall asleep around 9pm. All of a sudden I clearly heard a soft, low, deep voice that sounded slightly synthisized within my head saying the following numbers; 080 (approx. a 2 second delay) 54308
I did not hear these numbers through my ear, rather on the left side of my brain. I heard only the numbers and nothing else! It was very deliberate
This has NEVER happened to me before nor anything like it. I am curious if anyone has had this happen and/or understands the number sequence?
I’m not really sure if I am a synsthete, I would love to be one though. I think I have a slight form of it where numbers, letters, months and days have personalities and genders, for example:
1- Male, loves rules, goody two shoes.
2- female, loves children, secretly likes 1
3- male, best friends with 4, trouble maker
4- male, together with 3 he likes to annoy 7
5- female, bossy, thinks she is the best, vain
6- female, likes to follow 5 around, bookworm, fan girl.
7- female, fed up with 3 and 4, Strong feminist
8- male, tries to keep 3 and 4 away from 7, except she insists she can look after herself, he mainly takes care of the younger numbers (3,4,5 &6)
9- female, moody, likes to be alone, only listens to 10, absolutely despises 5&6
10- male, the care taker of them all, although he is not their father. He is like the alpha, has a deep voice, the only one that 9 will talk to.
I also see days, months and years layed out in a particular way. So, there you have it… All of my family thinks I am weird, but it’s just what I am used to, I thought it was normal until a few days ago!
Same. It’s called ordinal linguistic personification synesthesia. Except, my personalities and genders of numbers and letters are very different to yours.
For example;
1- Male, confident (but not obnoxious)
2- Male, indifferent
3- No gender, very lucky
4- Female, quiet and nice
5- Female- Strong, audacious
6- Male, competitive
7- No gender, sarcastic
8- Male, very strong, bossy (especially of 4)
9- Male, thinks he is funny but nobody else does
And so on…
I was just rambling on to someone about how I feel things as colours. And that although I can’t describe how I feel, I can describe the colour I feel. And she mentioned synesthesia, so I just googled it… I’ve never heard of it before.
I’ve never seen numbers or letters as colours, I just feel colours. There are some things that I taste or smell as colours, but not everything. But feelings, always in colour.
Is this synesthesia?
I have synesthesia, and what I find funny is how I originally (when I first learned about it) didn’t even realise I had it, and when I finally figured it out thought I only had sound-colour. Ha. No. Months are coloured and years are arches like a bridge, with the months as bricks. Numbers have colours, some letters, definitely dates.
It’s fascinating how all these things I didn’t even properly notice (I only see colours in my mind’s eye, not in real life) are actually a condition, rather than something everyone does.
Also, A is green. Like apples.
I’ve always related colors to numbers all my life, have been aware of it since I was maybe 4 years old. The numbers with the same color screw me up sometimes when trying to remember a number, like a price or something.
My color chart is:
0 – clear/transparent like glass
1 – white
2 – pink/red
3 – yellow
4 – green
5 – red
6 – yellow
7 – orange
8 – dark blue
9 – black
Combinations are interesting, for example 10 looks like watery milk. In my mind’s eye I can see impossible colors like red-green, I don’t know how to describe it; I’ve certainly never seen it in the real world. Although, the grocery store carries apples that are both red and green, so… 🙂
I have ordinal linguistic personification synesthesia. Basically, letters and numbers have personalities.
Hi everyone, my friend and I both have synesthesia. I have:
Grapheme-Color Synesthesia
Month/Day Synesthesia
Sequence Space Synesthesia
Emotion Color Synesthesia
Sensation Color Synesthesia
Sound-Taste Synesthesia (slight)
Mirror Touch Synesthesia (Mild)
Motion Sound Synesthesia
Auditory Tactile Synesthesia
The thing where everything people say is words on a screen in my head
My friend has the same except she doesn’t have Spatial and Sensation Color Synesthesia but does have Optical Linguistic Personification and Chromesthesia.
Thanks!