Primary mode of thought?

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Mostly words, but sometimes images. And when I do think in images they are usually abstract and schematic, not literal or photographics.

ruveyn

It's funny to me that I'm having trouble coming up with the words to explain this.

I perceive three kinds of my own thoughts:

1. The first kind is the most rudimentary. It's not based in language; it's much more basic. It's that I know something but I don't know the words to describe it, and I don't have any picture of it. But I know it. It's like noticing "This thing is related to this other thing" but without actually thinking the words "This thing is related to this other thing."
   
   
2. The second kind is sensory. If I have an idea of something to visualize, I can visualize it like a video, or if I'm recalling something that I saw, I'm viewing it like a video. If I'm trying to remember what someone said, it's like I'm listening to audio, or if I perceive something that I've perceived before, that's how I identify it.
   
   
3. The third kind is words. This is more like a translator, trying to make my rudimentary thoughts into words that can be explained by other people. I spend a lot of time trying to come up with words that are specific enough to convey my thoughts.

Usually, my thoughts are the first kind and the second kind. The thoughts themselves can be about simple or complicated things, but the way the thoughts themselves work seems very basic; they don't even necessarily get translated into words before or even after they're acted on. I may think about something like how the planets revolving around a star are like the subatomic particles like electrons orbiting the nucleus of an atom, and my mind would note a similarity, but it's not necessarily translated into language; I don't have a thought in English that "Yes, those two things are similar." But I do perceive that those things are similar.

The third kind deals with language and how to communicate. My thoughts are often so complicated that I get really frustrated because I know what I'm trying to make others understand but I don't know how to make them understand what I'm thinking. This is also used when converting things other people say into my own way of understanding it.

I don't know what to answer. I have different modes of thought for different things.

Generally, thinking through something like a logic problem, there will be some nonverbal thoughts that I also wouldn't call visual, more like thinking in concepts, but there will be a lot of words. With something like this, it's almost solely verbal, just thinking these very words, then typing them. If I get to a point where I'm dealing with something difficult, however, then I will engage Pace And Think Mode. This is the only kind of thought I know how to communicate. It has issues, because I like the sound of a word and then instead of going on, I go "communicate municate municate and cate and cate and" and lose my place. This is generally accompanied by stimming. It took me a while between the devolpment of this particular habit and learning to do it silently. Worse still, I have verbal tics that only happen in my head, but which take up a lot of time. "Um please and um please and um and..." and "I'm not a man" are frequent visitors. (The latter is quite accurate. Though sometimes I drop the "not." I generally proceed to feel really embarrassed. And after typing that sentence I thought "and so yeah, um and um...")

In Pace And Think Mode, I'm pacing back and forth, which seems to unlock new abilities, and thinking. This is also often spurred when something prompts a tangent, when I want to entertain myself, when I want to work on a story and when I want to work out problems involving people or pictures. In Pace And Think Mode, I retain only a little less verbal thought, with relatively clear visual thought. The images are moving or may be still, and it plays like a movie, no narration. (One thing of note is that I also sometimes pace while thinking verbally. It helps to get the words flowing.)

Conceptual Thought Mode is for things I have neither words nor pictures for. The feeling I get when I sense my mother's presence is only thought of in Conceptual Thought Mode, because there's no other way to think of it. This is also used sometimes as a stopgap measure to patch up a sentence when I forget a word (following which I derail the train of thought to find the exact word I want). Sometimes, I have Conceptual Thought Mode going parallel to what I'm thinking about verbally and they're totally different. Verbal Thought Mode is composing this post while Conceptual Thought Mode is ruminating on a story I was thinking about earlier without actually working out any plot points or really going over any dialogue.

A sample of something that might happen in Verbal Thought Mode would be:
"Okay, so now I need to give a sample of something I might think in Verbal Thought Mode. This feels stupid. Verbal Thought Mode is a stupid name." But then I end up trailing off into not-exactly-verbal, edge-of-consciousness use of Conceptual Thought Mode. Another sample (since that first one was short) might be... well, this whole post, though this post is heavily edited. HEAVILY edited, to remove traces of the other modes of thought that I've been experiencing occasionally. (Or translating them.)

A sample of Pace And Think Mode would be just like a movie.

It's almost impossible to translate Conceptual Thought Mode. (Which is also being used as a blanket term for what's essentially synesthesia, even though I don't have synesthesia.) I tried once for my shrink. It led to the sentence "green is red except when it's yellow," so I gave up. It's a shame, because I'd really like to explain that this one person's voice has a smooth, flat surface with rounded edges and is pastel blue. I'd love to explain what I mean by that.

To explain more clearly, here's an idea of how each might be used.
I think about an aspect of my experience that NTs don't share and for which I so far have no words. CONCEPTUAL THOUGHT MODE, with supporting verbal thoughts.
Then I think about how Aspies and NTs experience things differently. I start thinking about certain differences in perception, describing them as if for an essay. VERBAL THOUGHT MODE, with supporting conceptual/synesthetic thought.
Then I start thinking of a specific example interaction in which this might be significant, and I watch this interaction like a movie in PACE AND THINK MODE. (I might well have been pacing already, but not necessarily; I haven't gotten up to pace this entire post. Then again, I haven't done anything that would require it.)

When I think I see my thoughts both Visual and Auditory. At first it's generally just a voice then as my thoughts become more complex as I brainstorm it becomes more and more visual and less audio. In some areas I think in symbols such as Math and Word problems ect. It all depends other times I think purely visually occasionally and can't express it to other people which has in the past made me angry.

Agree with you Dandelionfireworks about the Conceptual Thought Mode I also experience that. It's like an instinct.

Words and formless thoughts. I usually "hear" my thoughts several times - once really fast, and then repeated much slower. If I could just think at the speed of the fast thought and not have to listen to the repeat(s), I'd be a genius.

I don't think in pictures, and can't imagine what it must be like to do so.

I think in pictures and words

my thoughts begin as feelings that "rhyme" with motions, images, sounds, tastes, etc.