For me it's time signatures in music. I grew up playing instruments, played in several orchestras, etc. But no matter how many times someone tries to explain time signatures to me, it makes no sense. I don't understand why people place such importance on it. To me, notes have a pitch and a duration, maybe some dynamics. That's it. I don't understand why people try to needlessly complicate it. It doesn't give you anything.

My wife will hear a song and go "Oh neat, it's in 5/8." And I'm like "How tf do you know that, and why does it matter?"

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[–] 4 points 6 days ago*

If it makes you feel better, I don't think being able to visualize helps as much as it would seem. Drawing is just hard. I say this as someone who has a very active mental imager and has been drawing (poorly) my whole life. The technical aspects of drawing/painting etc., is really just about understanding the theory, application, and practice.

Does it help? Sure, a little but nothing I've ever drawn has come out looking like the mental picture with any satisfaction and I could probably do just as well with a verbal or written description to go off of. And references, of course. Several famous modern artists have aphantasia.

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