When Brushstrokes Speak Before the Mind Can Translate
I see a story in every face on the bus, complete narratives unfolding behind strangers’ eyes. But when I try to share these visions—the woman counting prayer beads carries three generations of secrets, the man reading newspaper headlines is rehearsing an argument with his father—people look at me like I’m inventing meaning where none exists.
To have visions is to live perpetually misunderstood, seeing connections others dismiss as imagination.
Creative vision isn’t just about art—it’s about perceiving patterns, possibilities, meanings that exist outside consensus reality. I watch cloud formations and see entire civilizations. Happy sees weather approaching. Neither view is wrong, but mine is isolating.
Arash sometimes points at empty spaces and insists someone is standing there. We call it childhood imagination, but what if it’s simply unfiltered perception? What if growing up means learning to unsee the visions that don’t serve social functionality?
The loneliness deepens when you try to translate internal imagery into external communication. Words fail. Gestures approximate. Others nod politely while clearly not seeing what burns so clearly in your mind’s eye. You realize your vision is simultaneously your greatest gift and your most profound isolation.
I write to build bridges between my inner world and shared understanding, but the translation always loses something essential. The vision in my head is three-dimensional, alive, pulsing with meaning. On the page, it becomes flat symbols others interpret through their own limited experiences.
Yet the visions persist, demanding expression despite the futility of communication. Perhaps that’s what makes someone an artist—not the ability to see what others see better, but the compulsion to share what others can’t see at all, knowing the attempt will probably fail but unable to stop trying.
The deepest loneliness isn’t being alone—it’s being surrounded by people who inhabit a fundamentally different reality than the one you perceive.
