DO YOU HAVE A VOICE IN YOUR HEAD?

Words by Joana Stankevicius

You’re watching a coming of age movie, the main character is walking through the school corridor and the narrator is telling you their thoughts. Some people watch these scenes and don’t think twice because they also experience an internal monologue. For some, however, they watch such scenes and don’t realise having an internal narrative is normal for others. Most people just assume the way their mind works is the norm, and aren’t aware that anything different exists. There are those who have an internal narrator, meaning there is a voice in their head, and if this is you, then maybe as you read this, you hear these words in your head. If you don’t have an internal monologue, perhaps you visualise the words. Some people just have abstract, non-verbal thoughts and must consciously verbalize them. Maybe you wake up in the morning and you get a wave of existential dread, or maybe you wake up and think “ugh not again”.

As a person with an internal monologue, it is hard to believe someone can see an image, such as a to do list, and the only way they can get it out of their mind is to write it down. There are not only two kinds of minds: the human brain is so complex, everyone’s mind is different. The more that people look into this topic, the more evident it becomes no one is the same. In 2011 Russell Hulburt, a professor in psychology completed a study and found internalised verbal speech may not be as common as we think it is. When asked to reflect on how your thoughts occur, it’s easy to just say they’re verbal (if you think verbally that is). In Hulburt’s study, inner speech only occurred in an average of 20% of all subjects.

The way you think may be verbal, visual, emotional, sensational or even something entirely different. Some deaf persons are thought to be visual thinkers, seeing sign language, pictures or words. What we know is everyone’s mind is unique, and we may never comprehend that others experience their thoughts, and by extension their lives, in a completely different way.

CORPORATE DICKHEAD HEADQUARTERS Written: the day before applications close

To another corporate devil, Average Law student M:420 69 69 Ijustwanttoworkforfree@adelaide.edu.au Disappointment City SA 5000

RE: AN HONEST COVER LETTER

I am a fourth-year Laws and Commerce student who has no legal work experience. I want to work but none of you think I am smart enough to fetch your lattes or complete your photocopies.

I just wanted to thank you for this glorious existential crisis. Your bid to ignore GPA has only made your applications process even more delightful- this coming from someone with a shit GPA. Thanks for asking me to write a paragraph on my ‘greatest passion’. It was particularly confronting to realise a) I don’t have a passion because I’m a slave to my degree and b) feeling even if I had a passion it wouldn’t be unique enough to satiate your fine tastes. The pressure of the expectation I have discovered my life’s greatest passion at 21, whilst studying constantly and never sleeping is very realistic, it demonstrates the firm’s distinctive understanding of the realities associated with the lives of young people.

I am experienced in kissing the arses of people who do not care about who I am as a person but use frivolous application questions to improve their corporate image. I really appreciate your highly personal application questions; it was lovely to see you felt entitled to have comprehensively written answers of my personal thoughts to critique and deem unworthy. I thoroughly enjoyed the feeling of making my private dreams your personal property and sacrificing my sense of autonomy in choosing to apply because of my overwhelming desire to enter the corporate rat race.

My communication skills are excellent, I am fluent in bullshit and whenever you ask if I am enjoying my unpaid work my mouth automatically says: ‘I love having my time undervalued by wealthy firms who can afford to pay me’. Having received many rejection letters, which have ultimately detracted from my sense of personal merit, I am highly relatable. My newly acquired self-defecating habits are sure to stroke your ego and make me an asset to your firm. It would be my great privilege to further your god complex.

I have attached a current resume and hope I have the opportunity to show you my photocopying and coffee making skills in person. I am also gifted with a stapler. Alternatively, I relish the wait for another rejection letter from you containing a typographical error.

Kind Regards, Average law student.