Synesthesia (re: colours)

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Link to article: Rare but Real: People Who Feel, Taste and Hear Color

For ages, I have thought this to be normal. I have just assumed everyone could, and so, I never looked further into it. However, a few years ago I happened to say, "Please turn off the music. It's too orange. Please stop it." My mother asked what I meant by orange. This lead to me making futile attempts at explaining that there was too many orange elements in the music, and it gave me a pounding headache, because orange sounds has that particular effect on me. It was strange to realise this wasn't something everyone could experience.

I'm wondering how many of you view colours differently,
and what kind of experiences this has given.

(pardon if this topic has talked about an awful lot already)

you know whats weird, because colors represent something for me, if i see purple i must touch it doesn't matter where it is, ipurple has a certian feeling to me after i touch it, i feel so much better. Royal blue if i see that anywhere Have to stare it for a couple minutes, because its almost like it tells me something, and i feel like nothing in the world matters afterwards. Red i don't go near, red gives me headaches, the color just sends me horrible tingles in my body. Yellow is too bright, doesn't matter what shade of yellow it is. Blue i must put my ear up to, i love the way it sounds. Its all so weird when i try to explain this to ppl but there like huh? what is wrong with u.

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Being Normal Is Vastly Overrated

When I was a kid, I used to say that some kind of food tasted red, some tasted green and so on. I've heard that this is far more common amoung aspies than NTs.

This also applies to more than colors. I saw an interview with an aspie who once claimed that the name Einstein tasted like sour youghurt.

I thought it was normal too...my mom (also an Aspie) and me are always talking about it so I assumed the whole world had it. I perceive certain smells as colorful, chemicals tend to be green or silver, and when I hear music there are lots of colors in it. Jazz always struck me as orange and acoustic guitar is green. Don't know why.
Also when I hear certain sounds like paper against the ground or number two pencils when they're writing I can feel it in my teeth. Is that synesthesia or just oversensitivity? Anyone else have this problem?
(I'm new to the site)

i don't know either if it is unusual, but i have the teeth thing. i will say, "STOP! that is making my teeth itch!!" and people will say, "shut up, teeth can't itch." but that's what it feels like.

but other people must have it because TONS of people dislike nails on a chalkboard, so i think they just don't describe it as itching and just describe it as their teeth hurting.

paper doesn't do it to me but SANDPAPER does.

You should read Daniel Tammet's book, "Born On a Blue Day"...and how he relates to numbers which he sees as colors.

Read also Cytowic's "The Man Who Tasted Shapes."

I see numbers, letters and music notation in color.

I have some degree of it, I don't see the colours with my eyes, only ever in my mind's eye. On the other side, colours, shapes and movement represent my emotions and I don't know whether this is covered by synesthesia? For example, I feel blue when I'm thinking hard and feel good by that. I feel a dirty, pulsing yellow when I'm very angry and sad at the same time. Orange is activity, loads of it, dynamic, while darker shades are too much - one of my friends is a light orange. A strong orange isn't a colour I identify with, but it's my favourite colour. So I guess my colour perceptions have little to do with my likes and dislikes.

Some numbers and letters have colours and characters, but the colours I see don't have the exactly same characters as the character of the number. Most of the time, just parts of meaning of the colour. For example, a B is blue, but a B isn't at all like strategy and thinking, but rather lazy and sleepy, blue is a little relaxing. A 5 is blue too, but I don't like number, it's just way too much strategy and way too dark blue in my opinion.

People I know and like have colours, but I don't know that many people and thus can't say whether all people taste, sound and feel like colours or not.

I have few ideas of colours when it comes to music, which I find funny. So many things I know have colours and characters, but when it comes to my favourite medium, the music, it's all about colourless shapes and movement that not only express the music I hear but that are music.

Sometimes when I'm very nervous in a social situation for example, these associations vanish and I feel that I experience my surroundings a lot less and very unreal, like something important is missing. Even if I listen to music then, I feel as if I can't hear it 'right'.