> you’re supposed to be able to make an image of an apple appear in your brain by thinking about it?

This is very similar to how I reacted when I started reading “When the Mind’s Eye is Blind” [0] one day.

Up to that point (I think I was 31 at the time) I had always believed that when people talked about “visualizing” something, it was just a figure of speech. I didn’t realize people meant it literally.

30+ years of situations suddenly clicked and it was like a bomb of realization went off in my brain.

- [0] https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/when-the-minds-ey...