Daydreaming through life?
We all daydream. Every now and then our thoughts wander beyond space and time, making up scenarios in our head, controlling every plot down to every small detail. Whether due to boredom or excess of creativity, daydreams are like an escape where we can fulfil our fantasies, places we want to visit, and people we want to engage with, conversations we want to have, and the list goes on. Day dreams come different to everyone. For some they can be a let out of stress after a long day, fantasizing about things they’d rather want to be doing. Some might cope with desires that can’t be fulfilled while they even act as motivators to achieve goals for others. Then there are cathartic ‘do-over’ daydreams that help blow off steam and deal with difficult emotions like shame, guilt, frustration, and anger, letting us imagine a different outcome and are often a coping mechanism for trauma, abuse, loneliness or helplessness, helping deal with situations that would otherwise be almost too much to take in. But what happens when these daydreams start taking over our life?
For some of us these daydreams become so absorbing that the real life fades into the background and all the time and energy is invested in them. It starts as a momentary activity that makes one feel good but can become an addiction evolving into extreme and maladaptive behavior wherein people lose a sense of reality and are always lost in their fantasy. This is called Maladaptive Daydreaming, a highly immersive mental state, where all attention is gathered towards the happenings of the fantasy world and the person detaches themselves from their actual self, to exist in their falsely created version, thus also detaching insecurities, responsibilities, work and problems from their perception. People feel a compulsion to switch to their fantasy multiple times a day, spending even hours at a time in these imaginations. This interferes immensely with the person’s ability to carry out daily activities pertaining to their personal, social and academic or professional life without being able to let go of the constant need to dream.
“It was as if I’d lost the remote control and the TV set in my head was running constantly, never turning off.”
- Jayne Bigelsen (Author, lawyer, activist)
How does one overcome it? The first important thing to understand is that Maladaptive Daydreaming is not a mental disorder, it is very much possible to get out of this addictive behavior by sheer will power. Most of the maladaptive daydreamers are well aware of their habits, even if they aren’t able to predict the ways in which these fantasies might affect their routine. Consciously making the effort to sit back and think about the behavior one is indulging in when it happens, not suddenly stopping the process but gradually gaining control of the dreaming activity, through practices of mindfulness such as meditation that can help one be more aware of the mind’s switch from focusing to wandering.
When a person is not focused on the outside world, the Default Mode Network in the brain is activated, where we get distracted by our inner thoughts, letting the time pass by idly without realizing till it’s late. Practicing mindful meditation activates the Task Positive Network within the brain, thus helping us focus on the world around us, the real-time sensations in the form of hearing, feeling, touch, smell and taste, guiding us to put the same concentration and effort into the tasks at hand. The simple technique is to know when one is indulging in daydreams, take a deep breath and start practicing the technique, which eventually leads to gaining control and becoming more aware of our behavior.
Daydreams are an outcome of wandering minds looking more or less for a source (actual or present momentarily) of happiness. However, the more maladaptive daydreamers indulge in this, the more time they lose form working towards happiness in real life, hence growing more motivation for their unhappy minds to wander. This mind wandering is particularly off when we are doing something active, something we feel good doing, and something that we willingly put all our effort into. These moments when we perform and feel at our best that absorb our attention so much that everything else, even self-consciousness disappears from our concern and decision making happens effortlessly are when one is in the state of ‘FLOW’. Tapping into that flow is another way of getting out of this maladaptive behavior, especially when important tasks are at hand.
Anytime one feels the need to daydream, it can be consciously replaced with some very basic triggers used to getting into a state of flow- eliminating all external distractions and getting a quiet place to work in, taking deep breaths and meditating for a few minutes before starting anything, work with a fresh mind at the biological peak time like in the mornings or when feeling drained of energy 20 minute power naps help, focus all attention on only one task at a time preferably something you enjoy, which may be challenging enough but not too difficult that might end up causing frustration or stress and focus solely on goal till it is accomplished.
To conclude, positive daydreaming to gain motivation, deal with stress, negative emotions, or to want to be part of or do-over certain situations is an activity more people than one might think do indulge in. However in letting this take over life, fulfilling pleasures in our fantasy rather than actually working towards making some part of that fantasy our reality, just to avoid disappointment, boredom or pain we confuse false pleasure with real happiness. Consciously and mindfully making an effort can help take control and resist the hobby from becoming an addiction that interrupts the healthy flow of life.
