A bit important for me: Does anyone here have daydreams?

[DarkAxel]

The basic question is simple - do you daydream?

the story behind the question is...

I do, from time to time. It can be triggered by a line in a song or when i start thinking about something random...
The problem is - it's usually very depressing for me.

When i was a bit younger, I was going somewhere with my family by a car and all of a sudden, i had a daydream about a car crash and my mom dying.

Or when i broke up with my ex and i was super lonely, I was walking home in the evening and all of a sudden i had a daydream about a pretty girl passing me by when all of a sudden, she twisted her ankle... so i helped her and practically carried her to the emergency room, then i sat there with her and bought her a coffee and we talked for hours and then i helped her home and i got her number and she promised me she'd go out with me.

I had one similar when I was madly in love with my classmate for a LOOONG time, getting rejected all the time... we were going hiking and she twisted her ankle and i carried her all the way back down to the station...

Or not that long ago, i had one where my girlfriend was in a coma and i stayed with her and went to visit her often and talked to her and she woke up and didn't know who i was.

Today, i had a daydream about my dad dying and me giving a speech at his funeral... it literally made me cry on the train i was taking home.


see... they are usually either depressing or just sad... because of the motivation. The worst part is - i can't stop it when it starts happening... does anyone have any experience like that?

i admit... when i'm down, i always have hard time cheering up (not really possible deliberately), so that's not helping

bottom line: i would like that not happening... or at least having more control about it

[skullservant]

I have daydreams but in a different sense of just getting carried away with thoughts rather than actual dreams during the day while awake.

It definitely sounds like something subconcious though- I have a lot of dreams at night that are sad and seemingly random, but apparently there must be something going on

[dubkitty]

sometimes my subconscious brings things like this up, either in dreams while sleeping or when i'm awake. i strongly believe that this is one way our brains/subconscious mind try to work through our fears, worries, and possibilities by using one's imagination. sometimes when it's too much for me to take, i force myself to get off that thought pattern by repeating something like a mantra in my mind until the stuff that hurts goes away. most recently i just repeated "stop thinking about that" over and over. i've also used the Michael Stipe technique which he told Thom Yorke, who used it as the basis for "How To Disappear Completely": "I AM NOT HERE AND THIS IS NOT HAPPENING." in my therapy i learned strategies to derail my negative thought patterns, e.g. redirecting my attention to something that makes me happy such as looking outside at the trees (i love trees). i don't know if this makes sense, and i could probably be clearer in explaining, but the bottom line is that i think it's a normal way our brains deal with stuff.

[Joe Gress]

Depends on how interesting the professor happens to be. If he's a boring fuck, my imagination runs wild...

[MSUsousaphone]

So when this happens, is there usually stuff going on in your life that would depress other people.....like.....would you have this daydream and get depressed from it, but everything else in your life is going good so there's no reason to be depressed?

And when you say depressed, how long will this mood last after the day dream? Hours, days, weeks?

[DarkAxel]

ok, to be honest i don't mean depression in the truly clinical meaning and didn't want to diminish the "true" depression

it's usually for the day, next day is alright

and... it can happen randomly, the coma for example was just out of the blue... but sometimes it's when i'm stressed a lot, or just generally going through some bad stuff. Currently, i'm stressed a lot. It may make me mroe vulnerable to the emotional impact of music (usually it happens when i'm listening to something on my mp3 player and going somewhere)

[Achtane]

Not so much actual "dreams" as staring off into space, or at a wall, or whatever.
I do the thousand yard stare and think about society/existential shit/what I wish I were doing instead/where my life's going/what other people are doing/what the area used to look like before humans occupied it/how bizarre life is/etc allllllllll the time. It never strikes me when it's happening, but I really do it a lot, maybe too much.
I'll be half-done writing something, space out for 5 or 10 minutes, then finish it. It happens constantly.

[DarkAxel]

Not so much actual "dreams" as staring off into space, or at a wall, or whatever.
I do the thousand yard stare and think about society/existential shit/what I wish I were doing instead/where my life's going/what other people are doing/what the area used to look like before humans occupied it/how bizarre life is/etc allllllllll the time. It never strikes me when it's happening, but I really do it a lot, maybe too much.
I'll be half-done writing something, space out for 5 or 10 minutes, then finish it. It happens constantly.

that's kinda cool

[blahquaker]

I have daydreams too... pretty similar to what you (DarkAxel) describe.

[hollowhero]

Not so much actual "dreams" as staring off into space, or at a wall, or whatever.
I do the thousand yard stare and think about society/existential shit/what I wish I were doing instead/where my life's going/what other people are doing/what the area used to look like before humans occupied it/how bizarre life is/etc allllllllll the time. It never strikes me when it's happening, but I really do it a lot, maybe too much.
I'll be half-done writing something, space out for 5 or 10 minutes, then finish it. It happens constantly.

That's pretty much my experience with daydreams. Zoning out and pondering random shit.

Sometimes I zone out while cruising on the freeway...and then I come back to reality and wonder how the fuck I got way out there. Scary shit, but also kinda cool: apparently I can drive subconsciously.

[rustywire]

Probably everyday, but I have an [overly?] active imagination.

They're typically happy...even whimsical; and leave me feeling inspired, grateful or aware of what a dick I've been about something stupid.

Cue Teenage Riot.

[Greenfuz]

about 75% of my day is me daydreaming

[magiclawnchair]

i storta space out for a while, think about random things or music, now and then when im doing something im not really interested in. ive never had actual dreams during the day when im awake though. i can visualise things in my mind but not actual dreams.

have any of your day dreams ever happened later in life?

[rustywire]

I am the necromancerrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Interested in the answer to this question in 2018, esp among yas who were born in or after the 90s
Followup: how much time to you spend checking up on social media compared to 2013?

I still daydream as frequently but my web lurking has only increased over time, I've been trying to observe as much as I can (for myself) before the internet as we know it is revised and sanitized (topic for another discussion)

[coldbrightsunlight]

All the time! They're often fairly negative like yours too.

I am the necromancerrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Interested in the answer to this question in 2018, esp among yas who were born in or after the 90s
Followup: how much time to you spend checking up on social media compared to 2013?

Born in the early 90s just in case it's relevant.

I spend way more time on social media now probably, don't think I've noticed a difference in daydreaming as it can happen when I'm doing anything really and I'll just tune out of whatever that was. Hard to properly analyse your own life though!!