Daydreaming is not considered a good use of time.
Deliberately taking the brain down a zero stakes thought train that pauses only at completely useless stops, such as “bit of a giggle” and “basically pretty” might feel like a huge waste of time.
This thought train is the kind of carriage that comes to a rolling halt in the middle of an unnamed field, leaving you the long walk back to civilisation.
“There’s no point.”
“It doesn’t make anything better”
If the only advantage of daydreaming is that for 5 or 10 or 30 minutes of the day it succeeds in not making things worse, how many of our most common thoughts can boast the same?
Historically, people have spent very large sums of money and imbued unstable substances in order to give themselves a holiday from their thoughts.
A 5 minute daydream is not a silent week long meditation retreat with passive aggressive note writing and goat milk.
It’s not a packet of leaves from Shady Bob made into brownies that never kick in until they suddenly do and someone melts the “stovetop” kettle in an incident. *
It is smaller but like Ikea furniture, requires self assembly.
People give daydreaming various names. Brain retraining. Rewiring. Sticking “intentional” or “deliberate” on the front or “work” on the end.
In order to get the most out of daydreaming, it’s necessary to practice a couple of steps.
Figure out what is rattling around in your head like a bee in a window. Kindly and quietly let it rest for a moment. You may have to do this a bunch. That’s okay.
Take a few deep breaths. It’s really difficult to head off into a daydream if you are starting from anywhere other than here and now. Here and now is the terminal for everything. If the mind is off on a five page rant at Carol for saying what she said to you on holiday or imagining what would happen if you suddenly became allergic to carpets, the daydream does not stop there. You need to get back to You, Here, Now to board. Putting a thought down (step 1) and taking a deep breath (step 2) is metaphorically the same as climbing down out of the tree and coming back inside your house.
Pick a daydream and get cracking. For some reason, doing this out loud works even better. Repeat steps 1 and 2 as needed. Use all the senses while you are imagining. Your mirror neurons will thank you for being as detailed as possible. Large parts of your brain are set up to behave as if you are actually experiencing something if you observe it in enough detail. This is why it is great to daydream about nice things and why people who tell really good horror stories should be politely given some juice and a fidget toy before they can talk to you.
Sometimes it is hard to pick something to daydream about. Many of our most desired fantasies and memories come with a panoramic view of Longing and Envy, maybe Grief. The coffee on board is, perhaps, a little bitter. The carriages have doomsday clocks on board that are all set at one minute to midnight.
If that is the case, it can help to pick a daydream that does not have familiar scenery.
I created a deck of 100 cards to assist with deliberate daydreaming. When I am not sure how to progress (or begin) a daydream, I pull a card, to introduce a new idea or event.
It doesn’t make things worse.
Daydreaming is a key that leads to small places. A small relief. A small smile. Sometimes the small things are important. Sometimes they are everything.
The card deck is available below. Click on the deck to choose a card.
- I melted the kettle. It was me. In my defence it looked like a stovetop kettle, and if you make an electric kettle look that way, you are asking for trouble.