There is a certain pattern to daydreams that I’ve taken note of lately. As with anything that has been occurring for ages, but only recently has become worth noting, this pattern has become a problem (without the negative connotation). “Problem” meaning simply something to solve or get something extra out of because the pieces just don’t fully make sense with my current mode of thinking.
The pattern is as such: a outside occurrence (trigger) gets me thinking of some story to keep my mind occupied or distracted. The topic is of no consequence, the only criteria is that it fills me with some sort elation and intense need to play out the entire story over and over until all the loose ends are figured out and I have one linear daydream. The process is the best part, I get to feel all sorts of emotions which my everyday life doesn’t have (perhaps I don’t actually want in my everyday life) and I’m the one creating the story so I can imagine all sorts of possibilities that are off limits to the put-downs of outsiders. Of course when I encounter a situation in these daydreams that I dislike, I can still play out the drama, but then later decide that I wouldn’t want that to happen so I can go back to any part in the story and recreate the ending from there. I imagine I could write real stories this way… I would just have to record my voice because typing takes too long. Who knows, people may like it, the only problem being that I use real people as characters in these day dreams so I’d have to disguise them somehow. (I know, I’m not supposed to mediate on real people, I know I know, bad habit, because it distorts my perception of who they really are…but that is for another note)
Anyways, so that is the daydream pattern. Probably not too dissimilar to your own. But the “problem” comes along when I realize that my end product daydream is actually obtainable for me and I would really like it to happen. There is one piece that lets me know whether or not the idea is actually capable of happening: The beginning. Often these daydreams start as some sort of life altering event occurring that takes me into a whole new world or stage of life. Like, Prince Charming shows up and I suddenly don’t mind giving up my single freedoms… that sort of “outta the blue, completely change of behavior and outlook on things” type of cheesiness. (Day dreams are full of cheesy scenarios, don’t try to ly, I know yours are too, I blame Disney).
The thing with “the beginning” is that it cannot be planned as such. One cannot plan sending in a resume in response to a simple Craigslist job ad and suddenly having the job of your dreams, because things like that tend not to happen on cue. But once you do have the job of your dreams you can work with it, but there is no viable way of getting it suddenly or with luck.
What I am saying is that those sudden things you would need to happen in your life to get you to the next phase or step cannot be planned for because who knows if and how they could actually start to happen. But sometimes you do actually have a “beginning” that is reasonable and involves simple action on your part to get the ball rolling. Those are the viable daydreams to focus on, because you can actually make those happen, or at least take steps to see if you were right in believing that you would actually enjoy it if it did happen.
So “the beginning” is actually the last step in the dreaming process for me. I’ve got to play out the normal, nitty-gritty aspects of an idea to see if I like the idea before I can even think of where to begin, otherwise I would keep starting a whole bunch of things only to find out later that I don’t actually like doing it. And I’ve done a lot of pretty awesome things in life so far, so I don’t doubt that this method didn’t contribute to all that. There are probably other ways of getting me into action, but so far, my mental forecasts have done the job well enough.