Think about that addicting dream you had. Maybe it was yesterday, maybe it was today, and maybe it was years ago. Still, think about it. Had the thought of it while you were listening to music. That got addicting as well. Then you started building this dream, letting your daily activities stray aside because that high from that strange thought made you crave it even more. You see people differently. You see yourself differently. Seems fun to finally pretend that you and everyone else aren’t exactly who you believed you were. It’s not.

It feels.

We, as in ALL of us, have been in situations where escaping seemed more attractive than facing. Maladaptive daydreaming is a coping mechanism that is used in response to trauma, boredom, or stress. Once it starts, it is incredibly hard to end it. Why? Compare your everyday life and the fantasy you made up in your head and tell me which one feels more appetizing. It’s a coping mechanism for a reason. It’s not supposed to be less than what you have. It is a gift that keeps giving, unlike life, which is why it feels so good.

So good.

It feels so good that you can’t sleep until you end it at a perfect moment. It feels so good that you stop caring about a community because all the community you need is in your head. It feels so good that you forget you are a living person outside of your mind. It feels so good that you neglect every good thing that has happened in your life.

It feels.

Forces usually come in pairs, so with MD comes mental health disorders that are harder to get out of than your reality. Anhedonia is a major effect of MD. You lose interest in life itself, only wanting to focus on the unimportant things. Maladaptive daydreaming causes you to neglect your reality, which causes you to lose interest in anything that has to do with being human. You only intake the negative, throwing the positive out. Used to love reading: Who the hell likes to read? Used to like hanging out with friends: Not interested. That doesn’t really seem like a big deal; however, the absence of certain vitamins and community will and can cause your body to shut down.

So bad.

Maybe that’s what you think you want, but think about it: If your life was terrible before so you picked up a habit that is inherently worse, without trying to figure yourself out first, aren’t you technically limiting yourself? You didn’t try to figure it out, so you don’t actually know the outcome of it. I do believe that life can be so hard sometimes, but I don’t think it’s worth giving up on. It’s similar to being in a hermit crab shell. You know eventually that you have to find something bigger and better, but the shiny shell that you have now seems so much better than the other ones out there. In Maladaptive-daydreaming, the author explains that Maladapative daydreaming can be tied to several mental disorders because it is just THAT hard to get rid of them. Music, like stated earlier, plays a huge part in the addictive aspects of MD.

I don’t think it feels good.

It doesn’t actually feel good. It feels like it does. Being safe and complacent is easier than having the change yourself even when you know it’s best for you. It is easier to prevent anything that forces you to try, to feel, and to be. Reality isn’t perfect compared to what your mind creates, but it’s still your reality. It is still something real. You can shape reality. You can become something while being yourself and functioning. Dreaming causes you to stay the same. The point of living is to experience through doing.