Daydreaming

Daydream by Gunter Kallmann Choir and by Lily Meola
Daydream Believer by The Monkees
Daydreamin’ by Ariana Grande
Daydreamer by Adele
Day Dreaming by Aretha Franklin
Daydreaming by Radiohead, by Harry Styles, and by Milky Chance and Tash Sultana

Just thought I would give you a list of songs to pop on if you get bored today, or if you want to get in the zone for today’s post. I am going to be talking about daydreaming and my thoughts are all over the place (on purpose? Who can say?) so maybe preparing for that will do you all some good.

As writers, I think a universal canon event is when you have your first daydream. I find joy in calling myself a writer. I used to shy away from it, fearing that I was not a true writer, or not good enough, but lately I’ve been doing it and it feels good! I think I’ve been daydreaming since I was a little lass. I would go over to a friends house to just play make believe. Not a day goes by where my mind doesn’t wander. I also feel exceptionally qualified to speak on this subject because one, I am a Pisces rising, and two, I grew up in the late 90s and early 2000s. If this still doesn’t clear things up for you, let me explain.

Smart phones became popular when I was in high school, but they were not as “essential to survival” as they are now. If aliens or a new species uncover our remains one day, they may think that smart phones were parts of our bodies. When I was in high school we all had them, but we did not need them like people need them now. “Phone, Wallet, Keys,” was not an everyday saying when leaving the house. We would go over to each others house to watch dumb youtube videos, update our myspace, answer tbhs and upload side bang selfies on facebook, and then we would play hide and seek, play guitar hero, or straight up just talk. Technology was there, but it was not everywhere. I have lived through the rise (and perhaps one day I may live through the fall) of smart phones and watched them and humans evolve over the past decade.

Similarly, there is a stereotype (that I cannot beat) about Pisces Rising’s which says they are always getting lost in thought, have their head in the clouds, and are walking daydreamers.

So, now that you all understand where I am coming from, I want to talk about a concept that I stumbled upon the other day from a teacher who said her students don’t know how to daydream anymore.

As I write this I feel more and more like a boomer. Shout out boomers, love yall but also hate yall.

Okay back to the topic at hand. When we used to take standardized tests, exams, etc., when you finished your work you had free time to work on other school work, or you could sit in silence (I can still spin a pen around my fingers). Those moments of silent reflection and quiet in an otherwise stimulating and loud environment were essential to the art of daydreaming. According to said teacher, kids can’t daydream anymore. It’s as if they don’t know what to with free time. I hate to place blame anywhere, but raging kids have been given tablets to distract them with for so long now that it’s hard to view social media and apps as anything but an addictive drug. Those who weren’t given an iPhone before they started kindergarten still fall victim to societies expectations. If you don’t have a smartphone how will you make any friends?

I don’t want this post to be an attack on technology, or me shit talking ai (I do enough of that already), but rather a post about how important something as simple as daydreaming is to the health and well being of a person.

So let’s break it down. What is daydreaming? Daydreaming is dreaming while you are awake. This is a form of dreaming that you can control. I think it is similar to ai in a sense that we are feeding it all the information it needs to survive, all the facts and characters and notes it needs to become a fully thriving idea/thought. The difference is we are in control of the input and the output. Ai on the other hand is taking inputs from everyone else, and using those inputs to give you an output. The outputs also already exist, they are just presenting it to you.

There’s something inherently beautiful about daydreaming. There’ a whimsical nature to creating an idea in your head. It can start small, “what’s for dinner tonight? Maybe I make salmon. I probably need to go to the store though, I wonder if I could borrow anything from my roommate. Borrow, wow remember The Borrowers movie? What an interesting concept. What if I was a tiny little person living in a house? I would probably become friends with the family cat. Beatrice the cat and I would go on adventures all over the house.”

There’s also something nice about quietly filling the silence. For those of you that I may be losing, it’s like narrating your own audiobook in your head. Everyone is obsessed with dystopian literature and apocalyptic stories, yet day one of an internet blackout we would find people in an absolute panic not over resources, but from inability to formulate an opinion, a plan, or even a thought of their own. I know that’s an extreme take, but it’s something to consider. Originality is a prized possession from where I’m standing. I hate how everything is so connected, because I could say over-consumption, over-stimulation, and over-working are all contributing factors to this inability to daydream. People can’t be offline or else FOMO hits you in the face the second you get back online. FOMO used to be the opposite of what it is now. I have a fear of missing out on the moments out in the world with my friends, not a fear of missing out on an opportunity to collect content to be shared with other people so they know I didn’t miss out on something. Otherwise, when I’m scrolling in bed that night I realize I missed out on the exact moments I was literally present for.

I don’t know how eloquently I am weaving these ideas together, but hopefully at least some of you are sticking around to see where we take this thing.

I am probably a little more biased than the average person when it comes to daydreaming. As a writer, creating stories is in my nature. It’s one thing to have people around me lose the ability to daydream. It’s another for other people’s daydreams to be stolen. For years now, there’s been an ai attack on creative writing, digital art, etc, posted in free online spaces. Creators have to lock up their pieces, archive their works, and hide things from the world as a whole, because ai (and the humans behind it) decided to steal someones else’s ideas and creations. And what really sucks is they also have the innate human ability to do it themselves. It’s like when someone sees a piece of art and thinks, “Well I could’ve made that!” The fact of the matter is though, they didn’t make it.

If you think you could make something, that means you have the ability to be creative. You have the ability to daydream. I’ve heard more and more from friends and colleagues over the years that they want to do more for themselves creatively. They can feel themselves getting stuck on the bullet train that is life in America. There’s so many ways to combat these feelings and anxieties: yoga, meditation, exercise, creative endeavors, spending time with loved ones, trying something new, etc. I want to argue that even taking ten minutes to just sit and daydream can be one of them.

I’ve got friends with new little friends now, and I want to think they will be able to daydream. I know it’s hard to daydream in a world so totally fucked up, where people are being intentionally starved, bombed, murdered, overworked, kidnapped, and robbed, you name it, it’s happening. There’s only so much we can do to donate, call our officials, spread the word, have tough conversations, and take a stand. You have to tell yourself that small joys, like daydreaming, are not going to solve anything, but they also won’t make things worse. We have to have something to look forward to, something nice to think of and dream about for our kids. If the adults can’t daydream, how will the children?

I don’t know that there is a point to this, but that’s exactly the point now that I think about it. I want you to reflect, and wonder, and daydream because it doesn’t make sense. Because life is confusing and complicated and all over the place, that’s what makes daydreaming possible. That’s what makes it worth it. For Rosemary and Margot, for your younger self, for your parents and mentors that brought you up, for your friends, for your neighbors, and for the people you only see on your screen, it means something to be able to dream.