staying present

[magi]

I can feel myself zoning out, and struggling to come back.

most of the time I feel half in half out, meaning - half inside my head, half present in the real world.

my inner world is an absolute illusion.

these things will never happen. sometimes I tell myself that the things I dream of everyday are my goals in life, though I know they comes from a traumatic place in order to help me better deal with reality by escaping it. so you see, this dreams aren't real. and now I'm not even sure what my real ambitions are. what I want to do in my life. 

I am in that time in life when you take a path, study something in university and hopefully make a career out of it. that time when you no longer have anything holding you back from becoming something great, and you need to make decisions regarding your future.  

in my mind I am on a stage performing, and it sets me free. then I'm making movies and having lunch with all this people I adore. when I'm driving, I'm a taxi driver in L.A driving famous actors around. and I have to say it all feels rather pathetic in retrospect. I feel pathetic. I dream of these things all day, everyday.

it interrupts my life. even having a conversation is hard.

what I need from you are tips of staying focused [other than pinching myself, it doesn't work and I can't effort therapy]. I want to stay present. life is beautiful and I'm missing out. I want to be here, in the now, not inside my head. please help

thank you.

[Jui]

Here is some of the stuff that helps me:

Whenever I feel like I am zoning out I try to make it a conscious decision: Do I want to stay in the present or not? As soon as I get myself to think about this question I am always right back in the present.

I also started a kind-of-journal. Whenever there is something bothering me I write it down. I use different colors and pens and try to make it fun. Whenever I watch a documentary or hear something great I write it down as well.  It helps me in that moment to stay present and to become more present and aware of what is going on around me and even inside my mind. Also whenever I feel down I start reading stuff I wrote and it always helps.

For me it is a lot about willpower to stay present and I found some things that help me with that. Not necessarily right in that moment but as I keep going things get better within a couple of days:

Taking some vitamins (B12, Vitamin C and Omega3 work great for me), cutting down on sweets, daily shower in the morning before stating the day, increasing physical activity, reading mindful blog-posts or reading in this forum, not screening the news and facebook so much, cutting down on movies and tv, knowing and acknowledging that other people just struggle as much as I do, weekly yoga class, no afternoon naps. There are a lot more activities I try most of the days but I also give myself permission to dd before falling asleep. That way I know that I will have time to dd each day if I want to.

Hope this helps a little J

[Ulaan Gom]

I couldn't agree more with Jui's advice. Developing a healthy lifestyle in real life, even when it seems tough and pointless at the moment, can really help increase your sense of well-being which in turn will increase your presence of mind over the long run.

For me, in addition to maintaining a healthy lifestyle, I have to repeatedly ask myself what I want in life and what's stopping me from getting there. Even if you're not entirely sure about the answer to those questions, writing down a list of goals (ones you may want to accomplish within a month or a year) and having that list in a place you can see them every day can really help you stay focused and motivated when times are tough. Maladaptive Daydreaming can be enticing, and for me I always need to have a strong purpose in mind as to why I should stop daydreaming, or else it'll be difficult for me to gather the motivation to end my trail of daydreaming. 

Finally I take some time to focus on how I am emotionally, and how I feel about myself. I believe that my low self-esteem is by far one of the largest contributing factors to my Maladaptive Daydreaming, and addressing that issue can help tremendously towards overcoming MD. I usually either watch advice videos and read blogs about increasing self-esteem, and I also journal my feelings before bed.

I wish you the best of luck, because I know that you will eventually reach a time when Maladaptive Daydreaming no longer holds control over your life, and you will be able to live freely in the moment.

[magi]

thank you both for your replies !

I will take up some of those tips for a healthy lifestyle and hopefully eventually it will improve my mind ..

i will update my progress somewhere on this site/ thank you very much !