Wild Minds network
Anyone purchased the maladaptivedaydreaming.org course and found it useful?
I’m wondering if anyone has purchased the course available on https://maladaptivedaydreaming.org/ and found it useful.
I have read through some of the blog posts to try to get a feel for what the content would be, and some of them seem like good ideas:
1. “Poison the well” by adding negative elements into a story line so that it isn’t so attractive. — I imaged that one of my pigs on my imaginary farm attacked me, and now (for <24 hours at least), I’ve had less motivation to lose myself into that particular fantasy.
2. Try to figure out what the underlying cause of the MD
3. Try to write down all of the details of the daydreams and analyze and take it apart.
However, I’m a bit hesitant to buy it because firstly, the marketing for the course seems extremely well done (actually a compliment to the course creator, but I’m always wary of good marketing), AND secondly, I feel like the author of the course and the published success stories all had extrinsic factors which lead to their ability to get over MD quickly.
In my case, I’m pretty sure that the underlying cause of my MD is intrinsic — my (undiagnosed) ASD and probably an anxiety disorder. Even if I somehow were to manage getting over my MD, I feel like I would always be at risk of relapse because my stressors are still there and will always be there.
I also am skeptical of some of the information. Like this one which states that most MD occurs for younger people (<30) because they are stressed out about all of the options ahead of them (again: extrinsic stressors as opposed to intrinsic stressors): https://maladaptivedaydreaming.org/blogs/md/when-does-maladaptive-d...
I’m already >30 and I can easily imagine that my MD will continue for my whole life if I do nothing to address it.
In general, I think the tips might be helpful, but I also got the “I’ve now gotten over my MD and now I can’t believe I ever did it!” vibe from some of the content, and I’m pretty sure that would never be valid for me either. As someone who has been using MD as an escape/avoidance mechanism for >20, and who loves fantasy and storylines that my ASD brain can actually follow and comprehend, (differing from the real world where I consistently just do not get it), I can’t imagine ever reaching a point in my life where I would not understand how I could spend hours of my life in a dream.
I’ll be honest — a lot of days I don’t want to get over my MD because I feel like it is the only thing in my life that makes me happy. But I also recognize that that _happiness_ has all the hallmarks of being an addiction high and that my brain is probably tricking me into thinking that I am happy when in actual fact I am just using MD to avoid addressing the issues in my life that would actually have the potential to _actually_ make me happy if I were to overcome them.
Anyway… these are just my thoughts. If anyone has purchased the course and found it useful, I’d love to know. It seems to be very affordable ($9.99), so I may purchase it myself in the future.
I have read through some of the blog posts to try to get a feel for what the content would be, and some of them seem like good ideas:
1. “Poison the well” by adding negative elements into a story line so that it isn’t so attractive. — I imaged that one of my pigs on my imaginary farm attacked me, and now (for <24 hours at least), I’ve had less motivation to lose myself into that particular fantasy.
2. Try to figure out what the underlying cause of the MD
3. Try to write down all of the details of the daydreams and analyze and take it apart.
However, I’m a bit hesitant to buy it because firstly, the marketing for the course seems extremely well done (actually a compliment to the course creator, but I’m always wary of good marketing), AND secondly, I feel like the author of the course and the published success stories all had extrinsic factors which lead to their ability to get over MD quickly.
In my case, I’m pretty sure that the underlying cause of my MD is intrinsic — my (undiagnosed) ASD and probably an anxiety disorder. Even if I somehow were to manage getting over my MD, I feel like I would always be at risk of relapse because my stressors are still there and will always be there.
I also am skeptical of some of the information. Like this one which states that most MD occurs for younger people (<30) because they are stressed out about all of the options ahead of them (again: extrinsic stressors as opposed to intrinsic stressors): https://maladaptivedaydreaming.org/blogs/md/when-does-maladaptive-d...
I’m already >30 and I can easily imagine that my MD will continue for my whole life if I do nothing to address it.
In general, I think the tips might be helpful, but I also got the “I’ve now gotten over my MD and now I can’t believe I ever did it!” vibe from some of the content, and I’m pretty sure that would never be valid for me either. As someone who has been using MD as an escape/avoidance mechanism for >20, and who loves fantasy and storylines that my ASD brain can actually follow and comprehend, (differing from the real world where I consistently just do not get it), I can’t imagine ever reaching a point in my life where I would not understand how I could spend hours of my life in a dream.
I’ll be honest — a lot of days I don’t want to get over my MD because I feel like it is the only thing in my life that makes me happy. But I also recognize that that _happiness_ has all the hallmarks of being an addiction high and that my brain is probably tricking me into thinking that I am happy when in actual fact I am just using MD to avoid addressing the issues in my life that would actually have the potential to _actually_ make me happy if I were to overcome them.
Anyway… these are just my thoughts. If anyone has purchased the course and found it useful, I’d love to know. It seems to be very affordable ($9.99), so I may purchase it myself in the future.
Teresa Angela
Thank you for sharing this. I don't think a course is going to help any of us. Just maybe procrastinate on dealing with the interior issues that are causing us to escape the world in the first place. I admire the effort to help us though!
Oct 17
Kalliope
Honestly, reading Eretaia's blogs and truly understanding what she meant with MD = oppressed emotions was the key. Is the course still up? surprisingly.
Oct 20
Martino
I feel the same about that kind of course, of which I never knew before reading this post: maybe is good, maybe not. Here is the thing: being the MD something discovered very recently, 22 years ago, and not studied enough, I would take anyone of these courses with a pinch of salt.
Talking about the 1st point: I did this kind of tactics with some of my DD, with some worked, for others not so much; there are two problems about it: 1) once this particular DD goes away, there will be probably another one, new or already pre-existing, which will fill this void; 2) sometimes the DD poisoned made us feel so good that we'll find a way to "fix" it imagining a new scene in which all the nasty things happened before are now "corrected" or like never happened before.
About the 2nd point is very subjective, in my case is the fact that I live in a reality that doesn't satisfy me for various reasons, even personal ones.
About the 3rd point, I never did, despite I should do this since writing something could be very helpful.
Just like you, even I am over my 30s, 34 y.o. to be precise, and, since I too find happiness in them, MD are a real addiction to me, just like alcohol, drugs, porn and videogames are for many other people (I got the third one in the past, now overcame, unlike the MD).
Oct 25