Maladaptive Daydreaming and Sleep

So much trouble in the world
So much trouble in the world

Bless my eyes this morning
Jah sun is on the rise once again
The way earthly things are going
Anything can happen

Bob Marley and the Wailer, Survival Album, 1979

Yes, there is so much trouble in the world right now and it seems forever that escapism seems to be a drug more and more of us feel compelled to take. Some forms of escapism include physical activities (yes that is correct), working, overeating (guilty), alcohol abuse, drug abuse, substance abuse, pornography, gambling, daydreaming and the list goes on. Escapism is a fancy way of saying we tap out for a while because we cannot or refuse to deal with some aspect of life or life in totality. We do not want to be reminded of things or baggage we keep dragging around so we seek solace in one thing or another. While we think we are escaping we are killing ourselves. Escapism, which includes suppressing our emotions, has been linked to a 35% increase in death and a 70% increase in death from cancer. Now, other side effects of escapism do not paint a very glowing picture of what many believe to be a balm from reality. This is because escapism has been linked to addiction, withdrawal, mental health challenges, loss of job, decreased productivity, physical health challenges and relationship challenges.

Now Maladaptive daydreaming can be viewed as meeting at an intersection with escapism:

For those that are more introverted and potentially have a more creative disposition, the way in which they dissociate from themselves is not by getting absorbed in the exterior world, but rather by entering further into a more abstract interior world via daydreaming.

https://maladaptivedaydreaming.org/blogs/md/the-intersection-between-maladaptive-daydreaming-and-escapism

The danger of maladaptive daydreaming is that we become so enticed by the escape internally that over time many spend more time there and develop a wrapped sense of reality and may even come to despise their lives because it does not match where our internal world takes us. It leads to an imbalance. It leads to disease. This disease can manifest from daydreaming to insomnia and daydreaming, a cycle that can adversely affect the quality of our lives. We escape from reality and may want to stay in our controlled crafted world which leads to less and less sleep, affecting how we engage with the world which should be our waking hours. Why? When the dream is more real than your reality you want to stay there for as long as possible and when you lose sleep you go into the world, tired, unable to think straight and with a lacklustre attitude your best friend. So imagine the very thing that seems to keep you going causing more trouble, more disruptions in your world.