The role of movement in immersive and maladaptive daydreaming
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- Опубліковано 25 сер 2024
- In this video, Prof. Somer describes the two main roles of movement in immersive and maladaptive daydreaming: 1. Enhanced concentration and self-hypnosis and, 2. the acting out of the fantasized storyline.
Thank you for putting a name to my struggles , now I feel less crazy and have a term to reference when talking to therapists
Maladaptive daydreaming is an escape from an unhappy life situation. This was a way to cope when I was growing up to create my own world. I went for walks and often had headphones for music. This helped block out reality and help me get into my own zone. Once I was older and could control my life the need for it decreased. I seldom do it now. I have not heard of someone who was happy and contented spending hours in a maladaptive daydreaming state.
For me, it doesn't work without the movements either. I can daydream without them, but the experience of my daydreams is much more intense when I walk in circles, jump, and make hand movements. I even remember the day I started doing this and had to figure out for myself which corner to walk to and when to jump briefly. And that's how it became ingrained. I've sometimes done it for so long that I started sweating. Like 2 hours in a row…
Yes, the movements are the key.
When I daydream, the repetitive movement and the daydream seem to "represent" each other in my mind. That is the best way to describe it.
Thank you Dr. Somer for your work on this mental condition!
Just watched your video. Talking about how movement was used to block exterior stimuli. I can imagine that interception and proprioception could indeed have that effect. I’m not big on meditation, but I know that there are a lot of meditations that use body scanning … focussing on sensations in different parts of the body in order to block out anxious or intrusive thoughts. I imagine that there is a lot of overlap between the “self hypnosis“ and meditation techniques.
Personally, from thinking about stimming in Autism, I have become reconciled to my own habitual “stimming… Twiddling, a pen particularily, or doing something with my fingers in order to increase my focus and attention.
Thanks again for another stimulating and informative video.
Susan, M in Montreal.
Thank you for your work in MD research! The bottom-up role of movement makes it much easier to explain my kinesthesia while daydreaming
Thank you for sharing your knowledge with us and making accurate information more accessible, your work is invaluable. I hope you and your lab will make more informative videos :)
i was thing that im crazy when i walk in my room and listen to music
thank you..im not feeling lonly now💕
I walk, dance, twirl thing with my hands and also i make gestures and faces like my main character while daydreaming, it makes me feel more like i'm truly 'living the dream', it is true that daydreams feel much more satisfactory when I'm moving, thanks Eli for so much information, greetings from Argentina ❤🇦🇷
Do you always hear songs or music 🎶 in your head ?????
Looking forward to this new research paper. Apart from the fact that it brings hope to see research into MD, it's also a quite interesting topic. 😃
Here is an updated repository of research papers on maladaptive daydreaming: daydreamresearch.wixsite.com/md-research/publications
Thank you for this information Professor. I really, really, really appreciate, it.
it's been a while since I did any research on maladaptive daydreaming, much to preserve an aspect of normality to it all, and I am very grateful to see your research shared publicly, congratulations on the work and thank you.
Thanks for your kind words. Can you share privately your MD research with me?
Hi Eli
as we previously discussed in great depth I most certainly took the movement to the extreme (my travelling adventures in Asia lol)
Great topic and video Eli most interesting!
Aidan C.
Dr Somer, I forgot to ask:
the Embodiment Model of Movement in MD is:
MD-->Efferent stimulation from the sensorimotor cortex-->Body movement-->Afferent sensory stimulation to the brain-->Intensified emotions and feelings, and then again MD, it's a circle.
So, for those who voluntary use movement to trigger the MD, since the movement precedes the beginning of the MD, the circle would be:
Body movement-->Afferent sensory stimulation to the brain-->Intensified emotions and feelings-->MD-->Efferent stimulation from the sensorimotor cortex. Right?
Yes, that's what we believe is happening.
@SomerClinic thank you again, you're very kind Dr. Somer
Thank You very much for this information! It makes me feel better to understand what's been happening to me since my childhood. I have a question: When I need to strongly " concentrate in reality" sometimes I go into " auto Pilot mood" Even if I don't want to escape reality, and want to enjoy the real moment instead. For example, when I read my poetry out loud in front of other people, I get distracted by my thoughs, even if I know I have to concentrate. It's like I read it automatically, like I'm daydreaming while washing the dishes. I don't know if it's realeted with MD or if it's just my distracted self. PD. Sorry for my english😅
Thank you very much for your work. I feel every word you say. It is wonderful to know, that there are others feeling the way i am.
Movement is indeed very important to me, while I'm daydreaming. My daydreams are happening even when I read something or listen to someone. It's almost like a backround noise that gets louder every minute until it dominates my awareness. It's a bit problematic, since I decided to graduade so that that I can study Biochemistry. Also the combination with my autism makes it quite complicated. At the moment I try to figure out if my wish to study biochemistry is real, or just one of my daydream szenarios leaking into reality.
I can daydream withou moving, but not for long. After awhile i will get antsy or anxious. I have to get up and move. I will go and just walk in circles for hours, i do it in the basement away from people because my family tells me i make noises (i dont remember ever making noises).
I dance as my movement and have since I was in ballet. I'll do different steps, but eventually will find myself doing the same maybe 12? steps to begin over and over. Once I've made one of those sequences I've noticed going back to it in similar daydreams. Often my daydreams have dance components.
When I was in ballet, it was very difficult to remember the combinations because music was used to dance and I couldn't re-focus fast enough to learn the combinations my teacher was teaching.
what i understood is that the urge for the MD comes from the need to immerse in fantasy and the movement comes only as a mean to do that. but in may case even if i managed to quit the daydreaming, i started to daydream again because i felt the urge to move my hands, to walk in the room. in most of the cases i feel like the need to move my hands and daydream come together. for example i believed for years that my problems come from the need to move my hands. are there any case who resemble my situation. Is this MD what i am experiencing?
I use to turn my head left and right following the rhythm of the music I hear while daydreaming. I learnt to do this with slight movements so that my husband doesn’t notice this when we are in bed.
This has been my fear my whole life! I’ve been maladaptive day dreaming since I can remember, I’m 17 now, and my whole life I’ve been telling myself “at
Some point you’re gonna have to stop this!! you can’t do this forever!! You’re gonna have a husband and children in the house one day and you’re not gonna be able to walk around in circles and talk yourself for hours !! They are gonna think you are crazy” I’ve always had these thoughts in the back of my head, but I’ve been pushing them off since I was still a kid I knew me talking to myself or playing with imaginary people would not be concerning and
Considered normal. But now that I’m getting older, and I’ve just learned this past year that I’m not the only person who has imaginary friends while so old, it’s been comforting yet scary to hear that I wouldn’t grow out of it like I thought I would. What you just said has been my worst fear at the back of my mind my whole life. I’ve been so scared that it wouldn’t go away by the time I turned into an adult and had my own family !
@@haileyjackson1640 You are 17, which means you still have plenty of time to at least mitigate your issues. I always thought I was the only one on Earth with this habit and I've always been trying not to indulge too much and hide it, like it was something "dirty". It doesn't have to be like this for you, you have the great advantage of knowing your are not alone. I just recently discovered this myself watching videos on UA-cam and last week I talked with my parents and my husband about daydreaming. Turned out that my husband someway already guessed some of it was going on in my head. He doesn't love me less for this, he is OK with it as long as it doesn't interfere with my life too much and cause me pain. So don't be too hard to yourself, just take your time to work on this and consider opening with people that love you, when you feel you are ready. Wish you a happy life!
I want to add another thing which is a peculiar one. As a right handed person a few months ago i started to use my left hand when i write or when i use the mouse at PC at work. I won't speak about all the reasons of this because would take too long. One of them, though, was the fact that i always felt my right hand unrest, i felt it like i would have a rash inside the hand when i used it for writing or handing the mouse at work. Sorry but is very difficult to explain the feeling. This is a feeling that i experience in both my hands when i feel the urge to shake my hands and start to fantasize. I didn't succeed to cure the MD but i noticed that in that moments when i use the left hand i can contain me much better from starting to fantasize and i wouldn' feel that sensation in my hands too much. At this point i concluded that i can use this thing to help me contain the MD. What would be the explanation for this? Is it possible to be a placebo what i am experiencing when i am usig the laft hand? Could be this a habit which can help me contain the MD. Thank you and sorry if it is a little bit weird what i have told you.
If you study little bit yoga, it may help you to understand, there are to sides one is emotional left (moon channel / Ida nadi) and second is intellectual right side (sun channel / Pingala) I think imbalances in one the channel I think right side causing day dreaming (distraction from reality)
Dr Somer, I apologize again but I forgot to point out that: the 65% of participants who reported a complete sense of agency therefore also had body awareness, correct?
Eli mate
I wonder if the Tics in Tourettes operate by a similar mechanism as with stereotypy in MD?
My apologies if you have already investigated this.
Brain imaging (MRI and functional MRI fMRI for metabolic differences is a great idea and perhaps CT with contrast.
Also electroencephalograph and EMG muscle nerve conduction studies
The new STIR slicing imaging with MRI gives terrific information with regard to tissue differences ie water and fat and muscle
Great subject
please keep up the excellent work
Aidan (The Philippine Strange Attractor lol_
Twirling my hair keeos me focused when i am paying attention to conversation. Use to bite nails
When I started daydreaming I was 8 , I
dreamed at every recess at school
everyone wondered if I didn't have an
imaginary friend. At the very beginning
my daydream was me saving princesses
from a bag where she was locked up and
then growing up I saw a lot of cartoon
and manga, and when I saw that I wanted
to do the same, I was I think the
strongest I lifted rocks I had all the
powers (I dreamed I was Elsa's sister in
arendel and who saved the world ) . In my
dreams, I was often the strong rain but it
was not uncommon that I got tired of
dreaming so I died in my dreams to start
the story almost from scratch only the
anime and cartoon that I love did not
forget and waited for me and looked for
me where I was dead and there is a big
fight where my cartoon friends on evil
and I came back the time to help him and
I disappeared after it was in loop that it happened
And I don’t know if this matter but I am hypersensitive
Hey Dr. Somer do you agree that daydreaming is a sign of intelligence according by Dr. Eric Schumacher
According to me who has an avarege IQ, it is not :D
Many of the elaborate daydreams are very creative and clearly demonstrate a high level of intelligence. However, we do not have any evidence to show that people with lower intelligence arr incapable of immersive daydreaming.
@@SomerClinic in your study you publish that excessive daydreaming is a mental Des order but According by Dr. Eric Schumacher a neuroscientist and professor of technology in georgia he say daydreaming is a sign of intelligence because people daydreamer is higher intellectual and creative ability.😊
@@tirstietinaco7925 Daydreaming is a normal mental disorder. But, like sleeping and eating, even normal functions and behaviors can become disorders.
I always think MD blinds the mind. Bc you can reach happiness so easily(dopamine) by daydreaming. You always make same thing, never trying new things.
Dr. Somer, if I understand correctly, there are many MD or ID who can consciously decide to initiate a movement (like rocking ecc.) with the specific goal of initiating one's daydream, correct?
Thank you
Yes, it is.
@SomerClinic thank you very much Dr. Somer
Dr. Somer do you know if there is any link between Visual Snow Syndrome and Maladaptive Daydreaming? Visual snow has high correlation with anxiety,dissociation and depression so I think that might be a possibility. And when I created a poll in the reddit MDD community there was a surprisingly high percentage of people that had Visual Snow. Maybe in the future you could do a research about this.
And there was a research paper you took part in that stated maladaptive daydreaming was significantly reduced in some people via mindfulness techniques and such. Is there any resource explaining how to do these techniques?
I am in desperate need of a way to reduce MDDing so it would be of great help sir.
And thank you for your amazing work sir if it wasn't for you most people probably wouldn't recognize MDDing as an issue and wouldn't have a name for it. Your contributions to pyschology changed so many lives for the better🙏
There are many texts and videos online explaining mindfulness and how to practice it.
Hi prof: somer
My own experience with maladaptive daydreaming and ADHD meds
I notice that medications like Ritalin and wellbutrin even caffeine make my daydreaming way more intense than before it's only worked perfectly when i start to practice( focused breathing mediation) 15 minutes a day after 2 months i strat to notice i have developed such radar for daydreams and its healp and after mediation even ADHD medication start to work amazingly and make my mind quit.... Rather than makes daydreaming stronger... Only after mediation ADHD meds works??
What is your opinion prof is this mean daydreamers have weak brain circuit than normal guys...????
Hello, is there anyone who has overcome this illness?
I am greatly improved. In my teens and 20s I would do it for hours and hours a day. I have not had a full immerse day dream in years now.
That's very good. How?@@heatherm8736
@@heatherm8736how???? how!!!!!
i directly tried to quit daydreaming by forcing but after a day i used to get some headache i couldn't stop daydreaming at that time but now i was trying to make journal and monitoring on my daydream i tried to remember daydream and but after a day i was feeling the same headache this headache wants to make me more daydream and thats what i do , what mindset should i keep while self treating myself ? like shoud i force myelf to monitoring or there is another way ?
Some of the a lions that could be effective are self-monitoring, self-affirmations, socializing, practicing mindfulness, and identifying underlying emotional issues that may drive the motivation for MD.
I have finally opened up to a therapist about MD and was relieved to receive a positive response. Unfortunately, due to it not being well known there’s not much they can do in terms of help. I would love to connect with you or your team to get involved in any studies?
Send me this note to somereli @me.com (delete space)
I feel sad that this is a gateway to mass medicating/surgically treating immersive vivid imaginations
How to recover from it ?
send me a message to somereli @ me.com (delete spaces)
can i also send a message? really looking for help with this. my therapist doesn’t seem to resonate with my concerns about it
Yes, you may.@@openlyanonymous
Eli
Is it completely somatic or is there a strong autonomic component?
Secondly, could just regular dancing be thought of as stereotypy?
Aidan
I am not sure I understood the first question because body movement is, by definition, somatic. MD- related movements need not be stereotypical, and yes they can also dancing.
Thanks Eli.
I guess what I meant was is the movement used in MD under our complete control or is it an automatic response to what is going on mentally?
However, from your answers to other people's questions, it sounds like it can be both?
what is the difference between normal movement and stereotypical movement?
I think it would be interesting to compare EMG (electromyography) of muscles used in MD movement with just normal movements
This is an excellent topic very interesting
Certain MD movements can be an embodiment of the daydreamed storyline. Although are not really autonomic responses, I encountered reports of a loss of the sense of agency.