(Maladaptive Daydreaming) When Your Dream World Destroys Your Real Life

Maladaptive Daydreaming: When Dreams Trap You in an Endless Loop

Dream illustration from the book Your Soul Is Writing About You.

The statement is quite dramatic — but true. And it is with dreams that a person grows up.

A normal person sees four to six different kinds of dreams every night. Dreams come in many varieties. Some dreams inspire. Some dreams make us vulnerable. Some dreams stay with us. Some dreams vanish the moment we wake.

Christopher Nolan's famous film Inception with its layered dreams, the realistic dreams of the timeless film Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, or the dreams in Haruki Murakami's famous novel After Dark — where an entirely separate world is created for the protagonists of the novel. All of these make one thing clear: dreams perhaps hold infinite power. If they choose, they can control a great many things.

But does dreaming always mean something good? The reality that dreams confront us with — is it always satisfying, or in some cases suffocating, like something closing in on us?

The founder of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud, once said: what comes from the soul is a dream. But if a dream that comes from the soul traps someone in an endless loop — is that not a bad thing?

Suppose you are having a dream that is taking away hours and hours of your time every day. It is devastating your normal life. Would you call that a dream — or would you call it the dark side of dreams? In other words, a nightmare.

Anton Chekhov once wrote: my grandmother always used to say — never go to sleep with a heavy heart, dear child. You will be in trouble. This trouble can come in many forms. One such form is Maladaptive Daydreaming.

What Is Maladaptive Daydreaming?

It is not idle daydreaming or wishful thinking. Rather, it is a kind of dream that those affected by it cannot easily escape from. Being trapped in a long — an incredibly long — cycle of dreaming.

Let us go a little deeper into the matter. Many of us were quite good at studies from childhood. Leaving behind a trail of successes in every stage of academic life — we pass through school and college and enroll in university. At some point, we fall in love with a classmate. Often that love does not last long, and we become vulnerable.

We stop going out. We spend the entire day locked inside our own room. Studies, academic career, family, friends — we seem to slowly drift away from all of it. Often we do not realize that we have become trapped in a terrifying loop. That loop's name is Maladaptive Daydreaming.

In many cases, when people go to a doctor, even the doctor is at a loss. In most case studies, it is seen that the protagonist has begun to live in an imaginary dream world. The dream feels wonderful at first. In this deep-sleep dream, the person discovers themselves in another world entirely — where everyone is there, everyone is together, everyone is very happy, and there is no pain anywhere. But after waking from the dream, there is intense pain in the head. Then it becomes apparent that this dream has been consuming hours and hours. Because of this dream, all normal activities have come to a halt. And then the fear sets in.

The Discovery of Maladaptive Daydreaming

This strange dream pattern was first identified by psychologist Eli Somer in 2002. After analyzing the sleep and dreams of certain individuals, he discovered Maladaptive Daydreaming. The word "maladaptive" means something that is not adaptive — something that does not change in response to the environment. The dreams we see during sleep can be normal and adaptive. Dreams can even give people remedies or suggestions according to their emotional state, thought process, and physical health. But the moment it becomes a maladaptive dream, it turns into an exhausting, tiring journey. Instead of helping a person's emotional state, it becomes something harmful to that person's mental health.

This habit of dreaming begins in a very ordinary way. For those who are depressed or somewhat shattered by the battles of life, this dream works as a distraction — a slight isolation from reality. And it is from here that this cycle begins.

A Real Case: Snehasish Som

Snehasish Som was a student at Delhi University's Department of Finance and Business Economics. Snehasish became a Maladaptive Daydreaming patient at a time when his parents' divorce had just happened. On one side was academic pressure; on the other, a mentally shattered Snehasish one day noticed that he was spending most of his time asleep — and in his dreams, he had transformed into a rockstar. Thousands of people were crowding his concert on campus. He was the number one celebrity on campus. He was quite happy in his family too — his parents and he, a small but happy family. All in all, a wholesome scenario.

Why Franz Kafka Still Matters Today

Every time he woke from the dream, he felt quite refreshed — and the remaining waking hours, he would spend waiting for the dream again. And then one day, Snehasish realized he was no longer going to class. Classes, exams, friends — he had no connection with any of them. He was sitting alone in a corner of his room, sleeping and dreaming — one incredibly long dream.

When fantasy consumes hours upon hours, it is the academic performance, career, relationships, and much more that pay the price.

How Maladaptive Daydreaming Affects the Brain

Since a great deal of time has to be invested in these dreams and the brain has to work enormously hard, there is intense pressure on the brain. That is why Maladaptive Daydreaming patients feel exhausted even after waking from their dreams. As terrifying as it is, Maladaptive Daydreaming patients continually suffer from remorse. They understand that they are ruining their lives. This disconnection from life is what gives rise to isolation. The exciting life of the dream keeps bypassing the cruel reality. It is a comfort zone. A deeply personal refuge.

But if this dream were only a comfort zone or an escape route, there would not be so much cause for concern. Surveying patient histories reveals that Maladaptive Daydreaming patients eventually begin to suffer from ADHD — Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. And the reverse is also true: those who already have ADHD eventually become sufferers of Maladaptive Daydreaming as well. Since people with ADHD constantly struggle with their attention, this dream becomes a different kind of solution for them. Many Maladaptive Daydreamers have reported that symptoms of OCD — Obsessive Compulsive Disorder — appear in them as well. Since they see the same dream over and over again, they keep watching it until the dream becomes perfect. Like a mental ritual — they remain obsessed with the dream until they achieve perfection.

Plato's Allegory of the Cave and Maladaptive Daydreaming

The philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre once wrote: existence precedes essence. Meaning, a human being's first responsibility is to exist. To live. At the time of birth, a person arrives with no specific assignment — nothing they are obligated to do. The law of nature is that as they walk the path of life, they will make various decisions. And it is these decisions that ultimately determine what kind of person they become. Whether their life will be meaningful.

So then, what is the purpose of life for those who are Maladaptive Daydreamers? Why are they alive? Leaving that question where it stands, let us move a little further.

Maladaptive Daydreaming has a very strong resemblance to one of Plato's most discussed theories — the Allegory of the Cave. The Allegory of the Cave essentially describes cave-dwellers who have been chained tightly inside a cave. All of their faces are turned toward the wall of the cave. Because of this, there is only one thing these cave-dwellers can ever see: their own shadows on the wall.

For these cave-dwellers, the shadow is reality. But if these people were freed, if they could go outside their cave, they would see the world beyond — they would discover that there is an entire world out there, beyond the shadows. The core purpose of the Allegory of the Cave is to establish that human perception is extremely limited and biased.

Now if we try to connect this with Maladaptive Daydreaming, we see that the people afflicted with this condition are also trapped inside a cave. Trapped inside that cave, they create a reality — and like the shadows on the wall of that cave, it is the illusion of those shadows that consumes the rest of their entire lives.

Is Maladaptive Daydreaming an Official Disorder?

Although Maladaptive Daydreaming is not yet officially recognized in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, it has already caused quite a stir in medical science. In the brains of people affected by Maladaptive Daydreaming, the Executive Control Network functions at a reduced level. The main job of this network is to manage focus, working memory, and connections between other parts of the brain. Due to a weak or low-activity Executive Control Network, it becomes somewhat difficult for Maladaptive Daydreaming sufferers to return to normal life.

How to Break Free From Maladaptive Daydreaming

But this cannot go on for a lifetime. How can one escape from this all-consuming dream bubble?

The first thing that must be done is to identify the problem and accept it. First, one must ask: did this dream arise from some emotional crisis of mine? Why am I having this dream? To get a dopamine hit? To escape from emptiness? Or to run away from reality?

The next step is to maintain a journal for oneself. All descriptions of this dream should be written down there. How does the dream begin? What triggers the dream? What is present when the dream starts? What does the beginning and end of the dream look like? What is the physical and mental state after the dream ends? All of these things, and more.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy

In the next stage, one must find out how and when. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy works to correct the scattered thought patterns of Maladaptive Daydreamers. So at this stage, seeking the help of Cognitive Behavioral Therapists is most important. The moments or situations that trigger Maladaptive Daydreaming must also be brought under control through Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. Mindfulness must be maintained.

The 5-4-3-2-1 Sensory Rule

Another good daily practice is the sensory rule. Write about the five things you have seen, the four things you have felt, the three things you are hearing, the two things whose scent you are picking up, or the one thing whose taste you are experiencing.

Through this practice, your thoughts will stay grounded in reality. They will drift toward hyper-reality less. Beyond this, physical activity, setting small targets in every area of life, and trying to achieve them — these all play an effective role in getting out of this loop. One must not lose trust in oneself under any circumstances.

Alongside all of this, one more thing must be understood: for some people, Maladaptive Daydreaming is not just a dream. Having been ground down by the battles of life, they are so devastated that this dream has become their only means of surviving reality. They are trapped in a no man's land between fantasy and reality.

The Way Forward

On this note, the famous psychologist Carl Jung once said: who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakens.

For those caught in the cycle of Maladaptive Daydreaming, the fight now is just one thing: taking control of their own life back into their own hands. As Jung said: there is a deeply personal chamber in your heart. The name of the door to that chamber is a dream.

Let dreams give you a cinematic experience. Let them make you laugh, make you cry, give you mental peace. Let them confront you with many things you have kept sweet and buried. Let these dreams remain otherworldly. Let them not consume you — not consume your life. Let life not suddenly become a house of cards. Let it be meaningful, let it be colorful — as light and free as a dream. Let life be lived unburdened and at peace.