Musings

At night when I try and fall asleep, I find it nearly impossible to turn my brain off. The on/off switch has disappeared when I turn off the light. Yet in the middle of the day, when I am talking to friends or doing math, or just sometimes thinking about a song, I will completely zone out. Neither here nor there, in that place between awake and asleep. Between conscious and subconscious. I find myself in a different area, the walls of my bedroom have disappeared and I can barely feel them containing me. I am completely free of the bounds of gravity and am practically bouncing in all directions. I find that I can lose myself like this several times a day, totally and completely oblivious to my surroundings even as I am being spoken to.

On multiple occasions I become aware that I am not with the moment, but creating my own. It is best described as the sensation of realizing that you are dreaming; like pinching myself to see if I can feel it. Sometimes this pinching works all too well and I am pulled from my fantasy time. Jerked rudely away from my musings. Sometimes I bring this upon myself, and sometimes by someone else. Going into these daydreams is easy, like slipping into water. But it is always an unpleasant experience when I exit my surreal world. No matter how smooth the transition is, it will undoubtedly be bumpy. The middle part is probably best, before I realize what I’m doing and after I have left my conscious state of mind. My mind is free to go wherever it will, I can’t control it and I don’t want to. This is probably the closest I will ever get to flying. I have a very similar experience as I lie in bed and try and fall asleep at night, only much more active.

No matter how tired I am I always find myself thinking about the oddest things, sometimes not quite as pleasant. I try and stay focused on a singular topic, but my mind runs away from me. At such times I realize that I am letting my mind take control. Almost as soon as I close my book every night, my mind begins to whir, the cogs and gears coming up with things, and I just cannot stop them spinning. For awhile listening to music helped me to concentrate on one thing. The melody, the lyrics, the rhythm of the music. But after a few months the effect started wearing off. I was thinking around the music. Music that I knew by heart didn’t help because I would sing along or ignore it, and new music that I didn’t know so well made me pay too much attention to the music; tensing up, trying to catch every word.

I don’t know what gives me such tendencies, but I wish that it would become more constructive. Ideas building on each other, working toward a similar goal, instead of just absorbing everything from around me. Picking better times to space out. Falling asleep at night.

That's all for now.