I love to dream, but now I'm stressed, I did it wrong | Emma Beddington

There's something else we need to worry about (certainly what we were missing this summer): daydreaming. According to New Scientist, the pleasant reverie you imagine yourself in the Desert Island Discs studio modestly explaining your countless accomplishments to Lauren Laverne could be bad for you.

"Normal "Daydreaming is always good: it promotes creative and lateral thinking, and letting the mind wander might improve our ability to learn. But when daydreaming keeps you from engaging with life and interferes with your ability to bond and maintaining relationships, working, or learning, researchers call them "maladaptive."

Malawitative dreamers use fantasy as a release from stressful thoughts and a difficult present; loneliness, distress, and boredom are triggers. Considering all of this, I guess you won't be surprised to hear that maladaptive daydreaming seems to be becoming more and more prevalent. A 2020 study covering 70 countries found that participants were more likely to struggle with intense, consuming daydreams during lockdown than during normal life. A 2021 survey of 6,000 Italians found that 17% were atypically preoccupied with their fantasy life. You wouldn't be betting against it reaching epidemic proportions as 2022 approaches.

I wonder if maladjustment is the correct characterization. Who are you calling misfit? Isn't retreating to a softer fantasy world an entirely appropriate way to deal with financial and ecological catastrophe, a war being played out around an actual nuclear power plant, Covid, monkeypox and langya (the new zoonotic virus on the block, continue)? Typical themes of maladaptive daydreams are, apparently, "love, friendship, self-idealization, social support, and imaginary family." It would be better if we all felt like we had them in real life, sure, but who can blame anyone for dreaming about them while the world is burning?

I I'm about ready to let go of reality and indulge in my daydreams, but before that I have to train to have better ones. Mine are all death, disease, destruction and bitter settling of accounts; mares, really. Imagining that things are even worse than they really are is truly inappropriate.

Emma Beddington is a Guardian columnist