What is a Mind Wander?
A mindwander is a story that evolves when you let your subconscious mind take over and allow it to go into areas of your mind it wants to reveal to you, without your conscious mind directing it. After a while, it may reveal to you places within your heart that need attention from you. It sends a message in story-form from your subconscious mind to your conscious mind about a thing that you may be evading without even realizing it, a topic you’ve been avoiding because you don’t have a solution or a topic whose solution causes fear or anxiety or you believe could have disasterous effects. A mindwander will tell you what you need to be focusing on for your best mental health. For me, music is key. Music sets the tone as well as masks daily noises that could be distracting (note, never do this when you are in charge of dependents!). The mindwander tends to be in sync with the music. I gravitate towards relaxing, soothing music that has no words because I am looking for peace. And the story that comes along generally shows me a path to a place of peace.
Bob Timberlake writes in his book Partial to Home, “At times, I feel almost as if my life is a play. The script is already written, but I haven’t been allowed to read it. My lines and stage instructions are handed to me only when I’m supposed to speak them and act them out. The play is unfolding just as it is supposed to, but I have no idea what twists and turns the plot is going to take until they occur. I don’t even know what kind of play this is. It has many elements: comedy, drama, mystery. But more than anything else it seems to be a fantasy, an unbelievable but so far wonderfully happy fantasy.” He goes on to describe how he doesn’t know what the point or plot of the story is, but that it becomes more clear with progression. He doesn’t know when it began or how it will end. And so is the mindwander. I describe it as if I were going to watch a movie I didn’t know anything about, and I was told to write down whatever I see happening in the movie. I go in with no preparation, no suggestion of what I’d like to see, no plot, no outline, don’t know if will have a good ending. I just write what I see. And generally it leads me to a moral of the story, a suttle suggestion of how I should be living my life, or how I should feel about life. I learn to become a little freer, a little more understanding, a little more kind to myself and my self esteem because of where it takes me. It teaches by example as I walk through different scenarios of my own life, as if I were leading a double life.
And now I present to you stories of my mindwandering.