[Xin (OP)]

I remember driving home one afternoon, and for some reason started daydreaming about my plans for the evening. Perhaps it's my ADD that does this, but my daydream essentially turned into a mini-movie, where I was dreaming about going out with my friends at a bar and meeting a cute girl there and all the things that I'd say to her...and start over if I didn't like the outcome. All of this happens within seconds in my mind.

And it's about this time that I snap back into "reality" having realized that I was daydreaming while driving. I know I was aware that I was driving the entire time, but wasn't paying attention to what I was doing. I was running on a sort of auto-pilot.

I remember reading somewhere that the human brain can handle only so many signals it receives (1000?) at one time, and so I wonder where daydreaming fits into this. I'm kind of curious to wonder how many signals my brain is receiving just from daydreaming, and is it really that many that it causes me to not pay attention in reality? Having ADD, does this mean my brain can't handle as many signals as non-ADD people can?

I have been able to get so deep into a daydream that I can feel the effects of it as if it were reality. For example, if I'm daydreaming about riding a rollercoaster and I'm REALLY into it...I can actually feel my stomach churn and my head swim as if I really was riding the rollercoaster. A lot of the times, it's intense enough where it'll jar me "awake" and I notice my heart beating fast because of the adrenaline.

Does anyone else have this problem? What is it exactly? And am I'm slowly going insane?

[DoctorBeaver]

ADD does not fall within my field of expertise, but I'll se if I can find out anything for you.

[Hadrian]

We all have about 60,000 thoughts a day. 90% of them are automatic. They range from fleeting bits of ideas to elaborate images full of rich detail. Every experiences we have is constructed from our memory. Even new data has to be committed to our memory before we can perceive it. But memory is not pure data retrieval. It is altered data. Our reality is our interpretation of the world we are in. A lot of people with and without ADD spend a lot of time, time travelling in their heads. They use their memory to construct a possible future or relive past events altering what happened or inventing new outcomes. They can trick themselves into feeling the pain of events that have never taken place except in their minds. The fact is we spend far too little time enjoying the moment we are in, the only bit of time that we have any control of. The trap in all this is when we buy into this time travelling and let it take over our thoughts to the point they control us. This trap is the realm of madness. In is extreme form we give up control of our thoughts. That is the state of mind where you fine paranoia and delusion.  The key to be free even in its weakest forms it is to develop awareness of where your thoughts are coming from (past or future) and also to develop your power of focus on now. If you find this difficult I suggest you try to learn meditation.

[another_someone]

quote:Originally posted by Hadrian

We all have about 60,000 thoughts a day.

So where did you pick this number from?  How would you even identify a single thought, let alone enumerate 60,000 of them?


{quote]
The fact is we spend far too little time enjoying the moment we are in, the only bit of time that we have any control of.
[/quote]

I would disagree – the only thing we have any control over (however imperfectly) is the future.  By the time the future has become the present, we have already laid down most of the groundwork for what is now happening, and we have merely become passengers along our desitiny.

George

[Hadrian]

There are 3,600 seconds in an hour and 57,600 seconds in a normal 16-hour waking day. If we have one thought per second (much less than the brain's capacity), then we have about 60,000 thoughts in one day. What percentage of your 60,000 thoughts lead to positive emotions and what percentage to negative ones it up to you.

[another_someone]

quote:Originally posted by Hadrian

There are 3,600 seconds in an hour and 57,600 seconds in a normal 16-hour waking day. If we have one thought per second (much less than the brain's capacity), then we have about 60,000 thoughts in one day. What percentage of your 60,000 thoughts lead to positive emotions and what percentage to negative ones it up to you.

You have not answered the question as to how you would identify what a single thought is?

Why one per second, rather than one per millisecond?  Where does one thought end and another begin?

George

[Hadrian]

How to you think?

[Monox D. I-Fly]

I remember driving home one afternoon, and for some reason started daydreaming about my plans for the evening. Perhaps it's my ADD that does this, but my daydream essentially turned into a mini-movie, where I was dreaming about going out with my friends at a bar and meeting a cute girl there and all the things that I'd say to her...and start over if I didn't like the outcome. All of this happens within seconds in my mind.

If you have ADD, probably this forum can help: http://addforums.com/forums/index.php
I'm also a member there.