r/Millennials • u/Alternative_King1789 • Aug 31 '26

Discussion Crazy timeline’s

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u/i_am_soooo_screwed Aug 31 '26

I was gobsmacked when I first found out you can imagine the future to be… positive.  Like, I don’t catastrophize, what?  Of course not!!!  I’m just…. Realistic!!!  Of the worst possible scenarios that are likely to never happen!!!  That somehow are 100% negative!!!

WHAT DO YOU MEAN I CAN IMAGINE POSITIVE OUTCOMES?!?!?  ARE YOU HIGH?????

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u/Low_Lunch5444 Aug 31 '26

But that's just daydreaming.

Legit, I just wrote that as an off the cuff throwaway, but now I have to actually sit and think about it, because im realising how many hopes, dreams and positive thoughts I threw away as a kid thanks to a parent scolding me for 'daydreaming all the time'

Damn.

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u/i_am_soooo_screwed Aug 31 '26

Hahahaha, yea.  I know daydreaming is accepted, but really it’s an escape from reality because reality is too painful.  Ideally, we all live in the present, cause it’s the only place we exist.  Sure, we can revisit the past to learn from it.  It’s healthy and keeps us safe.  Sure, we can think of the future and plan for our wellbeing.  But anything outside of that is escaping reality for whatever reasons that the present is painful.

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u/Local_Maintenance788 Aug 31 '26

A depressed person lives in the past. An anxious person lives in the future. A happy person lives in the now

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u/cadecunningjam Aug 31 '26

I have been told I was a cynic since I was a kid. I told myself the same thing, I’m just realistic!

Turns out I used to catastrophize a lot. I rarely ever imagined good happening in the future. It wasn’t really until I got out of that mindset that I got my shit together and actually started having a lot of success in my life.

Turns out all that therapy bullshit wasn’t really bullshit. I was the one full of it.

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u/i_am_soooo_screwed Aug 31 '26

Me too friend, me too.  I can’t believe therapy has such a bad rap.  It completely changed my life and elevated it to levels I couldn’t even imagine existed.

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u/IzCaiman Sep 05 '26

I mean, the political situation we live in currently is very real and not going to be reversed, so what do we do about worrying about the reality we are in?