I can earnestly say that I dwell more in daydreams than in the realm of reality. Often, I find myself detaching from my interlocutor, plunging into a newly conjured daydream that, more often than not, seems far superior to the reality of the moment.
Sometimes, I claim to be pondering a novel idea or a study I’m working on, but truth be told, I'm often fabricating. I've repeatedly attempted to translate these daydreams into the literary world, yet reality looms over and imposes itself onto any text I try to immerse in as deeply as I do in my daydreams.
Regrettably, the dream I live in during wakefulness is filled with whimsical elements that satisfy a deep psychological need within me, replacing a missing sensation. These often involve very childlike desires: the yearning for admiration or love, the desire to be cherished by those we admire or seek to emulate, only to find that they, in turn, become one’s admirers. There's a longing for rebellion, for breaking away to distant worlds alone, where one can simply relish nature, literature, or the company of animals. A desire to break the shackles merely because they constrict and confine our dreams to a suffocatingly small space.
More disheartening is that these fanciful dreams and wild desires, merely attempts at savoring life, do not suffice to compose a novel in themselves. They might serve as a prelude or an introduction, but a novel requires structure, treatment, transformations, and a journey of self-discovery. It must convey an artistic vision and philosophical depth to be considered a worthy literary text.
But what if the protagonist has no desire to embark on any kind of journey? What if his philosophy is solely to enjoy life, living out his artistic visions in fleeting daydreams that evaporate, leaving nothing but a sweet residue of happiness?
Such a character might well be accused of nihilism, of being an Epicurean, or perhaps seen as a follower of John Stuart Mill. A novel with such a character might be viewed as continuing the legacies of Henry Miller or even Bukowski.
Humanity has done everything before, and it seems that all new ideas are merely iterations and transformations of old ones. No one can truly claim to have created something new.
I have contemplated writing a novel that intertwines many threads into a single narrative. After writing and publishing it (here, I refer to my novel “al-Qannas”: "The Sniper"-2018), I discovered Marcel Proust and his "In Search of Lost Time," and I laughed at myself in scorn.
Sometimes I wonder, why bother innovating? Isn't it enough to simply enjoy what you are doing? Here I return to daydreaming again. If enjoyment is the ultimate goal, why write at all? Why try to prove anything to anyone?
I recall Nozick and the experience machine he discussed in "Anarchy, State, and Utopia." What is the purpose of life—to achieve happiness or self-realization? Are these goals contradictory or intertwined? Why did Neo rebel against the Matrix, and why did he choose the red pill? Why wasn’t Winston content with his totalitarian world and sought love, rebellion, and truth? Why didn’t Raskolnikov just enjoy the money he stole from the old woman and drown in his philosophical and psychological musings? Why did Jonas in "The Giver" try to reveal the truth to people instead of enjoying the fabricated world?
Is self-realization the path to ultimate happiness? Why doesn’t a person just imagine achieving his true self in his daydreams and be content with that? Why strive to make it a reality? And what is reality? Are we living in a world of truth, or a world of fantasy, or are we merely living in a grand illusion as ancient philosophers claimed?
It's curious how this idea has captivated scientists and philosophers through the ages, from philosophers like the Pythagoreans, Heraclitus, and Parmenides, to philosophical currents like Indian Vedanta, which sees the reality we live in as an illusion (Maya) and the ultimate truth (Brahman) reached through the higher self (Atman), to renowned scholars like George Berkeley who believed that the physical existence of things depends solely on their perception. For him, objects do not exist independently of the minds that perceive them.
Why not create a parallel existence with our minds and daydreams then? This was the idea I incorporated into my novel "al-Immlaq al-Dahik”: "The Laughing Giant," published in 2012, where human perception expands to overlay reality, forming a parallel reality and crafting another truth.
But this was before I encountered holographic philosophy, which considers the world to be a very large hologram.
The situation is amusing. It appears that there are no truly original ideas in reality, and all ideas are extensions and transformations of other ideas. There is no original creator, no idea truly born from nothing, or created from the void. This takes us to the concept of creation and the meaning of God, which is not my topic here anyway.
What I mean to say is that although daydreams are merely illusions, they can seem very real for a moment, pushing us toward amusing beliefs and attractive thoughts that perhaps the daydream is the real thing and the world is the grand illusion.
Which life are you truly living? The dream or reality? This was a fascinating topic explored by the 2012 series "Awake."
Why do we cling to reality and drown in dreams? Is it our desire to elevate reality to the level of dreams?
This desire has never been realized in any historical experiment. And even when humans address it in an artistic or creative work, their thoughts soon lead them to realize it's a trick—a political, scientific, or societal trick that creates this beautiful illusory world hiding an unbearable ugliness.
Why doesn't a person believe in his dreams even in the dream itself?
This dividing line... this firewall... this impregnable barrier that a person creates between himself and his self, then goes to cross it a thousand times a day in search of salvation, rejecting reality and opposing the dream.
Why do I love my daydream but refuse to live in it forever? Is it a lie I concoct to claim idealism for myself? Is it a deep-rooted foolishness that savors misery and pain? Is it a planted conviction in myself that believes beauty and happiness are illusions masking an unbearable ugliness?
I doubt anyone in this world can answer such questions. It is the Sisyphean misery to travel between dream and reality, to reject both the dream and the reality, to push the rock to the summit of the mountain only to let it fall from the other side once it reaches its goal.
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