I just found out that there's a term for creating a detailed imaginary world in one's mind. It's called paracosm and I'm kind of shook that it has a name?? did y'all know about this and didn't tell me?
I always thought it's just a thing creative people did?? like i thought that's what writers did to make their own worlds and stories but apparently, while it's a similar thing, it's also something separate? And maladaptive daydreaming is also a different thing!! (as far as I understood)
I watched a video about it and the woman in it said something about the difference between paracosms and worldbuilding (to her) that I related to, which was that once an idea comes to her mind regarding her world, it is accepted as a fact and doesn't change. I've always struggled with changing "facts" about my world or names of characters once my brain declared "this is a thing that exists now."
The funny thing is I literally have draft in tumblr written since June, that in short says, "am i the only one who struggles to change things in their stories" and I never posted because I didn't know how to word it correctly and how to convey what I meant, and it's funny reading it back now. But I had to learn to change things when I started writing, because with writing, it needed to make sense, whereas in my head, it was all about the vibes. Regardless of paracosms, I'm sure my fellow writers understand this struggle too.
I also read that paracosms happened in childhood but for me it was more teenage years, and I only really started writing because I wanted the world I created in my mind to get out of my head and become something tangible. It's why I think of writing as medium to tell my stories, because while I love writing, my true passion is making stories. Even if they're just in my head.
It makes even more sense now why I'm so protective over my world, characters, and their stories. Why I didn't even tell anyone, like my close friends and family, that I write for a long time, even though I wanted to. Because I didn't want to publish my work, but still wanted to share the joy it brought me. I genuinely think it kept—still keeping—me sane, and if I didn't have this world and these silly little characters in my brain, I might be doing drugs right about now even though I sometimes lose sleep thinking about them
Anyway and a crazy thought occurred to me while reading about this: some people are really out there living without having an imaginary world in their mind. Bonkers man. I wonder what's that like. What do they think about before going to bed? Taxes?
