Is It A Glamorous Fantasy, Or Just A Daydream?
How to tell if you're remembering your future...or just bored.
Sometimes I regret calling my newsletter “Fantasy Self.”
Why? Because the word “fantasy” has more or less been co-opted by television shows about dragons, or sports gambling.
And usually when we describe a fantasy that we actually had, it’s some kind of idle daydream. Something we wish would happen, that’s probably not going to happen. Such as sharing a milkshake with Austin Butler. You may have one about your ex seeing you out on the town with someone way hotter. Or telling your horrible boss in florid detail how much you hate working for them. And so on. These are things you’d enjoy experiencing but they’re either impractical, indulgent, focused on settling scores, or entirely ego-driven.
These fantasies are compelling nevertheless. I’d wager that they make up a disconcerting percentage of the stuff on the Netflix screen that is your conscious mind. They are expressions of desire, and many of those desires are innocent and reasonable. (Who wouldn’t want to share a milkshake with Austin Butler?! Except vegans?!) But these fantasies don’t represent the desires of your higher self.
A glamorous fantasy is different.
It feels less like a flight of fancy and more like you’re remembering your future.
It has a quality of recognition to it, not always as strong as deja vu, but more like the resonance of memory. A glamorous fantasy evokes a powerful longing to change.
As I grow and evolve, I realize that I want this newsletter to help people discover what is glamorous to them and start acting on it.
Because for most of my life I’ve lived in fear of truly acting on any of my heart’s desires.
Like, for instance, accepting that I am an artist first, before I am anything else.
Since about the age of 17, I’ve been rife with shame that I am a creative person who makes things, or experiences, that are beautiful for the sake of being beautiful. I don’t want to do anything as badly as I want to make people feel things.
In a culture that has long cast it aside as an art form, I still write poetry. I’m a storyteller. I paint, I draw. I sing. I studied acting for six years. I am an artist. But even expressing this to you now feels like confessing a crime or something. It almost feels as if I don’t have a right to claim it.
In the rare moments when I allow myself to accept this truth (such as when I took acting classes, or during the pandemic when I was laid off and had nothing to do but make art) creativity pours out of me as if I am connected to something much bigger, beyond myself.
Of course, this selfsame vein of divine inspiration also robs me of any motivation to do anything else, including achieving financial independence, finding a partner, sleep, or housework. My devotion to creative projects, when I have them, becomes all-consuming. So it’s become something I’ve learned to suppress, deny, and avoid.
I also have felt a lot of tribal, cultural-level shame. Specifically I felt that I had failed at being a good American who exists to a) create value for corporations and b) earn back my parents’ investment in my English literature degree. (With a philosophy minor! My concentration was ETHICS! They must have been so embarrassed!)
Please God, I used to pray, take these talents away from me! Let me be good at marketing instead! Give me an intense desire to do data analytics! Or tech sales!
At some point I had to just accept that the things I am the best at doing at are not the conventional business-minded things. And that sets me at odds with American culture, now more than ever. I’m still really good at the conventional business-minded things. My email open rate at my marketing day job is roughly twice the industry benchmark for what’s considered excellent.
And yet, I am not as passionate about helping businesses as I am passionate about getting other people to have big feelings, or to experience beauty. Which also feels like confessing a crime.
So I still keep having fantasies of people actually paying for my art, or paying for my writing. Of being valued for my gifts, such as they are.
Usually these fantasies come in the form of identifying with other artists that matter to me—like Jonna Jinton, or Lana Del Rey, or even artists as illustrious as Marilyn Monroe or Frank Sinatra.
I suspect that some of you have a similar conundrum. You feel that something is missing, you feel like an aspect of self has been amputated or disowned. But you keep having fantasies of a different kind of life. Often times the fantasies are triggered by advertisements, but not always. Because ultimately you don’t want the product. You want whatever feeling or quality it represents.
Here’s how to tell what kind of fantasy you are having.
An Informal Rubric For Differentiating Your Fantasies
It is a glamorous fantasy IF:
It usually follows the logic of, if I had X, then I’d be Y.
In the fantasy, you appear or feel different from how you currently are.
In the fantasy, your life circumstances are also significantly different.
You feel a strong emotional pang when the fantasy plays out in your mind. It is not merely blissful escapism.
If you are not the center of the fantasy, and someone else is, you still identify with that someone. You have something meaningful in common with them, whether it’s cultural background, similar childhoods, a similar skill set or profession, overcoming a similar hurdle in your personal life, etc. They can otherwise be very different from you, so long as there is some feeling of identification.
It is NOT a glamorous fantasy if:
It’s merely about settling a personal score or stroking your ego.
It exists purely to offer you a moment of escape or pleasure.
The “you” in the fantasy is exactly the same person as you are now.
If you are not the center of the fantasy and someone else is, you don’t have anything meaningful in common with them.
If you want to understand what you really want in life, write down one of your glamorous fantasies. Then journal about the following:
How is your Fantasy Self different?
What are they doing? What are they feeling? How do they move through the world?
What quality do they have that you feel you are lacking?
And what is one (1) thing you can do to bring that quality into your current reality, even if it’s in a tiny amount?
You are not just daydreaming. You are remembering your future.
I like ethicists with style.