Legitimate Hallucinating

I could sit still for hours, staring out the window, watching and listening to the rain as it strikes the metal and the hard floor below. The sound makes me lose track of time entirely. It's therapeutic in that it often heals me. But it also sends me on a wild ride through my own mind. I've noticed I can get lost in imagination for hours without shifting position once. I lose track of my surroundings entirely; no noise penetrates my inner, meditative state. This is the most beautiful mental state possible, provided the mind isn't disturbed by negative thoughts. But when it's flooded with negative emotions, with thoughts of low self-esteem or self-harm, it becomes a kind of hell instead. For me, these sessions are usually always cathartic. I think through my stories and essays in detail. Every idea that eventually becomes an essay first lives in my head as part of a longer rumination. It exists there for my mind to turn over and examine. I think, then rethink, long before I ever sit…