In situations of low stress and safety, mind-wandering will be a gift, a pleasure, a creative force. In situations of high stress or danger, mind-wandering will be a torment.

Today, most of our stress is mental—it doesn’t exist in our physical world. And we let it build up inside of us, because we don’t give it a place to go. Exercise used to be an outlet for stress—we walked an average of thirteen kilometers a day. Social connection used to be another outlet—we spent nearly all of our time surrounded by other people.

if we can conjure up a relaxing scene internally, we can control our own stress response, willing ourselves to feel relaxed instead of letting overthinking and stress unbalance us. It goes a little further than mere distraction because what you are doing is reorienting your awareness to relaxing sensations and away from stressful ones.