Prisoner of your own mind?

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How many out there feel like you are prisoner in your own mind. Do you ever find yourself longing to be able to emotionally connect with another person but just can't no matter what you do. If you where ever granted one wish. Would you find that that is what you would wish for more then anything else?

I don't really look at myself as a prisoner because I don't have a strong desire to connect to others. If I research information that is important to me (current focus how amazing elephants are) then I just ramble on information to a select group of people at work who listen and actually find what I have to say interesting (ok one guy). So, I would say I feel more like I'm a hermit who has shunned society to live by himself on a mountain. I completely enjoy my view from here and I love the perspective that it gives me. If I was granted one wish it would be to be able to focus on what I personally wanted to focus on instead of feeling like my mind is a giant dog on a leash and I get dragged wherever it wants to investigate. That would be nice.

I don't get it.

Occasionally. Everyone seems to be marching to the beat of a drum I can't even hear.

I feel like I'm the master of my mind. Mental control and conditioning have a side effect of lowered anxiety about oneself.

that was meant to be somewhat meta-satirical, but true nonetheless

I enjoy the peace of mind I have in not being swayed by group pressure, but I often feel stuck in my mind (see my avatar/handle). A lifetime of this segregation has been painful, especially since I feel that I have much to give - I just have a really hard time breaking out of myself. Part of it is self-censorship, because I fear failure; so I do nothing. Probably a mistake, but eventually you get really sick of failing all the time.

I wouldn't worry about that, the drum is out of rhythm anyway. You are better off not having to put up with the noise it makes.

I spend a lot of my time living in my own head. I also have a lot of trouble expressing what is in my head to people in a way that they can understand (accurately describing my feelings or my perception of things). Ergo I feel stuck living in a world alone that no one else will ever truly comprehend or be a part of.

It's lonely sometimes, but I still like it in here though.

It's kind of warm in my own inner world especially as I am non judgmental about myself (more curious actually...).

I've learned in my life to have a balance. I live alone, and sometimes end up lost in my own mind for hours on end when I'm by myself. I also like to take walks with music on and by the time I get home I don't remember most of the walk because I've been in another world the whole time. I treasure this time as it is very important to me (in-fact, I would say this time is essential for my mental health).

When I'm at work, with friends, family, etc? I make a conscious effort to stay out of my mind, listen to what other people have to say, etc. Force myself to be social... when my instinct is to lower my eyes and walk past someone I instead force myself to say hi. By keeping "other world" time limited to specific scenarios like at home and on walks, but nowhere else (at least to the best of my ability), I don't feel so isolated.

Maybe you're setting your goals too high initially? You're saying that you're a prisoner of your own mind, which I interpret to mean you spend the vast majority of your time in your own world. Maybe you should set a goal of one hour a day, or two hours, or whatever you are comfortable with, where you go and talk to other people, sharing your interests but also making sure to listen to theirs and have a 2 way dialogue. I find actually forming an emotional connection with someone takes a lot of work and time, but that might be a good place to start?

I'm not bothered by the noise and don't want it and everyone else to go away, it's just curious.

I feel like a prisoner of my own mind, but for a different reason.
My mind is damn annoying, it keeps repeating things, for example, sentences I said in a conversation rewind like a a non stop looping machine. Also it's very hard to take somethingof my mind, for instance, if I have an irrational fear it's very hard to get rid of it even if I know it's irrational. And my mind contradicts me saying things I don't want to think about just to annoy me. To top off, my mind thinks very fast, thinks too much, analyze things all the time, perceive things all the time, it makes me exhausted, just make it stop. Annoying mind.

I can sympathize with this for sure. Sometimes I feel like telling it to STFU.

When my mind is like that I usually find it is because I am anxious for some reason.

Otherwise I like being lost in my own head pondering things. I particularly like to plan out and list my upcoming projects related to my interests, or tweaking any systems I am creating in my life to make things easier or more efficient or just for the fun of it, or pondering the nature of the universe, life, perception and human belief systems and how bizarre some of them are and so on.

I don't mind the speed of my thoughts. It was the main reason my hand writing was bad as a child...my brain thinks faster than my hand can write, but the speed of my thoughts is not distressing. They don't chase each other as with euphoria which i have also experienced, but only briefly before getting a migraine (the euphoria wears off as the headache sets in).

I like the speed my brain works. For example the last time I studied at University I managed to solve a physics question that involved combining equations without having to work through the problem solving process consciously. Despite never having answered such a question before (first time I had studied physics as I usually do subjects like geology instead) my brain knew within minutes which equations to use and combine. It was rather handy I thought as it saved me time when writing my paper, giving me more time to work on the other questions. I got 97% for that paper over all and was rather pleased as a result.

Fast brain = handy sometimes.

Me keep fast brain even if she does babble on at me sometimes and refuses to concentrate on boring things like getting my chores done. That is probably her biggest fault...I get distracted by more interesting things and don't get my housework etc accomplished. Hell I can even forget to shower..but to the point where I feel stinky. I don't smell! I am just relaxed about such things.

A fast brain can be a wonderful thing. Especially when it come to math and science which I excel in. But there are a lot of time I wish there was a throttle control on it because it can run too fast and like you said. It's next to imposable to concentrate on less interesting things.

"Prisoner Of Your Own Mind" sounds like a good title for a poem. Mind if I use it? I know it's off-topic