iStockphoto / maroke
Competitive Daydreaming in Japan, where competitors fully shut down their brains for 90 minutes and do literally nothing, is proof that I missed my calling in life because my guidance counselor didn’t tell me this incredible sport existed.
The annual ‘2024 Space-Out Competition’ took place days ago in Japan and clips from the event went viral almost immediately after people in the United States discovering how amazing it all looked. But before we get to those, let’s break down how Competitive Daydreaming works…
It is pretty simple. Competitors have to sit there, mindlessly, for 90 minutes. They cannot fall asleep. Laughing results in disqualification. Talking gets them DQ’d as well. And heart rates are checked during the 90 minutes of Competitive Daydreaming. Now let’s check out the action:
competitive daydreamers gathered in Tokyo today for the “2024 Space-out Competition”
Heart rates were checked and anyone who laughs, talks or dozes off was eliminated during the 90 min competition.
— Spoon & Tamago (@Johnny_suputama) October 13, 2024
That video has been viewed over 4.3 million times since it was first shared on X by user @johnny_suputama back on October 13th. It has since been picked up by Jomboy Media and shared across their channels including here on Threads which is where I came across it.
The winer of the 2024 Space-Out Competitive wearing bib #22 seemed as surprised as anyone to take down the most prestigious Competitive Daydreaming competition on earth. And rest assured, there are more. Another competition with around 200 entrants was held last year in China’s Sichuan province. And this year’s winner didn’t seem to be unanimous because many people on X believed this dude with the rice wave was the top competitive daydreamer this year:
Bro with the frozen rice wave should have won pic.twitter.com/BMroHYHhIW
— Travis 🐙 (@Treasures_NFTS) October 14, 2024
I’m able to zone out as much as anyone and daydream about winning the Powerball but falling asleep over the course of 90 minutes would be a real concern for me. So many of the comments express people saying they were built for this. And I feel that, I really do. But I’m concerned I’d either doze off or get so wrapped up in the competitive daydreaming I would start talking to myself.
This annual event is held in Tokyo and draws in hundreds of participants. It is absolutely mystifying to our Western culture with all of us wondering why we haven’t replicated this yet. Here are some highlights from last year’s event:
What do you all think, could you pull this off? Make the final 5? Would you fall asleep in the first 10 minutes? Let us know in the Facebook comments!