Dreams

Ok enough of the recession crap; let’s talk about something that’s more common. Something that occurs involuntarily everyday in our lives. Something that is fun, scary, mysterious and insightful depending on the way you perceive it. Let’s go gung ho over Dreams. Not day dreaming silly, thou sometimes day dreaming is entertainment in our otherwise monotonous tasks. These are the series of images you see while sleeping; where rules of reality don’t apply.

Sleep States

Sleep is mainly categorized into two states, Rapid Eye Movement (REM) and Non Rapid Eye Movement (NREM). During a normal sleep cycle a person alternates between these two sleep cycles. Non REM sleep is again split into four stages. An adult usually spends 75% of his sleep cycle in Non REM sleep out of which 15% is in the 4^th stage of NREM which is deep sleep. The remaining 25% is in the REM state. REM state is where dreaming takes place. Brain activity in this state is similar to an awakened state.

Dream Analysis

What you lack in intelligence you can make up in analysing your dreams ;) You can learn a lot about yourself from your dreams. Your environment, health, mental situation, feelings etc become very clear if you understand your dreams. Your dreams can give you more insight about the current state of your mind. Correlate your dream with anything that’s disturbing you or causing any anxiety.

Dreams are means of your subconscious mind talking to you, so listen to it. Just as you physical body needs cleaning up, dreams are means to clean up you mental/emotional body.

The toughest part about dream analysis is actually remembering your entire dream. The best way to remember your dream is; upon awakening lie on the bed for a few moments with your eyes closed. Try replying the entire dream sequence in your mind. This will help you remember more details of your dream. You can also have a pen and paper besides you and immediately write down your dream when you wake up.

Following are some interpretations of common dreams

• Falling Dreams, symbolizes fear of failure or loss of control
• Naked Dreams, symbolizes that you’re afraid of being exposed
• Chase Dreams, symbolizes your running away from difficulties
• Nightmare Dreams, symbolizes real life trauma and situations
• Flying Dreams, symbolizes your on top of the situation

Sometimes I look at dreams as movies you watch when you are sleeping (I know many of you are going, ya rite next time I wanna watch a movie, I’ll just go to sleep). The difference between watching a movie and dreaming is that, in a dream you are mostly the central character in that movie and your brain makes you feel that the events that your dreaming of, is really happening in your conscious life. In the case of a movie, you can select what you wanna watch, that is something you may not be able to do in the case of a dream or can you?

Lucid Dreaming

Lucid dreams are dreams when the sleeper is aware that he is dreaming. The first thing that makes me realise that I’m lucid dreaming is when I start wondering while lying on the bed, if I’m dreaming or thinking about something and then I realise that this thing is too weird for me to be thinking about. The best thing about lucid dreaming is that you can control what you’re dreaming. You can fulfil your weirdest adventure or your wildest fantasy.

Food For Thought

Dreams are so real that you cannot distinguish between the dream world and the real world when asleep, imagine if there is a scientific/spiritual way to program what you can dream about, would you want to dream about something nice for a few days?

Would you want to face some difficult phases in your life or just sleep them off dreaming about something nicer?

I'm sure there are times when you have twitched in your sleep dreaming about jumping or falling from a height. If you brain is made to believe that your dream is so real that it can actually send signals to your muscles to move, imagine the possibilities. Imagine dreaming about exercising or swimming, you never have to hit the gym again.

Leave a comment if I have changed your perception about Dreams or if you have anything to say about the food for thought section. Criticisms are also welcome.