Sleep is a complex and dynamic process that affects how you function in ways scientists are now beginning to understand. The most intriguing aspect of the sleep is dreaming. Many scientists believe that our brain is more active during our sleep than when we are awake. Some dismiss dreams as meaningless chatter of our brain. Many agree that dreams bring objectivity to everyday experience and are the voice of our subconscious that guides us through life.
Dreams aren’t that hard to get; what’s hard is to analyze them for the insights they reveal and act on them. In addition to providing insights, dreams may also serve as warnings, putting you in touch with something you’re not consciously aware of.
One of the cited examples is of a psychologist who paid attention to his dreams that warned of illness, went to the doctor and learned he was in the early stages of cancer. Interestingly, dreams can be prophetic too and there are many cited examples of them around the world. Majority of us never try to decode our dreams and that is a missed opportunity to enrich our lives.
WE ALL DREAM
We go through each sleep-cycle multiple times during the night till the time we wake up. Depending upon the sleep-cycle you were in when you woke up you may feel rested, fog- headed, dazed and confused or another mood. By some estimates, babies spend 50% or more of their sleep in REM stage as compared to about 20% for adults. Are they dreaming of their past lives or their future? Dreams can be entertaining, disturbing, or downright bizarre. We all dream — even if we don’t remember it the next day. But why do we dream? And what do dreams mean, anyway?
WHAT DO DREAMS MEAN, ANYWAY?
Although many folks claim, and some actually do, to have the ability to interpret dreams; dream interpretation is actually a very serious topic in the field of Psychology.
Sigmund Freud believed dreams are a window into our soul. His book, Interpretation of Dreams , is part of college curriculum. Carl G Jung wrote many books about how the dreams are the connection between our conscious and unconscious self. His book, Man and his Symbols, is also part of college curriculum.
Apart from these two masters you will find abundance of material authored and published by renowned researchers around the world. Surprisingly, some have innate ability to interpret dreams even though they have no formal education in psychology
DREAMS ARE PORTAL INTO YOUR SUBCONSCIOUS
Did you know that dreams have led to many inventions and discoveries?
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- – Mendeleev’s Periodic table
- – Structure of Benzene and Aromatic Chemistry
- – Sewing Machine
- – Theory of Relativity
… and not to mention thousands of new Mathematical Ideas (~4,000 proofs, identities, conjectures and equations in pure mathematics) by Srinivas Ramanujan who is also known as ‘The man who knew infinity’. “While asleep, I had an unusual experience. There was a red screen formed by flowing blood, as it were. I was observing it. Suddenly a hand began to write on the screen. I became all attention. That hand wrote a number of elliptic integrals. They stuck to my mind. As soon as I woke up, I committed them to writing.” – Srinivas Ramanujan (1887 – 1920)
