What are sleep and dreams? Why do people have dreams?


New information, emotions and experiences

According to scientists, dreams are a kind of protective reaction of the brain, which manifests itself as a result of receiving a large amount of different information throughout the day. Nerve brain cells located in the subcortex area begin to work at a slower pace due to overwork. As a result, the information accumulated during the day is partially deleted, which manifests itself in the form of dreams.

The brain reacts in a similar way to psycho-emotional stress.

If during the day a person has experienced a lot of feelings and emotions (no matter positive or negative), then this increases the likelihood of night dreams

According to this theory, it can be assumed that dreams are very often experienced by people who lead an active lifestyle, have a wide circle of friends, develop and regularly receive a large amount of new information. Most often, dreams are seen by creative and emotional people, since their central nervous system and brain are subject to increased stress and require relaxation.

Ways to fall asleep quickly

The secret to falling asleep quickly is to use your bed only for sleeping:

  • go to bed in the evening when you feel sleepy
  • after waking up, do not stay in it for more than 10 minutes
  • Never work in bed
  • If you can’t fall asleep, you need to spend time out of bed until you feel sleepy
  • Sleep no more than 30 minutes during the day

If you need to fall asleep urgently, this technique will help: lie on your back, close your eyes and roll your pupils up. Another way: close your eyes for ten seconds, then open them for one - and so on several times. You can use the sleepy point between the eyebrows - it should be massaged for 20-30 seconds.

Sleep quality disorders

The very mechanism of the appearance of dreams is explained by the fact that even during night sleep the brain cannot completely relax and continues its work. While the entire body is resting, this organ processes and analyzes the information received by a person throughout the day, displaying it in a slightly modified form . For this reason, some people can dream very often, almost daily.

However, when the deep sleep phase begins, a person simply cannot remember what he dreamed of at night. Experts, having conducted a number of scientific studies and tests, have proven that people remember their dreams only when awakening occurs in the rapid phase.


Reasons for frequent dreams

Therefore, if you have dreams every night and a person remembers them well, this may be due to impaired sleep quality , disorders in the central nervous system, stressful situations and psycho-emotional shocks.

Too frequent dreams are not a very good signal , because if the deep sleep phase does not occur, then the body cannot fully rest and recover during the night, which will subsequently negatively affect its health and ability to work.

Therefore, it is worth taking care to improve the quality of your sleep

Why does a person need sleep?

The average person spends a third of his life sleeping. What is it – “aimless years lived” or “another life” in the depths of one’s own consciousness? When reducing sleep time, we must know what we are giving up.

Self-healing

During sleep, the brain's work switches to solving internal problems.

  1. The processes of anabolism (growth, development) prevail over catabolism (decay, decomposition). During sleep, muscles and bones grow, skin, nails and hair are renewed.
  2. Anabolism is an energy-consuming process. A sleeping person spends up to 600 kcal – that’s about how much is burned during training! Energy is taken directly from fat depots under the influence of growth hormone. The peak release of this hormone is observed 2 hours after falling asleep. As a result, by the morning a well-rested person loses 350–400 g of pure fat. So sleep is also the prevention of obesity.
  3. During sleep, the interaction between the brain and spinal cord is weakened, or even completely blocked, and the sleeper’s body remains motionless. But the flow of information into the central nervous system (CNS) from internal organs increases. During sleep hours, “routine repairs” of minor faults and replenishment of cell energy reserves are organized. Sleep is the basis of health.
  4. In a sleepy state, the synthesis of T-lymphocytes, the main heroes of the immune system, accelerates. Adequate sleep strengthens the immune system.
  5. During sleep, the brain gets the opportunity to test its own condition: toxins are eliminated and damaged DNA is restored.

Data processing

  • All impressions of the past day are systematized when a person is in a sleepy state.
  • Information garbage is erased - we cannot remember thousands of little things and events the next day.
  • Relevant information remains in RAM - educational material, necessary figures and facts, names, addresses, etc.
  • People's faces, even glimpsed, remain forever in the waves of our memory. In dreams, “familiar strangers” play the role of emotional symbols.
  • Information that has lost its relevance is sent to long-term storage - “ZIP/RAR archives” of our brain. As soon as the brain receives a new task, the necessary information is extracted from them.
  • With a lack of sleep, information does not have time to be processed - a person drowns in a sea of ​​incoherent information. It is difficult for him to make the right decision, to perform the right action.

Even in deep sleep, the human brain has “sentinel centers” that are ready to wake up the sleeper in a moment of danger. A nursing mother is able to sleep soundly in the presence of noise and light, but the baby’s squeak instantly brings her into a state of wakefulness.

Mental function of sleep

During dreams, the activity of the central nervous system increases 7–10 times. The frontal lobes of the brain, which are responsible for logical thinking, are switched off during dreams. The limbic system, the area of ​​emotion management, is involved in the work.

The plots of dreams play out emotional problems of the individual. There is an intensive search for a way out of stressful situations; the baggage of life experiences is drawn from the subconscious.

During the night, a sleeping person manages to view several dreams, live through possible solutions to a difficult problem, and come to terms with inevitable losses. Anyone who goes to bed crying finds peace the next morning.

Recommendations for improving sleep quality

To improve the quality of your sleep and achieve complete relaxation, pay attention to the following recommendations from experts:

If these recommendations do not have the desired effect, then you should seek advice from a specialist, especially if you have symptoms such as increased fatigue, sleepiness during the day, causeless anxiety and irritability.

People who are endowed with a good imagination and lead an active lifestyle can dream often, and this is considered the norm. However, if dreams come every night, then you should pay attention to the state of the central nervous system.

More interesting information on the topic in the video:

Source

Why do we have dreams every day?

Almost the same processes occur in all living beings. This especially applies to wakefulness and sleep at night, which both animals and people see. Naturally, animals cannot tell about this like people, but this can be understood by the involuntary movements of dogs, cats, etc.

A person spends almost a third of his life sleeping.

By 11 p.m., the sleep hormone melatonin begins to be produced. It is better to fall asleep in the dark from 22.00 to 1.00 am.

With a healthy, full eight-hour night's rest, the body is completely restored. Each organ has its own hour of rest according to the natural cycle. Our brain also begins to process information. If some people say that they do not dream, this is not true. They just don't remember them. Any information is processed during sleep: some remains unprocessed, but there are elements that a person might not have paid attention to, appear in a dream and help to get rid of it completely or find a solution to some unresolved problem.

The brain doesn't sleep

Sleep is a temporary loss of connection with the environment. The brain switches from controlling the external world to solving internal problems. Along with people, mammals, amphibians, birds, and fish also sleep on Earth. The sleep criteria for everyone are the following:

  • there is no or very difficult connection with reality
  • a sleepy state, unlike hibernation, coma or lethargy, can be interrupted by exposure to external stimuli - a loud sound or bright light wakes up both people and animals
  • the body does not leave “lack of sleep” without consequences, the brain switches off at the first opportunity to fall asleep

Dreams are a part of sleep. During the night we live through 3-4 stories, most of them are forgotten, but some remain in memory for the rest of our lives. It has been proven that all people, without exception, see dreams, even the blind. The role of dreams in human life is the biggest mystery of somnology.

One of the varieties of healthy sleep is the siesta, the midday nap of the Spaniards, Italians, and Greeks. Between 1 and 5 p.m., Mediterranean cities become noticeably empty as the population pays tribute to the siesta.

Scientists believe that a midday nap is good for health: after lunch, blood flows to the digestive organs, performance drops sharply, and drowsiness sets in. A half-hour nap gives a second wind to the nervous system and allows you to remain active until late in the evening.

Greek scientists say: siesta reduces daytime stress and reduces the risk of heart attack in working men by up to 64%. It is important that daytime rest does not last more than 30 minutes - failure of the biological clock can lead to insomnia at night.

Dreams as a reflection of the human psyche

According to psychologists, dreams can reflect a person’s mental state and from them it is possible to understand and find answers regarding the state of his health.

If a person’s life is smooth, he sleeps peacefully and sees pleasant dreams.

But if there are unsolved problems that a person constantly thinks about, these searches can also be reflected in a dream, and, quite likely, hints about options for solving them.

The subconscious mind tries to give the most productive answer.

Imagine the dreams of a person who decided to start a family. Of course, he can see the girl of his dreams, but this does not mean that he can meet her in the real world. But there are also real dreams that point to a specific girl. Everything is relative. People are different, perceptions are also different, therefore, the interpretation will be different.

What affects sleep

The quality of sleep is primarily affected by light, or more precisely, darkness. After all, sleep is the body’s reaction to the absence of light. The darker the room, the stronger and healthier your sleep will be. External factors matter: sounds, smells, as well as the posture and mood with which a person goes to bed.

Sounds

Sounds are what connect the brain of a sleeping person with the real world.

  • Sleep is disturbed by: conversations and loud music, the noise of a washing machine or vacuum cleaner, and sometimes even a ticking clock and the whispering of people.
  • Sudden abrupt sounds: crying, shouting, car horns, telephone calls - interrupt sleep, after which it is not possible to fall asleep for a long time.
  • Homogeneous white noise: the sound of rain, rustling leaves, quiet fan operation, calm music - help you calm down and fall into a sweet sleep.

During the time of Peter I, fireweed tea was considered a remedy for insomnia. If it did not help well, dope (henbane) seeds were added. The effect was unpredictable: from restless sleep to convulsions and hallucinations

Smells

A person smells smells in a dream, but they cannot wake him up. For example, the smell of burning during a fire will not get a sleeper out of bed. But smells can invade our dreams and affect the process of falling asleep and the depth of sleep.

  • The scents of rose and jasmine are favorable for deep sleep
  • Mint, lavender, cypress help to calm down and fall asleep quickly
  • Eucalyptus, lemon, musk excite and prevent sleep
  • the smell of tobacco smoke and cigarettes can cause nightmares

A strong concentration of any odor, even a very pleasant one, is a signal of the danger of poisoning. It is difficult to fall asleep in such an environment, and it is quite possible to have a nightmare.

Pose

It is in our power to choose the best position for falling asleep. During sleep, we will unconsciously take positions that are comfortable for the body.

  • Statistics show that 70% of people prefer to sleep on their side. This position prevents snoring, sleep apnea, and is convenient for pregnant women.
  • About 23% fall asleep on their back - the position is comfortable for the spine, but those who snore should avoid falling asleep in this position.
  • People are least likely to fall asleep on their stomachs - this is indeed an uncomfortable position in which the internal organs are compressed and the muscles are tense; Sleeping on the stomach is also unfavorable for obese people.

A person's natural posture during sleep characterizes his personality. Curled up into a ball, a person reveals his defenselessness and melancholy. Those who sleep on one side with their arms at their sides are disciplined and stubborn.

Mood

Troubles, conflicts, and stress prevent us from falling asleep on time and getting a good night's sleep. If they are repeated day after day, you will not be able to fall asleep without sleeping pills, but this will no longer be a healthy sleep, but a surrogate for it. The following techniques will help you overcome a bad mood and improve your sleep:

  • physical fatigue - work in the country, fitness classes, walks before bedtime
  • “complaints in the vest” to loved ones - help to look at problems from the outside
  • leisurely ceremony of getting ready for bed: warm shower, ventilated room, favorite music, communication with your favorite cat
  • turning off all sources of negative information: telephone, computer, TV

The biological clock also works during times of stress: larks should not torture themselves until midnight with unnecessary heart-to-heart conversations, and night owls should not go to bed early - they still won’t be able to fall asleep.

Sleep as a dialogue with the subconscious

Most importantly, dreams are necessary for a person’s harmonious life. Seeing a dream every day is a sign of agreement between the personality and the subconscious, a connection between the past, present and future. If a connection is established with the subconscious, a person develops the ability to clairvoyance. Through sleep, clearer images, predictions and warnings appear. This happens during fortune telling for the betrothed, ceremonies, various rituals for Christmastide and Christmas holidays. For example, we Armenians have the feast of St. Sarkis, when young people, having eaten a salty flatbread at night, see their future husband or wife in a dream, if this event is to happen this year. Almost 80% of people actually have a prophetic dream, this happened to me too.

Everyone wants to believe in miracles. And this miracle is provided to us by the subconscious, helping and guiding us on the true path. Then the person himself strives to have a dream every day in order to make his daily life easier. But, unfortunately, not everyone can dream dreams to order. Creative people get inspiration through dreams.

How to manage your sleep

Remembering and recording dreams is the first step towards the exciting activity of lucid dream management. To do this, you need to order a dream to the subconscious:

  1. Create a target request: imagine in detail what you would like to see in your future dream.
  2. While falling asleep, focus on the details of the ordered dream: sounds, mood, pictures.
  3. Mentally follow the plot of the dream,
  4. gradually relaxing the body.
  5. When falling into sleep, check whether everything that is happening is real, or whether it is a dream (for example, you will not be able to count the fingers on your hand in a dream).
  6. Be prepared for sleep paralysis, a condition where the brain is active but the muscles are stiff. Consciousness is filled with horror from the fact that the helpless body is threatened by ominous entities that are clearly and visibly present in the dream.
  7. When you wake up, record the dream, its events, analyze it, compare it with past dreams.

Dream control is an activity that requires time, patience and a lot of energy.

For the first time you enter controlled sleep, set yourself simple goals: fly, eat something in your sleep. Then you can plan a trip, search for people - and with each dream complicate the tasks

The nature of changes in brain activity during night rest

During sleep, people see images. For a long time they tried to understand the nature of their occurrence, decipher the secret meaning, and wanted to control them. In the Middle Ages, dreams were considered either the messages of angels or the machinations of the devil.

Esotericism, the doctrine of self-knowledge, tries to interpret visions. Psychology also finds out why we constantly have dreams, where and why they come from, because the brain must rest. The nature of this phenomenon is not fully understood even now. But the veil of secrecy has been lifted; much can be explained from a scientific point of view.

It seems that the brain does not work during sleep. But this is not so, he constantly works. Only the nature of the activity changes. The central organ of the nervous system reacts less to external stimuli and begins to classify and process the information it received during the day. It is analyzed, compared with the existing one and “sent for storage.”


In the arms of Morpheus, distractions fade into the background, many events are perceived differently, and new details become visible.

If there is no proper rest, this process is disrupted, causing information to be poorly recorded and memory to become worse.

The amazing world of dreams

People experience completely different night visions. They differ in brightness, plots, and experiences. They can be divided into several types:

It is believed that significant dreams can occur on certain days. The images that are important are those that you dreamed about before waking up (not necessarily in the morning), that are vivid and memorable. They are more filled with events, meaning and possible solutions to problems.

To interpret these plots, many dream books and tips on deciphering them are published. They explain that in an unfamiliar place, a night image can be prophetic; a guy in a girl’s dream is most likely her future husband.

Deciphering the concept of “dream”

A dream is a visual imagery, psychological images that arise in a person during sleep. Z. Freud considered them the realization of secret desires. There are scientists who do not see any meaning in night dreams.

Dreams are very closely intertwined with real life and convey their messages to it. They reflect the inner world of a person. Black and white images emerge from the immediate subconscious, reveal your personality, and help you understand yourself better. If only such dreams arise, a person relies exclusively on himself in life, relies on his own strength.

The phase that promotes the formation of dreams

Dreams happen all the time, at all stages of sleep, but they have their own differences. The slow phase accounts for 75% of the total duration. It is during this period that a person can talk in his sleep, get up, and walk. During it, dreams are fragmentary, dim, and often not connected with each other. They do not carry much meaning and are usually not remembered.

REM sleep is much shorter and may not occur at all during the daytime. It is easy to notice that the sleeper is in this phase by the movement of the eyeballs. The information, emotions, and impressions received during the day are processed. It is during such a period that it is possible to see colorful dreams with a dynamic plot and deep emotional experiences.

A person dreams every day: is it good or bad?

The question often arises: why do I have dreams every day? Is this a rule or a pathology? Seeing different scenes all night is normal for a person. The brain processes the information received at night, and dreams are a product of this analysis. If this did not happen, the day's impressions would not be structured, and the memory would become full. In this case, the person would not rest, the nervous system would be exhausted.

During dreams, the realities of time are erased. The period seems to last for many hours, but in reality it does not exceed a few minutes. There are times when you feel as if you just closed your eyes and the whole night has already passed.

Causes of good and bad dreams

Every person has had a nightmare at least once in their life. Children often have dreams with scary plots and terrible monsters. Parents may be to blame for why this happens.

Childhood is a period when a child learns new things and adapts to living conditions. Adults frighten children with various dangers, or try to make them brave, demanding correct behavior. This causes fears and anxiety in children, which transform into nightmares.

In adults, bad dreams can occur for various reasons:

Nightmares can aggravate a bad psychological mood and provoke depression.

Good dreams calm a person, help to find a compromise in relationships, and solve everyday problems. They help you think about future actions and build life plans.

Prophetic scenes of night dreams

Prophetic dreams are considered to be those whose plot later occurs in life. People have always sought to know their future, at least not very distant. And any coincidences were immediately interpreted as foresight. In such cases, they say that the dream has begun to come true. Often especially suggestible individuals even try to fit life situations into a previously seen plot.

Modern research explains this phenomenon by the work of the brain. By analyzing and comparing various facts in a dream, they draw certain conclusions. Based on past life experience, identifying details not noticed during wakefulness, the subconscious mind can predict the likely course of further events. This is transformed into various bizarre images, which are visible in dreams. If subsequent life confirms them, a person regards dreams as prophetic.

I can’t remember a dream: what’s causing it?

People have dreams every night, but what is the reason why so many people don't remember them? Some people wake up with the feeling that they saw something, but they can’t remember absolutely anything. Others claim that they never have dreams; when they go to bed, they seem to fall into emptiness. But dreams are usually much brighter and more dynamic than everyday life.

Human chronotypes

Having trouble getting up in the morning or nodding off at work does not mean being an incorrigible lazy person. In the 70s of the last century, somnologists experimentally proved that people have different chronotypes - rhythms of daily activity of the body. At least 60% of people on earth have a normal rhythm of life - they are conventionally called pigeons. A fifth of the world's population are larks - their biological clocks run ahead. Owls are people with a slow biological rhythm.

Lark

People of the early chronotype do not need an alarm clock - they easily get up at dawn and are active until lunch. In the afternoon, the performance of larks noticeably weakens - an afternoon siesta is perfect for them.

At 8–9 pm the body begins to prepare for sleep: the body temperature drops, the first portions of melatonin enter the blood. At 10 o'clock in the evening, the lark falls out of reality - an 8-hour working sleep begins for him.

Representatives of the early chronotype can adapt to disturbances if necessary. Night vigils and morning hibernation do not pass without a trace for larks. Long-term rhythm disturbance leads to depression.

Owl

For an owl, waking up on your own at dawn is just as unrealistic as getting yourself into bed before midnight. The production of cortisol in the morning is delayed - getting up without suffering is possible no earlier than 9 o'clock, or even by noon.

Before lunch, the owl spends time in a sleepy slumber - it is very difficult for an owl to do any serious work without tonics. Peak performance in people of late chronotype occurs at 6–8 pm. Projects are born, vigorous activity develops, a taste for life appears - the rest phase is pushed back to late night.

Adaptation to the daily work routine is very difficult for owls. Researchers from Japan have proven that owls, adapting to the daily rhythm of larks, risk losing sleep altogether or becoming depressed. Options for night owls: night shifts, flexible work schedules, freelancing - where peak performance occurs later in the day.

Even larks and owls tend to lie at different times: early birds prefer to deceive in the evenings, and lovers of night vigils usually lie in the morning

People who don't dream

All people see dreams, usually more than one per night. But not everyone remembers their visions well; on average, this is 2-3 cases per week. There are people who believe that they do not dream. They just don't remember them.

The sleep of such a person is very deep; he wakes up in the slow-wave sleep phase and forgets his dreams. If you wake him up at the end of REM sleep, he will be able to remember what he saw in his dream. There are situations when a person did not have dreams for a long time, but at some point he began to have dreams every day.

What do our smaller brothers dream about?

Dreams are experienced by those animals that have managed to record the REM phase - sleep with rapid eye movement and increased brain activity. Reptiles, amphibians and fish do not have a REM sleep phase and, most likely, do not dream.

But in birds and mammals, the REM phase occupies from 1 to 20% of the sleepy state. In dreams, our pets move their whiskers, move their paws, whine, squeal and even bark. Scientists managed to penetrate into the secret of these experiences.

  1. Cats were the first to reveal the contents of their dreams. It is known that during the REM stage of sleep, the muscles of the sleeper are paralyzed. The researchers removed the part of the brain from the test pussy that carried paralyzing signals to the muscles. The sleeping cat got the opportunity to move during the dream: she jumped up, sneaked up, attacked - demonstrated all the techniques of hunting mice familiar to her. It turned out that our little brothers also experience real life impressions in their dreams.
  2. The following experiment with rats shows how animals solve vital problems for them in dreams. Experimental rats had electrodes implanted into their brains. With their help, scientists observed the behavior of a rodent as it searched for food in the maze. While in sleep, the rat showed activity in the same brain centers that searched for food in the real world. By looking at the encephalogram, scientists could tell exactly which part of the maze the cheese seeker was currently dreaming about.
  3. Bird dreams are a rehearsal for their creativity. Each note of birds' chirping excites certain neurons in their brains. Encephalograms of experimental finches show that in their sleep they try to sing all the notes that they produce while awake.

It is difficult to say whether animals remember their dreams. Even people forget 90% of their dreams.

A cat that purrs in its sleep for up to 16 hours a day can heal not only itself, but also its owners.

Why do I start having dreams every day?

The question of why people dream every day is more often asked by people who believe that they rarely see them. Some people worry about whether it will interfere with their night's rest, while others worry about recurring dreams or nightmares.

Despite the fact that sleep occupies a decent part of our lives, some of its mysteries have not yet been solved. Scientists still cannot accurately answer the question of why we have dreams and why they are needed. However, they can already tell how often we should see them and what their frequent appearance or, conversely, absence may mean.

Expert help and recommendations

Often, negative visions in a dream are only a consequence of the emotions experienced during the day. Despite this, you need to know what to do if you have bad dreams every day. After all, they can be a sign of a serious illness.

Frequent awakenings in a panic state require a visit to a specialist. Sometimes you may need to consult a psychologist or sleep specialist. Don't be shy to ask for help, otherwise nightmares can lead to mental disorders.

To get rid of terrible visions, you should take into account some tips:

  • It is necessary to normalize the day and night routine.
  • Before going to bed, you need to create the most comfortable conditions for rest.
  • It is necessary to get rid of bad habits.
  • You should not overeat before bed and it is better not to take sleeping pills.
  • Stressful situations should be avoided.
  • You can keep a diary in which you should record the emotions and dreams you experience.
  • You can't watch horror movies before bed. It is better to limit viewing of films of this genre during the day.
  • You can practice meditation and relaxation before bed.
  • It is recommended to take relaxing baths in the evening.

Living in harmony with the world around you, believing in yourself and your strengths, you can easily cope with bad dreams. Indeed, in most cases, their cause lies in ourselves.

Source



When we dream

There is nothing abnormal about a person constantly having dreams. Some people feel that they see them rarely or not at all, and therefore are surprised when dreams begin to visit them too often. In fact, we all have dreams every night, and more than once.

Dreams occur during REM sleep.

At this moment, the brain begins to work more actively, and this affects the entire body:

Any of these signs indicates that the person had a dream. If you wake him up in the active phase, he is likely to remember the dream in detail. But if you do this after entering the slow phase of sleep, he is likely to forget what he saw.

The physical activity of the person having the dream depends on its content. So a nightmare can cause screams and thrashing in bed, and an erotic dream can end in a waking orgasm.

The phases of slow-wave sleep and rapid eye movement sleep (also called the rapid movement phase - REM) constitute a single cycle lasting one and a half hours. During 7-8 hours of sleep, it manages to repeat itself 4-5 times. And at the end of each cycle, a person has a chance to have a dream. However, he may simply not remember this.

History of sleep research

In ancient times, sleep was considered the border between life and death. In ancient Greek mythology, the god of sleep Hypnos was the brother of Thanatos, the god of death. The ancient philosopher Aristotle imagined sleep as a passive state, similar to death: the sleeper does not feel anything, which means he is more dead than alive. The authority of the ancient thinker was so high that for a long time European science showed no interest in the study of sleep.

Sleep deprivation

The problem of the importance of sleep for a living organism was raised at the end of the 19th century by a female doctor from Russia M. M. Manaseina. She conducted experiments on dogs, depriving them of sleep. Within 5 days, the animals died due to the degradation of brain cells. Further experiments confirmed that animals deprived of the opportunity to sleep die after 2–3 weeks due to the complete destruction of the immune system.

At the beginning of the 20th century, physiologists from Germany, France and Japan experimentally established that well-rested animals instantly fall asleep again as soon as they are transfused with the blood of sleep-deprived dogs. 100 years later, already in our time, adenosine was discovered - a product of energy reactions in the cells of the body. It causes drowsiness and inhibition processes in the brain.

Electroencephalography

The impetus for the objective study of sleep was the invention of G. Berger. In 1928, he found a way to record electrical impulses coming from the brain. The state of wakefulness is characterized by oscillations with high frequency and low amplitude - the β rhythm. In a state of deep sleep, the brain sends low-frequency signals with high amplitude - the δ rhythm. Thus, scientists have the opportunity to know for sure when a person is sleeping and when he is awake. At that time, it was believed that a sleeping person was in the same state of deep sleep.

In 1949, the Italians G. Moruzzi and H. Maguna discovered in the brain stem a center responsible for changing states of wakefulness and sleep - the reticular formation. When this center is damaged, the brain falls into an uninterrupted sleep - coma.

Discovery of REM sleep

1953 is considered the year of birth of the science of sleep - somnology. The American physiologist N. Kleitman and his assistants discovered and described the phenomenon of rapid eye movement, which periodically occurs in a sleeping person. This sleep cycle is called the Rapid Eye Movement (REM) phase. Scientists have proven that REM sleep is characteristic of all sleeping people. The subjects, awakened in the rapid eye movement phase, emotionally and colorfully described the scenes they dreamed about. This gave grounds to assert that it is in the REM phase that a person experiences dreams.

In 1959, the Frenchman M. Jouvet discovered the phenomenon of paradoxical sleep: with maximum brain activity in the REM sleep stage, the sleeper cannot move either his leg or his arm - the muscles were paralyzed. Caring nature made sure that the sleeping hero of the dream did not harm himself with sudden movements.

The ability to sleep anywhere and in any position is a sign of severe sleep deficiency. Sleeping in a public place is considered natural for the Japanese, because 40% of the population of this country sleeps less than 6 hours a day

Who often dreams

Why do some people have dreams every day, while others are absolutely sure that they don’t see them at all? It all depends on the psyche of the person himself, his physical condition, lifestyle and temperament.

Who often dreams and why:

Nightmares or recurring unpleasant dreams can be a cause for concern, but a complete absence of dreams is a much more worrisome sign. If a person really does not dream, it means that there is no REM phase in his night cycle, and the body does not receive normal rest.

If the reason why you often have vivid dreams is an overload of the nervous system, a good rest will help relieve excess stress. You can also get rid of excess stress through relaxation practices such as meditation and autogenic training.

Why are dreams forgotten?

Some theories about the origin of dreams claim that they are needed to process and sort information entering the brain. The necessary data is stored in long-term memory, and everything unnecessary is deleted. According to these hypotheses, forgotten dreams are discarded informational garbage.

There are suggestions that the brain specifically produces information in the form of certain images in order, based on the reaction to them, to decide what needs to be saved and what to discard. Thus, our consciousness is freed from the data accumulated during the day.

If you want to remember your dreams, there are several ways to do this:

If you often begin to have dreams, do not worry ahead of time. Most likely, the reason lies in your condition or the influence of external circumstances.

Dreams may contain a hint or warning from the subconscious; you can try to interpret them using a dream book. In case of recurring nightmares, it is worth visiting a somnologist.

Source

Why are there periods when a person does not dream?

There are different people who can see dreams at some periods of their lives and not at others. It all depends on the state of mind and specific experiences.

Usually a person cannot remember dreams if everyday reality has caused severe disappointment, great excitement and passions that the subconscious does not accept.

Such psychotrauma can be acute or chronic. If a person is forced to work or study at a job that is completely uninteresting or unpleasant to him, then dreams stop.

Or, on the contrary, he often begins to see incoherent plots that do not bode well and cause a feeling of dissatisfaction and disappointment.

Dreams often do not come for the following reasons: Nature protects the psyche from traumatic experiences, so at this time a person either has no dreams at all or night scenes become plotless and unmemorable. Some people even think that they don’t dream. In fact, this is not so and everyone has dreams, but they cannot remember them, either because the plot was blurry and did not carry any information, or the subconscious blocked access to nightly information.

Paradoxes of sleep

Science is exploring sleep patterns. But some facts remain unexplained.

  1. The dreams of former smokers are much more vivid than those of anyone who did not have this habit at all.
  2. When the natives of Bali are extremely frightened by something, they instantly fall asleep.
  3. During the First World War, P. Kern received a fatal wound to the head. He miraculously survived, but spent 40 years of his subsequent life without sleep.
  4. A tightrope walker from France, A. Rochatin, lived for six months on a wire stretched at a height of 25 meters. The bottom of the bed on which he slept was placed on a rope.
  5. On the night of April 4, 1865, A. Lincoln had a dream in which he saw his own funeral. He recorded this dream in his diary. 10 days later he was killed in Washington during a performance.

Why does a person dream about something every day?

If a person is physically healthy and not overworked, then immersing himself in the world of dreams brings him vivid night scenes. Is it normal for them to come while you are resting at night every day? It depends on the specific plot of the dream.

Any person in a healthy and calm state can see ordinary dreams, in which there are vivid events, various night visions.

They can be prophetic in some cases or convey information about the future or present in a symbolic form. For example, you suspect a colleague of insincerity and falsehood, but you drive this thought away from yourself.

During sleep, relaxation occurs and in night images the dreamer dreams of what actually happens. This could be either a prophetic dream that reveals future events, or the disclosure of classified information that you did not pay attention to during the day.

Depending on what caused the suspicion of insincerity, you see stories of different content. For example, one girl may have a dream in which a colleague smiles in her eyes, and she gossips about her to her superiors.

Or he flirts with her boyfriend in an informal setting, trying to pretend that nothing happened.

Why do you have scary stories? Usually such dreams reflect either the dreamer’s anxiety or the approach of dangerous and unpleasant events. If you dream that you find yourself in danger, in extreme situations, this indicates difficulties and difficult circumstances in life. By the way, based on the plots of recurring dreams that you have every day, you can identify the problem and get rid of the obsession. Dreams should be interpreted depending on the recurring element, and all daily dreams can be divided into several categories:

They do not carry any information about the future and in some situations instill sad and unpleasant thoughts. A person usually dreams of them if he has a lot of things to do and worries that he cannot get started with;

The most common plots of recurring dreams and their interpretation

There are several such shots; they are caused both by the anxiety of the dreamer himself and by various experiences, including danger that may be close.
In such dreams, it is important to interpret every detail, but the main attention should be paid to the chain of repeating night scenes. Here are the most common plots that can predict various events or indicate a problem.

  • hurry, hurry, be late for a train, bus or plane. Such dreams reflect the dreamer’s anxiety and fear of not having time to do something or engage in important activities and work.
Rating
( 1 rating, average 4 out of 5 )
Did you like the article? Share with friends:
For any suggestions regarding the site: [email protected]
Для любых предложений по сайту: [email protected]