Is there a connection between dreams and reality?

Veronica Tropper was watching a documentary about the Pearl Harbour with her family late at night. To the majority of the population watching a documentary late at night can be a very drowsy experience. As expected, Veronica fell asleep.  Suddenly she found herself ‘watching a large commercial jet crashing into a very tall building’…

She woke up feeling extremely disturbed. Eventually she did shake the feeling off and return to sleeping. Exactly 3 days later, United Airlines (a commercial jet) crashed into the twin towers (a very tall building).

The twin towers [Credits: Google images]

Dreams.

 Since the dawn of mankind, dreams have fascinated us. The cavemen used to draw their dreams on tiny clay tablets. The Greeks and Romans used to view dreams as a message from God or from the dead. The ancient Egyptians would even have books that stated what each dream meant.

What are dreams?

 Though science is developing at an astounding pace, most of us (mainly the scientists) are still baffled with the brain.

This also applies with dreams. If you go to Wikipedia and read the section on dreams, you will only find a massive list of theories about what dreams are and why they occur. However, there is actually no solid explanation. In fact, MedicalNewsToday states that “there is no cognitive state as extensive studied and yet as frequently misunderstood as dreaming.”

However, most brain researchers have established for sure when dreams occur. We often sleep in 5 stages (For an in-depth explanation about sleep stages, click here to read my Quora post).  One of the sleep stages is called REM (Rapid Eye Movement). During REM the blood pressure increase, the eyes move much more, and we start dreaming…

So, what are dreams?

Well, dreams are thought to be a part in your sleep where the dreamer has reduced controls over the content, visual images and activation of the memory.

Why do dreams occur and how do they shape up?

Dreams are thought to occur for the following reason:

• Interpretation of different signals from the brain and body
• Information gathering and re-processing
• Refreshing the memory

We can see from the above that dreams mostly occur as a by-product of a bodily process. This also means that most of our dreams are usually connected to what is happening in our real life. Yet it does not come in the way you think.  A research report by Mr. Robert Stick Gold questioned 330 adults about their dreams and found that they are connected in a symbolical way;

• Dreams which usually contain nightmares are associated with depression, illness, anxiety and trauma.
• Dreams about characters (friends, family, movie heroes, etc.) are usually associated with happiness, ease of mind.
• Dreams that feel like they have happened in real life usually mean that it has actually happened in real life. What you saw was the short-term memory being converted into long term memory.
• Dreams that show objects such as books, beer bottles, etc. are usually connected with a relational conflict.
• Dreams have also known to show whether a person has a disease or not. For example, many cancer patients have dreamt to see themselves having a lump on a specific part of their body. These dreamers usually go on to find out that they have cancer

Meaning of Dreams – A story of interpretation

 At the end of the day, it is very difficult to pin point why dreams occur and what exactly they convey. Most dreams are connected to real life in one form or the other. Yet it is all about interpretation. I was reading one research report which tested 133 adults about their dreams and concluded that dreams about airplanes usually signify a transition. However, another research report tested the dreams of 152 adults in 1980 and another 150 adults in 2010. They found that the adults in 2010 dreamt 10% more about airplanes. Ergo, they concluded that dreams relating to airplanes usually signify that the dreamer has been traveling a lot.

This led to me believe that finding the meaning of dreams are all about interpretation. We just have to follow our intuition and perceive whether the nightmare we had was because of the horror movie we watched yesterday or perhaps a forewarning or simply, plainly, basically, nothing…meaningless.