Dreams occupy a special place in the human experience. Along with sleep, dreams seem necessary for our survival and well-being. What we experience in our dreams is subject to many interpretations. The effects are usually,, but not always subtle, if we can remember them at all. So what is the power of dreams and how can understanding dream states be useful and help us in our lives?
Usually, the dreams I remember most are sexual one. However the more powerful ones tend to be the one that I wind up seeing through someone else's eyes, feeling what they feel. I becomes quite disconcerting, because It isn't a familiar body, it doesn't feel like me, and eventually I just wake-up because I can't process the sensations. If I've actually done those things, then all these SciFi shows where someone takes over another body, are all BS. How do you cope when your hands don't feel like your hands, and your teeth feel wrong in your mouth?
The ones that I remember are the recurring ones. I suppose those must be important. Maybe something that still hasn't been worked out. Certainly traumatic events feature in our dreams. We may forget them afterwards. That could be something beneficial. Do we rewire our DNA during sleep? Is our brain rewiring itself while replaying events real, feared, imagined to help us cope? Do dreams succeed in helping with something like PTSD, or do they make it worse?
So far, none of my dreams have assisted me with my own PTSD, and my only solution has been avoidance. Without going into major detail. I was the victim of a serious dog attack, and the authorities simply wrote it off and told me to get over it. I can't approach or be approached by a dog larger than a toy poodle anymore. I don't usually have traumatic dreams. I have had falling dreams and eventually the desire to see it through got the better of me, and each time, I land on something soft, of land like a cat, or am plucked out of the air. But it hasn't given me relief from a fear of falling. I don't mind heights, but standing too close to the edge, and i begin to panic. I also have to wonder if dreams are solely a personal phenomenon, or can others affect the dream? I don't mean dreaming about someone you met or anything so bland. But if you know someone, have had contact with them, even if nothing more than a handshake. Would, having a chemical bond with someone allow them to affect your dream, even if they are not present when you begin dreaming?
Dreams have always puzzled me. Mine start off with me being lost, then unable to find my car. Then I get back to a sort of commune where supposedly I am staying, but other people seem to be sleeping in my area and all my stuff is missing. Then when I go out to sort things out, I seem to be able to spirit myself a few inches off the ground and travel at the speed of a motorbike. I then arrive at some sort of shop, but I don't want to go inside, because my trousers are mysteriously missing. Then I wake up, sometimes asking Jane what she has done with my trousers. She just looks puzzled. Variants of this dream have been going on for more than 40 years, some of them including cold hotels and theatres, where somehow I am responsible for the boilers. In one of hem the boiler house was large enough to heat a city, but nothing worked. Somehow, these dreams always seem to be in the past, probably before I was born. I always wonder whether they have some links to what we assume is reincarnation. With my engineering abilities that just seem like common sense to me, perhaps I was Brunel in a previous life. Or perhaps I just arrived from the planet Zoc. Jane agrees with that one. PS, perhaps no one has invented trousers on Zoc.
