FuglyDuck@lemmy.world 1 day ago
As far as I know- and I’m far from an expert here- dreams are really just your brain trying to make sense of your brain doing whatever the fuck it is your brain is doing why you sleep. (maybe a de-fragmentation cycle to keep everything nice and functional? bad analogy, probably.)
in any case, your brain is trying to make sense of signals and synapses firing off, in what is basically a random pattern. so it cobbles together a reality as best it can and fit things to that.
Its also trying to maintain a certain amount of continuity with where you are. So, if you’re anxious while you fall a sleep, your brain is going to incorporate that anxiety.
Also, as Bigfish mentioned, the freaky/weird/anxious ones are more likely to wake you up so that you actually remember them.
In any case, I would suggest maybe changing your bedtime routine up and finding something positive/calming to focus on. crotchet works well for me. but it could be just about anything. a feel-good novel, or whatever. (I also suggest turning the screens off.)
might not change that the only things you remember are the unpleasant ones, but it might make them less frequent.
Thorry@feddit.org 1 day ago
This is mostly correct. It’s also the case that “dreams” are formed after you wake up. You aren’t dreaming while you are asleep, your brain is firing random shit that makes no sense. As soon as you start to wake it tries to piece together what the fuck was going on into something resembling a narrative. This piecing together is part of the waking up and not a part of the sleeping. This is why you can have a dream about an alarm going of for seemingly tens of minutes or even hours, while you are being woken up by your alarm going off. Your alarm probably hasn’t been going for more than a few seconds, but your brain incorporates it into the narrative. Now this isn’t to say you can’t have a bad dream or nightmare and be woken up by them. The random firing can definitely cause enough stress to wake you up. Especially if you are ill (fever dreams) or under a lot of stress in general, your brain can misbehave during sleep and wake you up. It’s just that the “story” part of the dream only happens when you wake up, while you are sleeping it is random.
whaleross@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Oh this is interesting. I’ve recently come to terms with the amazing plasticity of the brain. So if the brain assembles a narrative only after the flood of random stimuli, it should be possible to train it to use certain baselines for what narratives to assemble.
Any neurologists and psychiatrists and other brain specialists in the house?
FuglyDuck@lemmy.world 1 day ago
IIRC, what you’re describing is called Lucid Dreaming. most people who lucid dream are aware, though some can actively control their dreams. The degree of control varies, though.
HeyThisIsntTheYMCA@lemmy.world 13 hours ago
I’m pretty much a god when I lucid dream. The imagined reality is very malleable
whaleross@lemmy.world 1 day ago
I think it sounds like something different. Lucid dreaming is being in a state between awake and asleep to stay in first person control with the brain in unrestrained creative mode, while this is about training the brain to make up desired interpretations after waking up from full sleep mode.