What is a dream? Oxford English Dictionary has two definitions that I believe are the main things we think of when we hear the word dream. The first definition is “a train of thoughts, images, or fancies passing through the mind during sleep.” The second definition is “an ideal or aspiration.” After reading Arlen's post on dreams and sleep habit, I decided to focus on the first definition.
In Arlen's post, he mentions that he rarely has dreams and lists out a few reasons why he doesn't think he dreams. I thought that his reason of sleeping “a consistent amount and on a regular basis” was very unique and one I had never heard of or thought about before. As I thought about it though, the logic there seems a bit flawed. If a person is able to sleep more, I would think that there is a higher likelihood of a dream occurring. Also, by sleeping more, a person enters more REM cycles. REM sleep has been associated with dreaming. One possible explanation as to why Arlen might not think he dreams is because he does not remember them. If a person wakes up during the REM cycle of sleep, they are very likely to remember dreaming about something. However, if they don't, there is a higher likelihood that they will not remember if they dreamt about anything. When he mentioned that he does not eat spicy food, it got me a little curious about the connection between spicy food and dreams. I did a quick search and supposedly, if you eat spicy food, you have disturbing dreams. That part really surprised me, as I enjoy spicy food. I eat pho fairly often, and every time I always douse the soup with so much hot sauce that it ends up turning red. I also use hot sauce or chili oil in some random foods and I rarely have disturbing dreams.
There are various theories as to why we dream and what dreams mean. Some people believe that dreams hold no real purpose and that it just occurs while you sleep. Others believe dreaming allows the mind to be satisfied through fantasy. Maybe dreaming helps us regulate our moods. There is no consensus in explaining why people dream. The simplest explanation given is that the function of dreams has yet to be discovered. As for what dreams mean, there appears to be numerous ways they can be interpreted. A search on Google using the terms “dream analysis” yield over 1.1 million results. One interesting theory about dreams was Freud's interpretation. He believes we dream to satisfy unconscious wishes which are represented with symbols. Under this theory, a therapist's aid is needed to help interpret the symbols to help uncover a patient's hidden desires. Another theory states that dreams provide clues to the person's problems, concerns, and emotions. I think this theory makes a lot of sense. During a day, we as humans are constantly under stress from various factors. Whether it be from work, family, bills, or paying an arm and a leg for gas, we are barraged by things that stress us out and worry us. It would not be surprising that some of these worries drift into our dreams. Then again, who can explain a dream where you are eating a donut shaped like a laundry basket?!
Dreams are supposed to be a train of thoughts passing through the mind during sleep. Sometimes it is clearly seen to be, as dreams can help us uncover our problems that bother us. However, not all of us dream constantly and it is hard to know what we think about while we sleep. Until we can figure out why we dream, endless interpretations of dreams will occur.
2 comments:
Denny, this is an excellent response to Arlen's post. It is true that dreaming is a complex act—this is true both for any single individual and for people trying to figure out what dreams 'mean'. Probably the most discouraging yet interesting theory is that dreams don't 'mean' anything, or that they represent the fundamental meaninglessness of life—because we dream, we know that being is ineffable. I'm not quite saying that I believe this, but it certainly seems like it is worth considering in our endless interpretations of dreams. (What about animal dreams? No one has discussed this yet. I've seen cats and dogs have dreams, for sure.)
Nice post.
In response to your theory about me just forgetting my dreams, I think I'm just not getting into the REM cycle of sleep. I don’t think I’m forgetting my dreams because I had a dream two nights ago, that I remembered. I don’t remember what the dream was about, but I remembered that I had a dream.
But, maybe you are right. Maybe I forget my dreams so quickly that I never knew they existed. Maybe the only reason I remembered that I had a dream two nights ago was because I was trying to prove to myself that I wasn’t forgetting my dreams (For example: If you are vigilantly trying to see if anyone forgot to put on deodorant by concentrating on every person’s smell as they go by, then you’ll smell BO, when it’s there, but if you aren’t going out of your way to look for BO, then you probably won’t smell it). If that was the case, though, I would have remembered my dream from last night and I didn’t, so I think I’m not getting into the REM cycle of sleep.
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