There are dreams that we simply do not remember, and even wrongly claim that tonight I did not dream. Everyone dreams, even the blind people who during the day do not see certain images or colours. But there are dreams that surprise, scare, move us, regardless of how superstitious we are, and make us look for a dream interpretation book, or most likely make us try finding one in google.com.
Photo of the ( source )
On one hand it is a positive thing because you try to cognize yourself and your visions, you try to get to know your brain pot better - what exactly is boiling there. Maybe in such a way you find a solution to an incumbent problem because not without a reason scientists say that when the human body is resting, his brain activity is twice as active. Interestingly, even the studies show that the number of calories burned while dreaming is greater than staying awake sitting in front of the television. It is possible that the dream points to the cause of the problem or shows a way of solving it.
On the other hand, nowadays when the dreams have been thoroughly examined through psychoanalysis, Freud and K. G. Jung dream interpretations, it can be argued that all the so-called dream glossaries are a complete nonsense. Every person`s dream is deeply subjective. One and the same vision, object or situation to one person can mean - disease, injury, or something like that, to another it means only changes in their lives that lead to something good and long-awaited.
Either way, the dream still remains a non-completely explored area that has always captivated researchers, scientists, psychologists, astrologers, healers and every one of us. Why not if we spend at least a third of our lives dreaming.
An attempt to interpret and in some way systematize (what people usually want to do) dreams took place in the second century AD, when the Greek philosopher Artemidorus (Ἀρτεμίδωρος ο Δαλδιανός) wrote the treatise ''Oneirocritica" in five books. He provided the interpretation of more than 3000 dreams. The first edition of this book was published in Venice in 1518 and was later translated and re-published in Latin.
The 1518 edition of "Oneirocritica" and the Latin version.
Even before Artemidorus and B.C. there are written evidence of the interpretation of dreams but the author of "Oneirocritica" does not simply confine himself with only the things common in his society. He gathered information and adjusted it to the dreamer according to their occupation, life style, social layer, and sex. Also nowadays we talk about gender based differences in dreams.
Oneiros- ancient Greek. "a dream" and the name comes from the science, that studies dreams - oneirology. Examining the sources in Latvian I found almost nothing unlike the information in English and Russian. So briefly about it. Oneirology correlates the process of dreaming that consists of different stages of the so called "REM sleep" (they last for about 20 minutes and repeat every 2-3 hours) with the rapid eye movement. So while watching somebody sleep it is easy to tell when they are dreaming. Furthermore, the pulse quickens and breathing becomes erratic in the stage of dreaming. Also a complete body paralysis, freezing takes place.
Stages of sleep (source) & Dali`s "Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bee Around a Pomegranate a Second Before Awakening" (1944)
Many have managed to catch or feel the latter feeling (at least I have felt it myself and a few friends have admitted to have felt it and told me about it). If suddenly something like a noise or touch) wakes you up during "REM sleep" then it feels as if the mind had waken up but the body is still paralysed. I must say one can get scared pretty much.
Mystics tend to call this paralysis "the small death of the body" when a person is balancing between this world and another one. Moreover, in recent years, new speculations on the understanding of the reality have emerged together with such movies as „Matrix”(1999), „Inception”(2010) etc, giving dreams and waking up a whole new meaning. Provocative questions are asked -is our reality just one of the stages of a dream?
Then a person starts asking questions about conscious dreams and controlled dreams (that is also one of the things people lie to do). I remember how my mother told me that in Soviet times during her studies (in the 70s) experiments were conducted in Riga where students were asked to come to laboratories to sleep and the process of their sleeping was examined; there were discussions of acquiring knowledge and foreign languages in the state of sleeping. I am wondering, are any similar experiments conducted nowadays?
I am not sure if a deliberate manipulation of dreams is a good thing even though it can have positive results on a person`s real life. I rather agree to the suggestion to note, write down our dreams thus understanding them better and discovering some episodes that recur and point to something essential in one`s life.
» Comments