by Mabon Dane

Created on: February 18, 2010

"The dream shows the inner truth and reality of the patient as it really is: not as I conjecture it to be, and not as he would like it to be, but as it is." So said Carl Jung of dreams. The dream is the best personal advisor and friend you will ever need, once you understand the metaphorical language of dream you will realise the dream will speak the harsh truth about you and your life.

Jung, Freud and many others have put forward theories on why we dream. Many scientific studies have been made on dreams.  Hundreds of books have been written about dreams.  And the debate rages among the great minds upon this very question.

We all dream. That is, those of us who have no brain damage. Some of us may not remember we dream, but we dream.  Dreams occur in one of four sleep cycles that rotate several times in a single night of sleep, called REM sleep.  REM sleep, short for rapid eye movement, so called because in sleep laboratories it was noted the eyes twitch rapidly in the dreaming stage, occupies 20-25% of total sleep.

A clue as to why we dream may be suggested from the fact that newborn babies spend more than 80% of their sleep time in REM, and this proportion of REM sleep drops the further we age.  The second clue is that studies have shown there is a link between REM sleep and memory, those deprived of sleep have trouble remembering and learning new things. As a newborn we are inundated with experiences and knowledge about our new world, information that our small brains will process, making sense and organising this information as efficiently as possible.  A newborn brain will like a computer be in downtime most of the time, as their brain processes the information in REM sleep. As we get older, our need to learn new skills and information drops off markedly compared to our younger days, reflected in a substantial drop in REM sleep.

An individual will hold their daily experiences in short term memory until they sleep, REM sleep will then process the information into long term memory by stimulating neurons to grow new connections, rewiring others, and even stimulating neural stem cells to create new neurons that migrate across the highways of the brain.

We dream to help us learn. Dreams can also give us insight. Sleep and dreaming is not a matter of choice. Failure to sleep will eventually cause insanity and death. Failure to dream will result in poor learning and memory recall. As longs no drugs interfere, dreaming will naturally

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