Reasons of Dreaming

 

Dream is very common thing for all of us. We all use to dream, even in present time software engineers have been analyzing the dreams of their computers. Long ago in Mesopotamian civilization Oneiromancy was practiced which is a form of divination in which dreams are interpreted in order to predict the future. Thousand years later ancient Egyptians wrote a ‘Dream book’ listing over many types of dreams with their interpretations. Since then we have not paused to find out why we dream. Even after great innovations of scientific research, technological advancement and persistence we don’t have any proper answers. Here in this article I’m trying share my opinions on the reasons of dreaming. 

 WE DREAM TO KEEP OUR BRAIN WORKING

Sleep is the single most effective thing we can do to rest our brain and physical health each day. Atop of sleep, dreaming provides essential emotional first aid and a unique form of informational alchemy. If we wish to be as healthy, happy, and creative as possible, these are facts well worth waking up to. ‘Continual Activation Theory’ says that our dreams result from our brain’s need to continuously consolidate and create long term memories in order to function in a correct way. So when external input falls below a certain level, like when we sleep, our brain naturally triggers the generation of data from its memory storages, which appear to us in the form of the thoughts and feelings we experience in our dreams. In other words, your dreams might be a random screensaver your brain turns on so it doesn’t completely shut down. 

WE DREAM TO HEAL OURSELVES

Dreams help us heal. Although dreams can be perplexing and even frightening at times, they are vital for our emotional health as human beings. In fact, interestingly enough, one of the most common comparable that people suffering with depression share in common is insomnia. Stress neurotransmitters in the brain are little active during the REM stage of sleep, during dreams of traumatic experiences, leading some researchers to theorize that one purpose of dreaming is to take the edge off painful experiences to allow for psychological healing. Flash-backing traumatic events in our dreams with less mental stress may grant us a clearer perspective and an enhanced ability to process them in psychologically healthy ways. People with certain mood disorders and PTSD often have difficulty sleeping, leading scientists to believe that lack of dreaming may be a contributing factor to their illnesses. 

 WE DREAM TO FIND SOLUTIONS OF PROBLEMS

The answer to our problems may be found in our dreams. During sleep, dreams may offer solutions to difficulties within a week after the trouble starts, in our dreams our mind can create limitless scenarios to help us grasp problems and formulate solutions that we may not consider while awake. Nobel Laureate American author John Steinbeck called it “the Committee of Sleep” and research has demonstrated the effectiveness of dreaming on problem solving. There is a nice story which I must share here which is related with the topic the story is about Elias Howe, who was an American inventor who wanted to refine the concept and design of sewing machines of the 1800s. He struggled with the key component of an automated stitch until it came to him in a dream. Howe’s original idea was to follow the model of the ordinary needle, and have the eye of the needle located at the heel. This did not work for what he wanted to accomplish. In his dream, he was being chased and attacked by cannibals with spears that had holes in their tips. It was after this dream that he realized that the needle in his invention must have a hole in the tip to put the thread through it, which lead to an innovative, efficient, and functional design used in modern day sewing machines. It’s also how renowned chemist August Kekule discovered the structure of the benzene molecule, and it’s the reason that sometimes the best solution for a problem is to “sleep on it”. 

WE DREAM TO FORGET 

There are nearly ten thousand trillion neural connections within the architecture of our brain. They are created by everything we think, and everything we do. As per "reverse learning theory" which is basically a neurobiological theory of dreaming, we dream to get rid of undesirable connections and associations that build up in our brains throughout the day. Basically, dreams are garbage collection mechanisms, clearing our minds of useless thoughts and making way for better ones. Essentially, we dream in order to forget. Dreams help us eliminate the information overload of daily life and retain only the most important data. To say more elaborately while sleeping, and mainly during REM sleep cycles, our neocortex reviews all ten thousand trillion neural connections within the architecture of our brain and dumps the unnecessary ones. Without this unlearning process, which results in our dreams, our brain could be overrun by useless connections, and parasitic thoughts could disrupt the necessary thinking we need to do while we’re awake. 

WE DREAM TO REMEMBER

To increase performance on certain mental tasks, sleep is good, but dreaming while sleeping is better. We actually dream to remember rather than forget. It's based on a number of studies that show people remember what they've learned better if they dream after learning it.  It is also scientifically proven that people go to sleep right after a traumatic experience that they are more likely to remember and be haunted by the trauma. So one form of triage for traumatized people is to keep them awake and talking for several hours, even if they are exhausted, to prevent this traumatic memory consolidation from happening. Researchers theorize that certain memory processes can happen only when we are asleep, and our dreams are a signal that these processes are taking place. 

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