The Right Direction Towards Advancement

First, let examined the definition of dream according to Sigmund Freud “dream is the disguised fulfilment of a repressed wish. Dreams are constructed like a neurotic symptom:

This is a short article written by a collaboration of people by a company named Today’s Science. Their main goal was to describe the pattern of sleep a human goes through during the night. This cycle is called NREM and REM, non-rapid eye movement and rapid eye movement. They mostly describe what happens during sleep because without sleeping you could not dream. Dreaming occurs during the rapid eye movement cyc

A series of thoughts, images, and sensations that occur during a person’s mind during the time that they sleep is known as a dream. Dreams go way back until the beginning of mankind, even to the BC era during the time that Egyptians and Greeks were the leading force! The Egyptians examined the meanings behind the dreams we have and analyzed the symbols. There are a numerous amount of reasons behind our dreams. People must ask all the time, what is the reasoning behind dreaming? Why do we dream? What is the meaning behind the dream I had? In an average lifetime, approximately six years is spent dreaming. Every single person on this planet dreams and just because one might not remember doing so, it was still done. One might have several dreams occur throughout a normal night of sleep that lasts from about seven to eight hours. Everyone has dreams and each experience is distinctive and personal. Some can contain vivid pictures or memorable illustrations of reality and others can be unreal or abstract. In a way, they all have certain meanings to them and there can be messages hidden that are trying to tell someone something. An abundant amount of people are always curious as to why they dreamed what they did and spend time looking for those answers.

We spend six years of our lives in sleep and many of us do not think about what occurs while asleep. Everyone has experienced more than a few dreams while asleep, that is because, whether you know it or not, everyone dreams while asleep. Based off the Activation Information Mode Model theory, dreams are random neurological firings that have no particular meaning. The reason dreams feel so real and personal is because they are based from recent memories located in the brainstem. Although dreams are meaningless, our brain tries to make connections. Through the Activation Information Mode model people are able to analysis personal dreams.

To many people, dreams are the thoughts that occur while sleeping, having almost mystic qualities. For millennia the significance of dreams has escaped even the brightest of philosophers and intellectuals. Many people have speculated about why people dream and what meanings the dreams have but in recent times two theories have gained credibility in answering those questions. The first theory is Sigmund Freuds and the other is known as the cognitive theory of dreams also known as biological determinism.

As we lay ourselves down every night to put our bodies to rest, our brains begin doing something extraordinary. It begins piecing together images, creating scenarios, simulating sensory perception, and adding in emotions and fears. They can make us wake up with a smile on our face or in a cold sweat. Dreaming is such a strange and often inexplicable phenomenon, but something we all do just about every night. People have theorized the process and the utility of dreams for centuries. However, much of the accepted knowledge we have a bout dreams today is still only theory. In fact, hardly anything about the dreaming experience is concrete because it is an experience

A dream, by definition, is a sequence of emotions, ideas, images, and sensations that involuntarily occur in the mind at various times; typically during the rapid-eye movement (REM) stage of sleep (American Heritage Dictionary, 2000). Throughout history, dreams have been the cause of much speculation; holding both philosophical and religious interests (Hobson, 2009). Before the days of scientific research, opinions varied regarding dreams, and their usefulness in psychotherapy. Dreams were often viewed as either being divinely inspired or having derived from a dark, evil source. Even in today’s scientifically advanced society; dreams are still not totally understood.

Dreams are the language of a person's subconscious mind. Therefore, taking the opportunity to understand them can lead to great enrichment. This paper demonstrates the similarities and differences between Freud and Jung's idea on dream theory. It illustrates Freud's belief that analyzing dreams could give the interpreter substantial information on that person's psyche. His concept of free association and wish-fulfillment are also explored. Jung's theories are also discussed. Although Jung began as a follower of Freud, he did end up disagreeing on some of Freud's theories. Jung's

This finding indicated that a different part of the brain that has to do with the consciousness of a dream, suggesting that dreaming is a physiological rather than psychological process. Thus, it was theorized that dreaming is actually caused by the effort of the brain to interpret random electrical impulses throughout the REM sleep. Likewise, while in a sleep state, periodic activation in the brain stem area happens that produces electrical impulses despite the lack of activation of sensory and motor output. Then, certain impulses travel to other parts of the brain, which attempts to resolve the dynamics and simultaneously creates the process of

Another dream theory is the psychoanalytic perspective, which is a part of Freud’s theory, are dreams that are a representation of the unconscious motivations, desires, and thoughts. The thoughts are consciously expressed and also suggested that we find the way into the awareness through

These studies were focused by the well-known Philosophers like Freud and Aristotle in On Prophecy in Sleep. Psychologist Joan Schön builds on the topic of dreams through the ideology of many great philosophers and states, "Freud made the greatest contribution to our understanding of dreams, his followers diverged in their thinking and developed differing theories." .Schön’s purpose is to give the reader a better understanding of philosophical views on dreams in order to allow us to have a better understanding of major breakthroughs of dreams . (76-108). Freud believes that dreams have a very adaptive function in which they are meant to preserve sleep and keep us in a healthy state of mind in our sleep. This might explain why we may wake up when having horrific nightmares and things of that

The studies on dreams described by Linden highlight the emotional aspect of the images to which we are spectators during our sleep. As Linden concludes,

In addition, a recent study, published by Matthew Walker and his colleagues at the Sleep and Neuroimaging Lab at UC Berkeley, proposed a link between dreaming and emotions. These scientists focused on individuals during REM, rapid eye movement, sleep. REM sleep is one of the many stages the body experiences during sleep, which also stimulates the regions of the brain used for learning. In addition, individuals do the most dreaming during REM sleep. They found that a reduction in REM sleep negatively influences their ability to comprehend and work through complex emotions in day to day life (Scientific

In his book, Modern Man In Search Of A Soul, C.G. Jung gives a layperson insight into his ideas on dream analysis. Jung's primary objective in this book is to educate the reader as to what a psychoanalyst does when analyzing a patient's dreams. The principal message in the section of the book centered on dream analysis is that dreams should never stand alone. Dreams are meaningless in a vacuum, but on the other hand when put against a strict set of rules, they are oftentimes misunderstood. The unconscious is a fluid entity and cannot be handled either in isolation or with a static set of guidelines. Dreams are reflections of the unconscious and can represent many different things inside of

Since the beginning of time humans have been intrigued by what happens in their brains at night; especially dreams. We can see that all the way from Ancient history to Medieval to Classical and now in modern history, humans’ views on Dreams and Sleep have played huge roles. According to Gackenbach and Sheikh (1991) in some cultures, like Ancient Egypt, people with “vivid and significant” dreams were considered blessed. A philosophical question that may never be answered is that of the meaning of dreams. Throughout history man has pondered the meaning of dreams. Philosophers often bounce to Hippocrates and Aristotle for the philosophy behind these questions, however even before Hippocrates, Ancient Indians believed that dreams meant two things. The first was inner desires, in that each dream you had reflected your deepest wishes. The second is that dreams are when souls leave the body and are being guided through dreams until woken up. William C. Dement, once said “I believe that the study of sleep became a true scientific field in 1953.” He said that because of his ingenious findings. Dement conducted an experiment on REM Deprivation. He deprived 8 subjects of REM sleep for 7 days and, the study showed that as time went on the subjects went into REM rebound, which is when the body enters into REM sleep more frequently because of a lack of REM sleep. REM rebound shows the importance of REM sleep to the body.