Ways To Control Your Dreams To Prevent Nightmares

When we talk about dreams, it’s not about playing Sloto Cash online casino and winning the million-dollar jackpot.

We are talking about REM sleep and the dreams we have at night.

Why do we dream?

Scientists now believe that we dream to help with memory retention.  Dreams help you to store memories, take important memories and put them into long term and discard unimportant memories.  If we remembered everything, we would go crazy.

Dreams also help us to sort through complicated thoughts and feelings. When you sleep, your brain is still active. Your thoughts and dreams make little or no sense. This is because dreams are triggered by the emotional centers of our brains and not the logical center of our brains.

Why do we have nightmares?

What is a nightmare? It is simply a dream that we find more frightening or upsetting.  Nightmares tend to be caused by stress, anxiety, or a reaction to medicines we are taking.  Although it is normal to sometimes have nightmares, it is not normal to have them regularly.  If you do, it probably means that something else is going on that you need to deal with, especially if you become frightened to go to sleep or it keeps waking you up at night.

What is a dream notebook?  How do I create one?  How will it help with my nightmares?

If you cannot remember your dream, just write down what you would have remembered from your dream if you could have remembered your dream.

What is a Lucid Dream? How do you control your dream?

A lucid dream is a dream where the dreamer becomes aware that they are dreaming. Because the dreamer is aware that they are dreaming, they can control their dream: the characters in the dream, the narrative in the dream, and the environment of the dream.

The first step in lucid dreaming is to become aware that it is a dream. This is done by trying to quickly read a sign, and seeing that it is blurry.  Practice this skill in real life.  Look at a road sign quickly, look away, and keep repeating this 5 times.  Repeat this action several times a day.

It does not even have to be a road sign. If you are typing on a computer, look away at the bookshelf and quickly read a book title.  Just keep doing this several times a day over a month to a point where it becomes second nature to do it.

Once it becomes second nature to do it while you are awake, you will start to do it while you are asleep. The difference between doing it while you are awake and while you are sleeping is that when you do it while you are sleeping, you will not be able to read the words on the book or the sign. They will look blurry (or something will just not be right).  That is the point when your brain will realize that this is not the point of reality (the real world), but it is a point of fantasy (the dream world).

When you have that realization, you then gain the power to change anything that you want the dream, because you are no longer limited to the real world and your mind progressed into the world of your imagination.

If you are having a nightmare with a dragon, you can then imagine that you have a sword and you then slay the dragon.  If you do not want to kill the dragon, you just imagine that the dragon is your friendly pet and you start rubbing its belly until it starts purring like a kitten.   If you are nervous about a job interview, you start to imagine yourself doing the interview perfectly and you get the job with a great sign-on bonus. You get the idea.

What is it like to have sleep paralysis?  How does it affect dreams?

You are not able to move, so you try to scream and you can’t. It is almost as if you can’t breathe for a couple of seconds. You see this shadow person at the edge of the bed. It could be one or more people. After, what feels like hours, it sounds as if people are having a conversation outside your room.  The voices go away, and you are left in complete silence.

Then you feel a small pressure as if someone has placed a small weight on your chest. You panic as it gets heavier and heavier until it starts to become difficult to breathe. You try to scream, but no words come out.  The only thing that you can do is to stare upward. Even you can’t see anyone else, you still feel that there are others in the room. In traditional terms, you are having a nightmare, but you not being able to move is part of that nightmare.

Since at this point you are aware that you are in a dream, you can then turn your sleep paralysis into a lucid dream. You now have the ability to essentially “change the channel” from being a nightmare that you currently feel that your sleep paralysis is, to a happy dream that you want to go around and explore. If your happy place is a sunny beach with the sand beneath your feet, close your eyes and envision it, including how the sand feels to benefit your feet. Try to wiggle your toes in the sand. How does it feel?

Sleep and external stimulus — While asleep, children respond to a parent’s voice over an alarm? Parent voice smoke alarms. Children respond to a parent’s voice, even when they are sleeping.

Do parents’ voices really have an effect on children while they are sleeping?  Do children listen to what parents are saying while they are asleep?

Researchers have discovered that children under 12 years of age will wake up from a smoke detector that has their parent’s voice over the traditional beep beep beep smoke alarms. This is an important scientific discovery.

Four different alarms were tested involving vocal voice and high-pitched beeps.

• 90% of children woke from a voice alarm.
• 53% of children woke from a traditional beep beep beep alarm.
• 85% of the children escaped from the room within 5 minutes when the alarm featured their mother’s voice.
• 50% of the children escaped from the room within 5 minutes when the alarm was a high pitched beep beep beep alarm.

The exact words that were in the message did not make a difference. Although it was not specifically tested, it is assumed that any familiar voice, which the child listens to instructions from, would work.

If a fire is happening, the most important thing is to hear the fire alarm and leave the building where the fire is. Small children, who have not been taught fire safety, believe if they hide, they can protect themselves from the fire.  This does not work, because one cannot be protected from fire by hiding in a closet or under the bed. But it also makes it more difficult for a firefighter to find a small child to rescue them from a fire.

For children under the age of 5, it is very unlikely that a child will save themselves. That is why it is a good idea when you are making your emergency evacuation plan to figure out who is going to make sure that the young children under 5 are checked.  Children above the age of 5, if they have been taught fire safety, can let themselves out of the house, assuming that they have to way to exit. But take a headcount at your designated meeting place. As a price comparison, voice-activated smoke and carbon monoxide alarms sell for $70 for 3 alarms or around $25 each.  Non-voice-activated smoke alarms with carbon dioxide doctors seem to sell for around the same price. A smoke detector by itself can sell for 2 packages for $16 or $8 each.

The feature of a 10-year battery is what increases the price, not just the ability to have a small voice recording.  Also, a lot of police departments will give out for free, simple traditional alarms for free, and since fire alarms are required to get a renter’s license, these inexpensive traditional alarms are what most landlords install.

Is a voice-recorded fire alarm worth getting if you do not have children?  Yes, because you can also record the location of the alarm.  “Fire in the basement”, “Fire in the kitchen”, etc. Then you know which family member will have a higher risk of not being able to get out, and which ones, as long as they are awake, can get themselves out.

A ten-year battery feature will help you to not forget the change the smoke alarm.  The button to quiet it will keep you from uninstalling the fire alarm in the kitchen when you burn dinner. The carbon monoxide feature is needed in the basement where the furnace is and other places where there are risks for carbon monoxide.

Summary

Dreams and how our brains work during sleep is a very interesting area of science that is still being studied  Try taking control of your dreams and experiencing a lucid dream. If you have problems with nightmares and sleep paralysis, try to convert those dreams into lucid dreams and actively change the environment, people in the dream, and/or manipulate objects in the dream.