I had a bad dream last night. Or was it this morning? Regardless of when I went into REM sleep, I still had a nightmare. And I woke up rather scared. Of any shadows or other lurking thing. I kid you not, I was scared.
So my bad dream was about demons haunting a place. Yes, as dreams go, it was rather real, and in my dreamlike state, I was really scared. But, I wonder why my feelings of fear carried over to when I woke up.
I'm quite sure, for most people, the feelings that they experience in dreams do carry over once in a while (especially if it is a particular vivid or striking dream). Perhaps the most vivid dream I had (of which I remained shaken and affected until the next day) was about...a cat. As for the details, well, from what I can remember, it was traveling along a road through the mountains (I think) amidst a thunderstorm. It may be a thin connection, but perhaps that dream made me like cats. I don't know.
By the way, do lucid dreams tend to maximize the possibility of feelings that are carried over into one's waking state? I'm not sure, and I have tried lucid dreaming (following a how-to guide) somewhat unsuccessfully. In my experience, I have only realized that I was dreaming only once or twice, and in those cases I could only "control" my dream in a somewhat shaky manner. Then again, I wonder whether I was merely dreaming that I could control my dream. Ah, how much clearer reality is. (And I don't want to get started on whether life is a dream, because all discussions on solipsism tend to be a dead end.)
Being not very well read in psychological and neurological literature, I don't know for sure. Perhaps I can offer one interpretation, which I gleaned from a study on "absent minded trangessions".
In a dream like state, feelings tend to remain into the waking state the same way emotions from one's waking state carry over day after day. For example, in reality, if someone close to you dies, feeling of sadness remain day after day, for quite some time. Likewise, if one experienced a particularly shocking incident, the feelings tend to linger for quite sometime.
Thus, in the mind (or should I say brain?) at least, dreams are as real as reality, and the feelings as such that occur in them linger as long as they do in one's consciousness from the dream state to the waking state, the same way impressionable feelings that are experienced in everyday life remain and linger.
So my bad dream was about demons haunting a place. Yes, as dreams go, it was rather real, and in my dreamlike state, I was really scared. But, I wonder why my feelings of fear carried over to when I woke up.
I'm quite sure, for most people, the feelings that they experience in dreams do carry over once in a while (especially if it is a particular vivid or striking dream). Perhaps the most vivid dream I had (of which I remained shaken and affected until the next day) was about...a cat. As for the details, well, from what I can remember, it was traveling along a road through the mountains (I think) amidst a thunderstorm. It may be a thin connection, but perhaps that dream made me like cats. I don't know.
By the way, do lucid dreams tend to maximize the possibility of feelings that are carried over into one's waking state? I'm not sure, and I have tried lucid dreaming (following a how-to guide) somewhat unsuccessfully. In my experience, I have only realized that I was dreaming only once or twice, and in those cases I could only "control" my dream in a somewhat shaky manner. Then again, I wonder whether I was merely dreaming that I could control my dream. Ah, how much clearer reality is. (And I don't want to get started on whether life is a dream, because all discussions on solipsism tend to be a dead end.)
Being not very well read in psychological and neurological literature, I don't know for sure. Perhaps I can offer one interpretation, which I gleaned from a study on "absent minded trangessions".
In a dream like state, feelings tend to remain into the waking state the same way emotions from one's waking state carry over day after day. For example, in reality, if someone close to you dies, feeling of sadness remain day after day, for quite some time. Likewise, if one experienced a particularly shocking incident, the feelings tend to linger for quite sometime.
Thus, in the mind (or should I say brain?) at least, dreams are as real as reality, and the feelings as such that occur in them linger as long as they do in one's consciousness from the dream state to the waking state, the same way impressionable feelings that are experienced in everyday life remain and linger.
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