How often do you dream

[chamin]

well from what I know you have lucid dreams throughout REM sleep.

and miscellaneous dreams in non REM sleep as well as dreams/dream like experiences (night terrors for example).

so my question is how often do you dream. Based on what I read around you either.

1. Dream constantly thruout sleep.

2. Have either dreams or dreamlike experiences throughout sleep

3. Sometimes dream and sometimes don't dream.

Which is it?

[stephaniescurtis1]

Usually I'm able to dream very consistently with practice of lucid dream, so I'd say option 2.

 

Yesterday night, for example, I had a very surreal lucid dream.

It was kinda dreamlike actually, because deep down inside I realised that I was in reality still napping in my room even while I was sailing through the universe at a couple billion km a second. While I realize it had taken much conditioning to get to this point, I completely think that it was worth it.

When I first tried lucid dreaming I tried tons of free Internet "books" I found while skimming online blogs. However, after experimenting with these approaches for around four weeks I still had no dominance over my nightmares.

I think the element that they were missing was the compelling audio tracks that I got when I bought a professional lucid dreaming course with markedly good feedback, but I would never violate the rules by trying to advertise this course on SFN.

Now I can pretty much do any thing I like (though often I stick sailing all over the world).

Edited August 5, 2013 by Phi for All
removed advertising link

[CharonY]

IIRC you basically every time you go into REM sleep. However, you often do not remember it after a relatively short time. If you do wake up shortly after a dream and think about it, then you can often recall it.

 

There are also non-REM dreams but I am not sure about their frequency.

Edited August 5, 2013 by CharonY

[chamin]

That's what I was wondering, if there are any completely unconscious (or even simply dreamless) stages in sleep at all, or if the answer to that is known even.

So far my searches (and even queries on other forums) have ended in a pretty wide variety of answers/speculations.

And if it is true that you dream for all, or almost all, of the length of a sleep how is your temporal perception affected?

Edited August 5, 2013 by chamin

[EdEarl]

I rarely remember my dreams. When I was young, I had a recurring nightmare of riding in a car on a mountain road and going over the side of the road. My stepfather who drank and drove on mountains roads, actually killed himself driving off a mountain road, luckily I was not in the car. I think I stopped remembering my dreams because many were bad. It is now been over 50 years since I last remember having that nightmare, but it is still vivid.

 

Please, be good to children, whether they are yours or not.

[Crispy Bacon]

Can anyone control there dreams? I kinda did last night towards the end of it right before I woke up. (I don't remember the dream now, but I know I controled it towards the end)

[iNow]

if there are any completely unconscious (or even simply dreamless) stages in sleep at all

 

Yes, there are. As CharonY mentioned, you primarily dream during REM, even though (on some occasions) there is non-REM dreaming that takes place.

 

See stage 5 at the following summary page for a simple overview: http://psychology.about.com/od/statesofconsciousness/a/SleepStages.htm

 

Can anyone control there dreams?

 

Yes. It's known as lucid dreaming and is a skill that can be practiced and improved.

 

http://science.howstuffworks.com/life/inside-the-mind/human-brain/lucid-dreaming.htm

Specific to the question asked in the thread title... We dream more often the more new encounters we experience and the more new information we learned that day while awake. More new experiences and information to organize and process tends to equal more dreaming since it's a process of the brain reorganizing itself. We also dream more when very young and when very old, so frequency depends on age, as well.

[chamin]

Another question is, where are experiences such as night terrors, etc. classified? Are they dreams, experiences, or what?
How much is known about these anyway?

[chamin]

how much is even known about sleep?

[zorro]

I REM dream about once a month depending how much mental stressers have built up. Stressers either mental, academic, physical, sexual ... that don't get resolved by day rationalizations are put in the dream basket for REM sleep dreams to resolve or relieve.

[J.Nassar]

I often dream meaningless things and I rarely lucid dream, and when I do I ruin it by getting overexcited, enough to end the dream, I guess I need to train more to stabilise them, Don't look at mirrors!