I jumped off the plane for a 14000 feet dive. That very moment I jolted awake from the dream and took a few minutes to stabilize. Fast forward, next day, the Sigmund Freud in me decided to backtrack why I had this crazy dream considering I’m anything but an adventure junkie. However, I ended up engulfed in the world of understanding dreams and so here I am with some uber-cool facts that I absolutely loved. 

What makes dreams so fascinating is that despite so much scientific research since decades, it is still certainly shrouded in mystery. For starters, while we might dream four to six times during sleep, most lucid dreams occur during a phase called REM (rapid eye movement) sleep. This is when our brain is most active and most of our muscles are paralyzed during this phase to prevent us from acting upon our dreams. How cool is that?! Else I would have landed on my floor if I took that skydive in my dream!

The next curious question I had was, do all dreams mean something? Well, there are different schools of thought around this. Some experts believe that dreams have no meaning and serve no function. While others believe that our dreams do mean something; ranging from coping with unconscious desires, and personal conflicts to providing a place to hold our memories.

All said and done, analyzing dreams and ascribing meaning to them is legit fun and introspective. Remember how Dr. Jehangir Khan helped Kaira unearth the meaning of the bizarre dream she had in the movie “Dear Zindagi”? Looks like there are dreams that are very common and most of us at some point or the other would have dreamt about being attacked, being naked in public, being chased, falling, losing a tooth, having sex, taking a dreadful test, flying, or a loved one dying. All these dreams have underpinning themes of trust, fear of the unknown, failure, anxiety, letting go, childhood trauma, imposter syndrome, and more! Do you believe that dreams reflect the events of your waking life?

Anyway, I then stumbled upon precognitive dreams. Like how you dream of getting a call from a long-lost friend and the next day you actually receive a call from that person? Though there is no scientific evidence, some people have foretold life events after a dream. I got a bit spooked that Abraham Lincoln had a vivid dream about his assassination, a few weeks before he was shot dead. He had shared his dream with his friend Hill Lamon. In the dream, Abraham witnessed mourners in the East Room of the white house, the same room where his body would be laid in state. Curious here, would you ever want such a foretelling dream? 

Coming full circle on the dream that I had, looks like the best way to analyze would be to journal down everything. Then take a hard look at what it might mean to me, connect the dots between the events of the dream, and the feelings it evoked. 

You now know what to do when you dream next!