Dreams

You know that you've had some great conversations with your friends about dreams. Sometimes you discuss the absurdity and terror of your nightmares. Sometimes you find it uncanny how you can trace the contents of your dream(s) to certain events from the recent and distant past.

I don't usually remember my dreams, but I can tell when I've had one especially deep because I'm tired in the morning when I wake up.

I've come to the conclusion that its because my mind becomes incredibly active during some of these dreams. Its gotten to the point that my eyes are tired when I get up in the morning from what I can only guess is excessive rapid eye movement (REM).

Let me back up a little bit. I do a lot of studying, reading, analysis, etc every day. By "a lot" I mean 10 -15 hours on campus every day. Needless to say, there's a lot of information just running around my mind. I think that this has had a lot to do with some of my more recent dreams.

I've been reading books in my sleep. No, I haven't been sleep-reading, as in being asleep still and reading physical books. I've been seeing words on pages, reading them, as I lay asleep. It really is fascinating and bizarre. However, that's not the best part of it: they are books that I've never read before.

We accumulate information and its stored in our brain. Many times dreams consist of permutations (changes in the order) of this information. I am currently taking a literature class that addresses this very subject - the permutation of literature, alphabets, and knowledge in general. The argument is that everything has been done,that everything has been created and nothing is new, but at the same time there is no end to what can be created. It is still infinite because the permutations of knowledge can repeat themselves indefinitely. Its like when you think of a great idea completely on your own and then someone tells you that its already been done. The point is: you came up with it again!

Anyway, I can only assume that my mind has done this very thing, but to a much greater extent. I've read entirely new books, exhausting my mind as I sleep, but at the same time they are not new because they are derived from the information already in my mind.

I realize now that this is not the first time this has happened. I cannot remember the words, the books, or pages, but a conversation recently made me recall something - I could even remember the side of the page it was on.

Wouldn't it be amazing if I could recall the books that already exist in my mind?