Can a long dream last a split second?

SexyGreyFox

SexyGreyFox

SexyGreyFox

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Bare with me on this because over the last 40 years I can remember about 10 dreams where something happened in real life but had on impact on the dream.

1) The first one I can remember I was about 16 and I was dreaming about skiing even though I've never tried it. I was skiing for a long time when I suddenly went over a cliff and I remember falling to the ground and thinking I was going to die. When I hit the ground there was a massive crash which woke me up and in real life my Mother had dropped a tray with my cup of tea & toast on it.
So, was it possible that I heard the smash and in a split second have all that dream?

2) The latest one last night. I'd been invited to play in John Parr's backing band, now I have absolutely no idea why hie would be a part of my dream (he had a huge hit with St Elmo's Fire). Anyway we were rehearsing a cover of Black Velvet by Alannah Myles (again no idea why) but I looked over at his young son who was in the band and he told me to put my trousers on (what!). So I put my trousers on that were standing up on their own, picked up my guitar and started to play along when John said he'd got an idea for a new intro. He started to play an arpeggio on the piano which I was trying to play along with and then I woke up. In real life the piano arpeggio was my phone alarm going off :eek:
So once again, when my alarm went off could I have had the whole of that dream in a split second?

Anybody else as weird as me?
 
The answer is yes.

I read about a study whereby people were monitored in their sleep and the second they began dreaming they had a bucket of water thrown on them. This obviously woke them and they were immediately asked to describe their dream. The test subjects recalled things like being in a rain forest for hours with water sluicing down on them as they searched for a way out. Another was going on about being stuck under a waterfall for ages.

When the subjects were told they'd been dreaming for a few seconds they didn't believe it :)
 
I've had this happen to me a few times as well - external stimuli having some kind of impact on dreams. I'm not sure if the implication is that the entire dream was only for a split second or whether it's just the subconscious rationalisation of the external sound. I had quite a regular run of dreaming about explosions or car crashes when the bin men arrived and tipped out the glass recycling into the lorry when I lived next to a pub!
 
This is something that has always fascinated me. I've had really long dreams, where the dream me has a whole lifetime of memories (dream memories, not my real ones) and it feels like I must have been having the dream all night.....or did it just last a fraction of a second?
 
Yep.

I read a long time ago somewhere that when you dream your mind is working at a pace far far faster than normal so even the longest dreams can take place in a very short amount of time. Something to do with REM sleep where your left and right hemisphere liaise better than when you are awake I think.

I quite often have a vivid dream where by I'll trip or fall into something like a fence or wall and in actual fact it was a giant twitch that wakes me before I go into a deep sleep.
 
Interesting thread.

I have had some very crazy and messed up dreams before and sleep paralysis once or twice - where you are awake but sort of still in the dream but cannot move.

I once had a dream that I was sat up in bed, looking out my bedroom window at total destruction - flattened houses and fire etc. I woke from the dream and was sat up in bed looking out towards the window, even though the curtains were shut. Its possible that I was only dreaming for a split second when I had sat up or woke up to get out of bed, fallen back to sleep for a second, had the whole dream then woke up again!

It just shows how powerful the brain can be and how much could be unlocked. If we have the power to create stories in our heads that seem 100% real in 1 or 2 seconds :eek:
 
I still have a vivid memory that I can recall perfectly of driving a jeep through a rainforest and coming to a wooden bridge over a waterfall. I had to then fix the bridge in order to carry on.

Now either I'm a sleeper agent and this actually happened and I'm just getting parts of my hidden life or the dreams can really screw with you :D. Hope for the former!

And yes I think dreams can happen quickly but it's more likely that the crash was the key for you to wake and your brain quickly made up the end to reduce the stress of coming out of sleep.
 
Wish we knew more about dreams - fascinating stuff! The dreams being affected by things going on in the real world happens to me every so often too, usually by the way of sounds. I always assumed that the noise had changed the dream at that exact moment though, didn't realise you could experience really detailed dreams in a split second.

I remember once having a dream where I was being chased by a dog and it bit me on the leg. I woke up and it was sore and there was actually a mark on my leg. Must have scratched myself as I was sleeping or something, but it was rather odd :D
 
Steveocee said:
I quite often have a vivid dream where by I'll trip or fall into something like a fence or wall and in actual fact it was a giant twitch that wakes me before I go into a deep sleep.
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That's called a hypnic jerk.
The history of it is that it prevented us falling out of trees when we were monkeys. Apparently. I find it hard to visualize it as preventative
 
I get the twitch stuff all the time! Also things like Krands1985 - dreaming about things related to my legs or them not working when I have been to the gym training legs. It must be the body repairing itself that I can feel or maybe even my bodys was of me dreaming that I cannot move so I am more still and they can repair quicker!
 
Dimple said:
Anybody else as weird as me?
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Everybody is likely to be as weird as you! :D

Only the Mad ones will admit to it! :cool:

Dreams are strange, I am sure that there is a sort of time divergence issue with them. I can remember dreams of my own that related to real life incidents (EG Rolling over in an unfamiliar Bed and hitting my head on the wall) that actually correlated within a complex dream that seemed to last for quite a long time (That culminated with a dive towards a collision. IE somehow I could see it coming, in the dream, though the run up must only have been 2-3 seconds!)

Don't worry about it, it is all perfectly normal! ;) :p
 
I once heard that your brain "dreams" many times while you sleep but you can only recall those which you were disturbed during. No idea if it's true or not!
 
Dreams are not in real time, they are on some crazy frequency that is way faster than dumb ass am awake mode. :p

I hate dreams, so try to avoid them like the plague. :mad:
 
Krands1985 said:
Wish we knew more about dreams - fascinating stuff! The dreams being affected by things going on in the real world happens to me every so often too, usually by the way of sounds. I always assumed that the noise had changed the dream at that exact moment though, didn't realise you could experience really detailed dreams in a split second.

I remember once having a dream where I was being chased by a dog and it bit me on the leg. I woke up and it was sore and there was actually a mark on my leg. Must have scratched myself as I was sleeping or something, but it was rather odd :D
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Here's the thing.

All animals sleep (Even insects, though with insects it is called "Torpor")

Why?

Sleeping is actually incredibly dangerous!

There is a world of predators out there that just want to consider you food. Sleeping prey is basically a free lunch!

If there was any possible way that "Darwin" might have eliminated the need for sleep It would have happened hundreds of millions of years ago.

And yet!

Here we are

4.3 billion years of highly competitive life and death struggle later and STILL, most animals have to spend a third of their lives unconscious and vulnerable to predation!!

WHY!????
 
inception_thimble.jpg


But you're still dreaming...
 
+1 to the twitch/jerk stuff. I don't always remember the dream, but I'll sometimes wake up with that twitch. I'm surprised I've not hit myself yet by doing this! The other thing I get is that I'll often wake up due to a massive grunt I made... a noise that I wouldn't make when I'm awake. That type of wake-up call is always dreamless and damn annoying.

+1 also to the sleep paralysis stuff. I'll wake up from (usually) a bad dream but I can't move. While this is happening, I think that people/strangers are in my room or just outside my room or climbing up a ladder outside through my bedroom window. While this is happening, it is so realistic... too realistic! :(
 
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