Читать книгу Understanding Dreams: What they are and how to interpret them - Nerys Dee - Страница 26

It has been concluded that, since resting the body and mind do not depend on sleep, its specific purpose must be to allow us to dream. During sleep our awareness reaches out to undiscovered realms, the land of dreams or, as C.G. Jung called it, the collective unconscious. This could well be the source from whence we came before we were born, and the place to which we return when we die. Do babies, therefore, who dream for most of their early life, revisit this source, our spiritual home?

Not all dreams, of course, are profound journeys to the great beyond. Many are literal action replays of real-life events, but even these take on a different significance when viewed from this inner standpoint. When, at night, we do return to the source, we enter a dimension far more expansive than the limited outer world. Here, we recharge with vitality following a physically active day, and when we are ill sleep is often the only healing force we need to recover.

To combat the stress and strain of life, relaxation and meditation are often resorted to, but these practices do not mitigate or remove such stress and strain. These are the result of circumstances with which we cannot cope and daytime techniques such as these are an apology for insufficient sleep. Few adults have enough of this and wonder why they always feel tired and cannot cope with problems. It is impossible to recharge when awake, for only in sleep can we contact the source and receive that essential vitality.

Some people can manage with less than seven hours sleep each night but they are, along with those who need over nine or ten, in the minority. The person who is occupied physically and mentally throughout the day needs an average of eight hours sleep. The test to know if you are having sufficient sleep is quite simple. If the alarm clock has to awaken you, it means you have not completed a REM or NREM cycle, so you are depriving yourself of valuable sleep. And if this happens five mornings out of seven, this deprivation is considerable and would account for loss of concentration, irritability, depression and many other unreasonable reactions to outer-world encounters and problems.

‘Sleep’, as Shakespeare so wisely put it, ‘is the balm for hurt minds, nature’s great second course’.