Ever had insomnia? If you have, you'll know why getting enough sleep is so important to one's mental and physical health. If you can't sleep, your body can't recover from the stresses of the previous cycle. But more importantly (I think) your cerebral cortex just keeps going and going, just like the late, great Energizer Bunny.
Some people count sheep when they are trying to fall asleep. Not me. Last night I occupied myself for quite a stretch by mentally apologizing to an endless list of people, living and dead, whom I've trampled upon, or disappointed, or betrayed, or slighted, or misunderstood, or wronged, or cheated on, or resented, or bad-mouthed, or yelled at, or ignored, or annoyed, or forgotten, or let down, or abandoned, or harrassed, or persecuted, or mocked, or fought, or stood up, or resisted, or lied to, or abused or failed to help over the years. And if I thought about it long enough, I'll bet everybody I ever met would wind up on that list. Brother, was I glad when the sun came up.
And what really gets me is that the bad stuff I was remembering was just the stuff that really happened and that I know about. There are probably rows and rows of people out there who have imaginary grievances against me, too. And people with legitimate grievances that I never knew about, or have forgotten about. And what about all those impure thoughts?
If it's really true that your life flashes before you in reverse when you're about to die, I hope you get to remember some of the good stuff, too.
Memory is a funny thing, really. Over many years, the justice system has demonstrated that eyewitness testimony isn't quite as surefire as always used to be assumed, because no two witnesses ever perceive the same event in exactly the same way. Further, research has established that people see what they expect to see, are very susceptible to suggestion, and have a tendency to fill in and edit details over time. A witness who's been carefully "prepared" to give testimony will sound convincing to most, even if the foundation for his or her story lies in somebody else's wishful thinking or artful suggestions. Remember the McMartin Pre-school case? Sock puppets wielded by state-retained psychologists were able to coax the most incredible stories from a bunch of allegedly-abused pre-schoolers, stories so incredible that even a jury of ordinary Americans wouldn't buy them.
You can coach yourself, too-- edit your own history. Say something often enough, and you'll come to believe it's true, whether you're recounting your high school athletic achievements or your noble ancestry. And once you can believe, you can beat a lie detector any day. My Mom's done her whole life over several times this way.
That's what we need dreams for, actually. As a sort of reality check. Other than frissons when you're walking through a deserted alley or a haunted house, or creepy feelings when the wild-eyed loser pulls up alongside of you in his windowless van, dreams are one of the few times that your subconscious mind will interface with your conscious self in a way that you can make sense out of without the discipline of meditation or prayer or at least a whopping dose of hallucinogens to help you out. And unlike these other methods, the subconscious usually gets to select the program when we're talking dreams. (Although I'm told that those who work at it have (sometimes) the ability to "incubate" a dream about a topic of interest, even then the subconscious has to agree on the topic before the show will start.)
"Vivid" dreams may be something special. Sometimes they involve prophecies. But regular old dreams are cool, too. In my case, I think one of the best things about them is that they are not (consciously) expected. But maybe I'm just waxing nostalgic, because to tell you the truth I don't often remember my dreams these days. Sleep apnea, maybe? Subconscious bored or dead? Who knows? At current rates, I can't afford a visit to the sleep clinic or the shrink to find out.
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