Are you having more nightmares because of the coronavirus pandemic? Do you think that you are just imagining things? Maybe your dreams seem more real now that we are facing a global pandemic and because no one is sure when this will end.
A dream researcher and assistant professor of psychology at Harvard University, Deirdre Barrett said that the increase in dreams that people are experiencing right now is normal because it usually happens shortly after a crisis has started. She collected dreams that are related to a pandemic by studying the dreams of those who survived the September 11, 2001 bombing and World War II British prisoners and found that crises such as this stir up people's dreams.
If you are one of these people who are afraid of having nightmares, read on to find out how you can prevent your succeeding nights to have horrifying dreams.
Ways to beat coronavirus nightmares
Have a deep sleep
Improve the quality of your sleep by training your biological clock. This means that you should sleep and wake up at the same time every day. Limit your alcohol intake because it could harm a deep night's sleep and try to avoid caffeine in the evening because it could help stimulate you.
It would also be wise to avoid using gadgets when it is soon your sleeping time. Try to do some exercise during the daytime because it could help you get a good night's sleep. Do some yoga or meditation in the evening to help relax your muscles and you will surely sleep well.
Help your children too by establishing a routine for them every bedtime. Give them a warm bath and give them warm milk to ease them into sleep. You may also read them storybooks to make them sleepy.
Learn about your subconscious self
An associate professor of psychology at Furman University and principle investigator of the Furman Sleep Lab, Erin Wamsley says that our dreams are made up of bits and pieces of our experiences that are interrelated to other remote memories. The top hypothesis of Wamsley's lab is to help strengthen and stabilize memories.
Carrier says that more often, the jumbled experiences were more negative which is especially true with our current situation. Sometimes a person is stressed or anxious even though he is not conscious about it, which could go into his dreams.
According to Barrett, once a person acknowledges his subconscious anxiety, the emotion comes up naturally.
Improve the outcome of your dream
Barrett's advice is to finish off your unpleasant dream into something good or something that you would look forward to. For example, you could try to draw how you want your dream to finish as suggested by Julie Carrier, a scientific director of both the Canadian Sleep and Circadian Network and Sleep on It Canada.
Think of happy thoughts
All these stress are not only getting into your nerves but also inside your dreams. Help yourself to dream of good things only by thinking of happy thoughts or beautiful memories that you would like to dream about. This way you could have a better sleep at night and wake up feeling refreshed in the morning.
Create your dream
Barrett shares that one night, she thought about a romantic scene for a show she watched on Netflix, and then she fell asleep. Every time she is woken up in the middle of the night, she would take note of her dreams which were all normal except for the last one where she dreamt that she was a leading lady who was adored by the leading man.
This could mean that there is a chance of us controlling our dreams or if not, we could at least alter the bad dreams into a more pleasing one.
