what does our consciousness do when we sleep?
540079
FIRST THING.....Mind is not the same as consciousness. And most folks are "asleep (not enlightened) with their eyes open," so sleep and asleep are not necessarily the same, from a philosphical and spiritual point of view that is. Thus awake and Awake are not the same either. When we are awakened-enlightened, we are conscious of our consciousness (spirit soul) and have control of what the mind, emotions and intelligence does. We only want to think of God-The Divine-Eternal, so we do not sleep so much for the sake of the "body-vehicle."\n\nWhen we are not "awakened as in enlightened" we believe we need alot more SLEEP! When we are awakened, we hardly need any sleep and have much more conscious control of the different states of consciousness humans exhibit. We do not want to waste time sleeping when we are in touch with the transcendental spiritual realms! When we are asleep, we believe what we were taught as children, that we need 8 hours of sleep at night.  When we are "awakened-enlightened," we can easily go on 5-6 hours a night, if that! Some advanced spiritualists need next to no sleep and are not sleeping when they LOOK like they are sleeping.  But most of us are so lazy and body identified, that we just believe what our SLEEPING culture and "pseudo-authorities" taught us about sleep.\n\nConsciousness is a feature of our spirit soul, NOT MIND.  The more we know who and what we really are (eternal spirit souls) the less ego (false self) is mis-identified and body mis-identified and personality mis-identified. We are not this body, mind, personality or story! That EUREKA is when we begin to have more consciousness of all states of consciousness and use our mind and intelligence to work to stay in transcendental eternal consciousness; then we know we need less sleep and the less asleep-ignorant we are of material and spiritual realms. (The more we are able to hold alpha and theta brain waves transcendentally, the less sleep our body-mind needs) Thus the "awakened-illumined" spirit-soul is "spiritually active" at night when it is nice and quiet and still, ie when most people are asleep! In fact, dawn and dusk are the quietest times on this earth and the times that are optimal for transcendental connections-travels. Funny how it is the time when most folks are taking their siestas-naps or are sleeping their 8-hr night.\n\nMind, ego, intelligence and spirit are always there, though.  Mind and intelligence and emotions are parts of false ego, aka false self, but whether we can consciously control them or work WITH them and can use them dovetailed for transcendental realms is varied and depends on our own states of consciousness, emotional and body control and spiritual evolution status. It also depends on brain waves speeds too which we can learn to speed up or slow down consciously, especially with different forms of yoga (hatha, pranayama, bhakti; bhakti is the highest form of yoga and gives one the ability to do all the other forms of yoga, so why not start from the TOP rung on the yogic stairway to heaven ).  \n\nMost people do not know how to use or control their brains, emotions and mind and intelligence, thus they cannot use their intelligence during the day or night in the way it is meant to be used....for self realization and God Realization. Control of mind-body is essential for Intelligence. And contol-proper use of intelligence is required for spirituality.  Intellect and intelligence are NOT the same thing. Wisdom is intelligence and includes knowledge of how both the temporary material world and eternal spiritual worlds work. The intellect is the fact storing resevoir of the material world and is part of lower mind-brain functions.  Many people have sharp intellects and are NOT intelligent or wise! The asleep think that the material world is the real and only world.  That is a form of "sleep" even if one's eyes are open, one is mater
59056
Warmachine02 is right.  what REM stands for is Rapid Eye Movement.  It is the only phase of sleep that you dream in (and there are more than 2 phases).  If you happen to wake up during REM, that is when you remember your dreams most.  You go through the stages of sleep several times in one night so you can potentially have several different dreams.  Its just a matter of when you wake up.  If you want to remember details of a dream, keep a dream journal by your bed, write them down as soon as you wake up so you remember exactly what happened.  then analyze them.  its fun!
411489
The primary purpose of dreams (REM sleep) in humans appears to be memory consolidation.  Humans who "lose" the ability to enter REM sleep due to certain medications or brain injury show no serious impairment of cognitive ability.\n\nMany people (particularly those in the Freudian tradition) try to attach special meaning to dreams.  The use of "dream dictionaries" to uncover the unconscious hidden meaning of dreams is a questionable therapeutic practice with little scientific justification.\n\nSome charlatans even claim that your dream images can predict the future.  As we are all free-willed beings, the future is unknowable until it becomes the present.\n\nHope this helps.
425247
The subconscious does not comprehend time or locality and so, does not work by ‘logic’ and ‘cause and effect’…it is passive by nature and tends to receive. Therefore, when the conscious mind is ‘asleep’ and its guard is down, you can see certain things coming your way like from the future (since for it, there is no past, present and future…it’s all happening in one plane as far as it’s concerned) or can reach and communicate with spirits…because it does not deal in ‘boundaries’…the subconscious lives in a reality of its own making where a mere thought changes everything. Unless you have read in spirituality and quantum physics, you might not believe in what I am saying, but it would mean that dreaming of your father or any dead person that you knew, is real. The best thing you can do for your father, if in the dream he does not communicate to you why he is unhappy, is to pray for him.
494921
You want an experiment you can do? Find out what happens to your mind when you are in a deep and dreamless sleep.\n\nYou will find that there is no 'mind' to have at all. It's pretty much like asking, "What happens to the light when you turn the light switch to off?"\n\nYour mind requires a certain venue to happen. It needs oxygen and nutrients to function. Without those, there is no mind to 'have'. The switch is off.\n\nBut check it out for yourself next time you are in a deep and dreamless sleep. You should be able to not see that there is no mind there to see.
452394
because just because your physical body needs rest, your brain can't just "die".  It's constantly doing something....so your subconscious just takes over for you when you sleep.  Takes you into another place
388539
If you wake up *slowly*, you can remember more dreams — prolong contact with our subconscious minds.\n\nMost of us, as soon as we awaken in the morning, allow our minds to wander off—to worrying about work, or school, or getting the kids ready—or we begin talking with our spouse or bed partner about our schedules for the day. If we do not work to recall our dreams immediately upon awakening, we will have missed a crucial opportunity. - check out the site below . . .
1106956
here is my best possible explanation, the brain is made up of 3 parts, concuss, sub-concuss, and super ego. between wake and sleep our concuss mind and sub-concuss mind actually link together. and in rem or deep sleep its or super ego and sub-concuss linking together, dammit Kirk i am not a doctor.
1009050
Typically is an over active mind... The mind did not have time to purge or dispense with all the sensory input from the day.. so the mind puts the body in action during rest.. because.. hey... if I can't sleep.. neither should the body... ha ha...
890689
During sleep, we usually pass through five phases of sleep. Some people say four phases or two phases. These stages progress in a cycle from stage 1 to rapid-eye-movement (REM) sleep, then the cycle starts over again with stage 1. \n\nThese sites discuss them in detail.
823890
NO, because our eyes are normally closed when we sleep... Blinking occurs naturally and is triggered by our brain when it detects that the the eye needs moisture. Blinking at some point can trigger our tear glands to release liquid to help avoid dryness.\n\nThe phenomenon you see when a sleeping person seem to jitter his eyes when close is called R.E.M. or Rapid Eye Movement. This usually happens when a person is dreaming in his sleep.
397295
Yes.  Whatever you don't deal with while your awake you deal with in your dreams.  They are mostly symbolic though rather than something easily decipherable.
1105454
the sub-conscious mind can be affected through dreaming, a common way to tap into you sub-conscious mind is through lucid dreaming, basically lucid dreaming allows you to consciously control your dreams, witch take place in your sub-conscious mind. Common way of taping into a lucid dreaming state is through self hypnosis, and deep relaxation meditation.in the dream state you would confront aspects of your own sub-conscious mind, and in doing so, you could change your sub-conscious mind as you see fit. Lucid dreaming is a hard state of mind to achieve for some people so it might not be right for you.
542831
Dreams are the subconscious minds' method of acting out possible scenarios in our own lives. There have been experiments into sleep deprivation...dreaming occurs during the REM (rapid-eye-movement) cycle and at this point the body is paralysed, all apart from breathing equipment and the eyes. This is to stop the body physically acting out its dreams. Nightmares occur when the dreams basically overlap into the non-REM cycle (non-rapid-eye-movement), it is at this point that people sleep walk or talk.\nDuring these experiments, participants were woken as soon as they fell into REM sleep (dream sleep), this stopped them from having dreams. Participants reported that they felt as if they had had no sleep, they eventually started having hallucinations...the body was having dreams during the period that they were awake, they overlapped into the conscious mind, such was the physical need to have dreams.\nNo-one actually knows why people (and animals) have dreams, but researchers have acknowledged their significance in human evolution.
808785
all i know is that it has to do with the thoughts you have while your sleeping. hopefully someone else can give you a better answer. good luck! i'm just as curious.
748381
sleeping when your awake?
622847
Sleep is the regular state of natural rest observed in all mammals, birds and fish. Sleep is not actually "unconsciousness," but rather, it is a natural state of rest characterized by a reduction in voluntary body movement, decreased awareness of the surroundings, an increased rate of anabolism (the synthesis of cell structures) and a decreased rate of catabolism (the breakdown of cell structures). Therefore, since consciousness is literally the awareness of the surroundings, being asleep is just an altered state of consciousness, as opposed to being unconscious. It is heavily influenced by circadian rhythms and by hormonal and environmental factors. Sleep performs a restorative function for the brain and body as evidenced by the myriad symptoms of metabolic dysfunction that result when animals are deprived of sleep.\nThe function of sleep in health and in disease is being increasingly studied in specialized sleep laboratories throughout the world. Not only insomnia, but more recently elucidated sleep disorders such as sleep apnea and narcolepsy are evaluated in such facilities. The increasing prevalence of sleep disorders is likely to be a function both of more sophisticated diagnostic tests and the disruption of the normal day-night cycle in modern societies.