The Brain's Favourite Lie

You ever wake up from a dream so vivid you have to stare at the wall for ten minutes like it personally betrayed you?

Good. You're human.

Now sit down. I have things to say.

Let’s start with science, because I like evidence when I yap:

Dreams happen mostly during REM sleep—rapid eye movement. That’s when your brain waves look suspiciously like you're awake, but your body is in a full shutdown mode called muscle atonia (which is just a fancy term for: your limbs are offline so you don't try to fight a dream demon with your actual fists).

Your prefrontal cortex, the logic part of your brain, goes offline too. Meanwhile, your amygdala (emotion center) and hippocampus (memory vault) go apeshit. That’s why your dead grandmother can show up as a fish and it somehow feels normal.

You know who else cared deeply about dreams?

The Babylonians.

In ancient Mesopotamia (bilad al rafedain, modern Iraq, Syria, and parts of Turkey), people didn’t just have dreams—they CONSULTED them. They believed dreams came from the gods, and some of those gods were tricksters. They even had dream interpreters employed in royal courts like full-time TikTok tarot readers with actual power.

There were dream dictionaries carved into clay tablets. Actual cuneiform records of people going:

“Last night I dreamed of a flood devouring the city. Should I marry the carpenter’s daughter?”

Slay.

Then you got the Ancient Egyptians—kings of the afterlife stuff.

They also believed dreams were messages from the gods, but they took it FURTHER. Dreams could foretell the future, explain disease, or even justify war!?! There were temple priests whose whole job was to sleep in sacred places and deliver dream messages.

I would've nailed being a full-time napper for the divine.

And the Greeks?

Artemidorus wrote a five-volume dream interpretation manual called Oneirocritica (oneiro -> dreams, critica -> interpretations).

Freud came much later and was like:

"Dreams are wish fulfillment.”

No offense, Freud, but I’m pretty sure my dream about my sister being a cat and asking me for rent money was NOT a repressed fantasy.

Jung was cooler. He said dreams are how our unconscious speaks in symbols. I like that. It gives dreams more artistry, less perversion.

Here’s my favorite interpretation though:

In Islamic tradition, there are three types of dreams:

1. Rahmani – from God, usually good and meaningful.

2. Nafsani – from the self, reflections of your thoughts and subconscious mind.

3. Shaytani – from the devil, chaotic, scary, false.

They say you shouldn’t share a bad dream unless you seek protection. I think about that sometimes before I post one online like:

“Hey guys, I dreamt I was in a grocery store that sold souls and hummus.”

Maybe I should shut up.

Dreams are little apocalypse simulations.

Sometimes I wake up crying.

Sometimes I wake up laughing.

Sometimes I wake up and write down a sentence like “the moon had teeth and it sang” and wonder what the hell is wrong with me.

But I’ll always believe this:

If the world didn’t need dreams, we wouldn’t have them.

And if the oppressors wanted us to stay awake forever, it’s because dreams are the last place they can’t invade.