Dreaming is ridiculous. For reference,
we know more about the abyss that is the
Mariana's Trench than we do about the
mental landscapes of your dreams. We
know more about the tiny remnants of DNA
extinct creatures have left behind than
we do about your nightly hallucinations.
Heck, we even know more about Martian
dust storms than we do about our little
bedtime stories. And yet, everyone
dreams. They're the most private thing
that all of us have in common.
immediately recognizable but incredibly
difficult to define. So much so that for
decades dreams were believed to be
nothing more than brain noise. Very
fleeting and completely meaningless.
But if that's true, why would your brain
paralyze you during REM sleep? Why would
it burn costly energy running
simulations instead of repairing itself?
And why would REM sleep appear in the
womb way before any life experience? The
reality is the rabbit hole of dreams is
deep, way deeper than you think. And
from personal Reddit threads claiming to
see the same stranger in every dream for
over a decade to entire scientific
databases containing tens of thousands
of peer-reviewed dream reports,
completely different people find
themselves in the exact same places with
the exact same sequence of events,
sometimes even while being awake. So,
what exactly is going on here? And how
deep into dreams do we have to go to
find out? Well, as it turns out, dreams
have levels, and they get far stranger,
go far deeper, and are far more
consequential than we could have ever
possibly imagined.
Level one.
>> The five levels of dreams aren't random.
They build on one another through a
sequence. But before that sequence even
begins, there are two primary states of
consciousness that everyone will
experience. Being awake and being
asleep. However, what's less wellknown
is that there's also a third state, a
strange in between called hypnogogia,
which is a transitional state between
being awake then falling asleep or vice
versa. But what's interesting is that
even though you're not fully asleep, raw
fragmented noise still floods the brain,
specifically geometric patterns. And
yes, I mean these geometric patterns,
which in level one is the pulsating
chaos you'll experience as you drift
into sleep. It was Hinrich Clover in the
1920s who first documented this
phenomenon and he found that there were
four common patterns anytime someone
begins entering an altered state.
Latises, cobwebs, tunnels, and spirals,
all of which are described as the
precursors to our inner worlds. We're
not entirely sure why this happens, but
we do know it comes from the visual
cortex, which is one of the theories
behind why we dream in general. Because
of neuroplasticity, if the visual cortex
is unused, like in people who are blind,
neighboring brain regions essentially
invade that space to then repurpose it
for what they do. So, it's thought that
we dream as a defense mechanism to keep
the visual cortex active and protect its
territory while we sleep. But while this
may very well be why we started dreaming
in the first place, it doesn't explain
the content of dreams or why so many
brain areas other than the visual cortex
need to be involved. But still, these
geometric patterns are the doorway to
dreams. They're all that exist in level
one. Some people remember experiencing
them and some people don't. But it is
only once you cross through them that
the real dreaming begins.
>> Level two.
>> In level two, you're dreaming kind of.
You're somewhere. You might be someone,
but the dream is still forming. So, at
this level, the landscape is the focus,
but it's odd, feels incomplete, and is
completely empty. which is why this
level is where the concept of dreamscape
comes from. An art style defined by
surrealism, usually characterized by
familiar landscapes and bright colors.
But while most people focus on the
everyday environments, the houses that
look familiar, or the proportions that
make things feel off, what I find most
interesting is the things that are
missing. Now, I'm no artist, but I am
familiar with the concept of negative
spaces, which is when the absence of
something outlines the main subject of
the image by contrast. It works by
creating a visual hierarchy that guides
the viewer's eyes through the
composition. But where it really shines
is in its contribution to the harmony of
the art piece. Negative spaces are used
to distribute visual weight evenly.
However, artists can take advantage of
this by using too little or too much.
Use too little and you can alter the
viewer's perception by creating the
feeling of being overwhelmed. Use too
much and you can create a feeling of
isolation or emptiness. In Dreamscape,
aside from the fact that familiar
objects are often conveyed, images feel
familiar because the large negative
space gives you the room needed to
project your own feelings onto that
artwork. And in this level of dreams,
that's exactly what's happening. Dream
researchers describe it as the void
behind perception. Anthony Ravanchow
calls it selective simulation. Dream
dictionaries call it the archetypal
emblem of the void. Either way, this is
when your brain starts to build. And oh
boy, does it do that with the most vivid
accessible material it has at its
disposal. Memories. But not just any
memories. Heavy ones tagged with emotion
which come from the amygdala instead of
the hippocampus. But at this point,
what's supposed to be a dream is a void,
unrendered and empty. And yet, it is
that emptiness that allows the brain to
project its emotions onto that void,
creating a simple, barely rendered
landscape of emotion. Pure emotion in
its most primal, raw, and chaotic form
stitched together from the deepest parts
of your memories with no plot, no
structure, and no people bubbling up to
the surface as a foundation that every
other level will be built upon. However,
at this stage, what you experience is
just the beginning.
Level three.
>> A strange phenomenon that exemplifies
what level 3 is about is the airport
dream, which has hundreds of posts
dedicated to it on our dreams. In them,
people report finding themselves in an
airport, scrambling to catch a flight.
But as they make their way towards the
flight gate, things start to go terribly
wrong. At first, the gate will move or
disappear. In response, the dreamer
changes course, but as they do, they get
lost. So, in a desperate attempt at
reaching their flight on time, they try
to ask people for help, but get ignored
or worse, turn to find themselves as the
only person in a massive airport. And no
matter how much they run or how hard
they try, eventually they'll miss their
flight. Now, by itself, this isn't a
particularly unsettling dream. It's not
comfortable, obviously, but I wouldn't
call it a nightmare. However, where
things do start to get nightmarish is
when they repeat. And in the airport
dream, this seems to be a frequent
occurrence as a couple months later, the
same person will find themselves in the
same narrative arc, but happening on a
cruise or in a hotel or when they're on
vacation. All of which have the same
outcome, but with a different sequence
of events. Generally, it's thought that
a dream about never arriving in a
transportation setting is tied to
anxiety about unresolved life tasks. But
with the setting itself, depending on
the transportation settings you're most
accustomed to. Regardless, this
phenomenon perfectly encapsulates the
key aspect of this level. It's
metaphorical. With raw emotion taking
center stage, your brain is now trying
to shape it. But to do that, it needs to
turn up the volume, amplifying the
emotion until it's strong enough to be
processed. Without the ability to use
language, since you know you're asleep,
it does this by distilling the emotions
into one of five central themes.
identity, desire, fear, loss, or
conflict. Taking the same memory
fragments as earlier and then
repurposing and combining them into a
structure that can express one of these
themes. So, the plot that comes from
this isn't logical. It's not the story
you'd expect from a movie script. It's
emotional logic, cause and effect that's
used to reinforce the core emotion, not
to make literal sense. But why it
chooses these specific themes or where
those themes even come from is something
we still don't know. However, some
people have ventured far enough to give
us some clues.
Level four.
>> Level four is where dreams cross a
boundary. They stop feeling like they're
generated from you and start feeling
like they're generated for you.
Experiences include characters that keep
returning, real places you'll visit, and
encounters with independent agents. But
above all else, what defines this level
is the feeling that your experience is
in yours. And on Reddit, there's some
really strange examples of this. One
case describes the experience of
encountering the same figure night after
night across more than 10 years of
dreaming, first meeting as children, and
then growing up together. Another
describes dreaming about places they've
never been to or heard of. Vividly
picturing everything like the colors,
the architecture, or the extravagant
shop names, only to then wake up and
find out that that place and the way
they dreamt it actually exists. In both
cases, the dream unfolds from their
perspective, while the person in place
feel like independent agents. However,
these are individual examples. It's not
like this theme is that widespread,
right? Nope.
When I was looking through the massive
Dream Bank database, the most
interesting thing I found was this
consistent reports of being chased,
sometimes by strangers and sometimes by
people you know, sometimes on foot and
sometimes in a vehicle. Regardless, the
theme is so widespread that it
consistently ranks in the top three most
experienced nightmares, as well as being
the single most frequently reoccurring
one. But what's more is that it's often
accompanied by an inability to escape
where the dreamer falls and then gets
caught or where their legs get so heavy
that they can't move. It's not like the
dreamer wants that to happen. They're
actively trying to escape. And yet, in a
similar manner to the Reddit examples,
no matter how urgently they try, the
outcome is inevitable. I believe that
this is because the elements of your
dreams can mean multiple things at once.
But why this happens is particularly
interesting to me. We know it's because
in some way level four is where the
brain attempts to extract meaning from
the structured emotions it created
earlier. But extracting meaning
predominantly comes in two forms.
There's the top layer which is
subjective and personal determined by
things like your experience, memories
and how you interpret them. And then
there's the deeper layer which is
universal and instinctual shaped by
evolutionary pressures where the
inherited neural templates that follow.
Generally the structuring of dreams
comes from the top layer. So think
things like the people, length of or
situations in your dreams. While the
emotional gravity, the five themes from
earlier come from the deeper shared
layer. In your dream, both are present
at the same time. But to do that, your
brain uses something called an emergent
attractor network, which to keep it
brief are reoccurring motifs of memory
that emerge from the interactions of
neurons due to how they're connected.
This gives them two key properties.
stable concepts that can be recalled
consistently while also being flexible
enough to adapt to new experiences. The
adaptable part is where your control in
the dream, the top layer, comes from
while the stable part stays the same and
is where the elements you can't control
come from. So, for example, if you
experience a nightmare about being
chased, the person chasing you might
embody something from your personal life
that you've had a recent conflict with,
while the experience of being chased
embodies the universal fear of a
confrontation with inescapable
consequences. In the Reddit example,
with the unknown person appearing again
and again, this figure might reappear
whenever the dreamer is caught in a
reoccurring emotional cycle, but in the
stable layer, it's a symbol for a part
of them that they need to incorporate.
And is only when they do that the person
and the emotional cycle will stop
appearing. So in other words, the lack
of control is what provides the
consistent framework necessary to make
the dream interpretable while the
flexibility of it is shaped and colored
by your own experiences for whatever
you're going through. Still, level four
is where dream research basically falls
off a cliff. So I'm reasoning based on
the limited information I have. But what
makes this even crazier is that this
isn't even the deepest level. There are
some dreams where you know you're
dreaming and that awareness opens up a
whole new door into an entirely
different experience.
>> Level five.
>> It's rare and I've never experienced it
before. But in the people who get to
level five, something radically
different emerges. lucid dreaming, which
is when you're in a dream, but are aware
of the fact that you're in a dream. When
things are going your way, that's great.
You can randomly fly or jump through
walls or otherwise play around with the
contents of your unconscious. But when
it's not, it's terrifying. As just
because you're aware doesn't mean you
have control. And when this happens, two
experiences are reported more than any
others. encounters with hostile
characters and getting stuck in a
nesting dream. In the first one, there
are many reports on both Reddit and the
Dream Bank that explain what happens.
The person becomes lucid, gains
awareness, and tries to tell the figures
in their dreams that they aren't real.
In the good scenarios, nothing happens.
But in the bad ones, the characters get
angry. Sometimes screaming things like,
"You weren't supposed to know." And at
others, just turning around to lunge at
the dreamer. No one really knows why
things like this happen. The only thing
we do know about lucid dreams is that
parts of your prefrontal cortex
reactivate. But even that gets
complicated because in the second
experience, you don't have the same
level of freedom. As the reports go, a
person wakes up and starts their day.
They get dressed, use the bathroom, and
brush their teeth. At first, everything
feels normal until they catch the
reflection in the mirror. It's wrong.
Their nose is on their forehead, and the
mirror is a different color than it's
supposed to be. As soon as they realize,
bam, they wake up. Luckily, it was just
a dream. So, they feel a sense of relief
and then get started on their morning
routine again. But when they check the
mirror this time, their face is still
distorted. Only now, the mirror's color
matches reality. So, they panic and then
bam, wake up again. This time, they get
suspicious, so they go straight into the
bathroom and look at the reflection in
the mirror. Immediately, a sense of
relief washes over them. They're finally
actually awake. But then when they take
a second glance, their face distorts
again. Suddenly, bam, they wake up. This
time for real. In the reports of people
who have experienced this, this cycle
can happen again and again and again.
Sometimes seven times in total, all
while the dream gets closer to reality
every single time. It's a terrifying
experience to think about, honestly,
because as of right now, all we have are
reports. Some people think these
experiences emerge from the tension of
being aware in the system of the dream
itself. Others think it's because your
awareness can't sync with the sensory
input you get when you're awake. So the
looping is done to flip through dream
layers and waking signals until they
match and that's when you wake up.
Regardless, this is the final level of
dreams, at least based on our
understanding right now. And honestly, I
think it just opens more questions than
it answers. But maybe with time we'll be
able to figure them out. Anyway, thanks
for watching.