A false awakening is an event in which someone dreams they have awoken from sleep. This illusion of having awakened is very convincing to the person. After a false awakening, people will often dream of performing daily morning rituals, believing they have truly awakened. A dream in which a false awakening takes place is sometimes colloquially referred to as a double dream, or a dream within a dream.

It may occur either following an ordinary dream or following a lucid dream, one in which the dreamer has been aware of dreaming. Particularly if the false awakening follows a lucid dream, the false awakening may turn into a pre-lucid dream, in which the dreamer may start to wonder if they are really awake and may or may not come to the correct conclusion.

A false awakening has significance to the simulation hypothesis which states that what we perceive as true reality is in fact an illusion as evidenced by our minds’ inability to distinguish between reality and dreams. Therefore, advocates of the simulation hypothesis argue that the probability of our true reality being a simulated reality is affected by the prevalence of false awakenings.

Certain aspects of life may be dramatized or out of place in false awakenings. Details like being able to see a painting on a wall, not being able to talk or difficulty reading are common. In some experiences, the human senses are heightened or changed. For instance, one may be able to see things in greater detail, or lesser detail, or one may feel an intense burst of fear and anxiety, or possibly pleasure.

Because the dreamer is still dreaming after a false awakening, it is possible for there to be more than one false awakening in a single dream. Often, dreamers will seem to have awakened, begin eating breakfast, brushing teeth, and so on and then find themselves back in bed, begin daily morning rituals, believe that they have awakened again, and so forth. The French psychologist Yves Delage reported an experience of his own of this kind, in which he experienced four successive false awakenings. The philosopher Bertrand Russell claimed to have experienced about a hundred false awakenings in succession while coming round from a general anaesthetic.

Dream interpretation is the process of assigning meaning to dreams. In many of the ancient societies, including Egypt and Greece, dreaming was considered a supernatural communication or a means of divine intervention, whose message could be unravelled by those with certain powers. In modern times, various schools of psychology have offered theories about the meaning of dreams.

The ancient Greeks constructed temples they called Asclepieions, where sick people were sent to be cured. It was believed that cures would be effected through divine grace by incubating dreams within the confines of the temple. Dreams were also considered prophetic or omens of particular significance. In ancient Egypt, priests also acted as dream interpreters. Joseph and Daniel are recorded as having interpreted dreams sent from God, and indeed the Bible describes many incidents of dreams as divine revelation. Hieroglyphics depicting dreams and their interpretations are evident. Dreams have been held in considerable importance through history by most cultures.

Dream interpretation was taken up as part of psychoanalysis at the end of the 19th century; the perceived, manifest content of a dream is analyzed to reveal its latent meaning to the psyche of the dreamer. One of the seminal works on the subject is The Interpretation of Dreams by Sigmund Freud.

In 1953, Calvin S. Hall developed a theory of dreams in which dreaming is considered to be a cognitive process. Hall argued that a dream was simply a thought or sequence of thoughts that occurred during sleep, and that dream images are visual representations of personal conceptions. For example, if one dreams of being attacked by friends, this may be a manifestation of fear of friendship; a more complicated example, which requires a cultural metaphor, is that a cat within a dream symbolizes a need to use one’s intuition. For English speakers, it may suggest that the dreamer must recognize that there is “more than one way to skin a cat”, or in other words, more than one way to do something.

In the 1970s, Ann Faraday and others helped bring dream interpretation into the mainstream by publishing books on do-it-yourself dream interpretation and forming groups to share and analyze dreams. Faraday focused on the application of dreams to situations occurring in one’s life. For instance, some dreams are warnings of something about to happen – e.g. a dream of failing an examination, if one is a student, may be a literal warning of unpreparedness. Outside of such context, it could relate to failing some other kind of test. Or it could even have a “punny” nature, e.g. that one has failed to examine some aspect of his life adequately.

Faraday noted that “one finding has emerged pretty firmly from modern research, namely that the majority of dreams seem in some way to reflect things that have preoccupied our minds during the previous day or two.”

Exploding head syndrome is a condition that causes the sufferer to occasionally experience a tremendously loud noise as originating from within his or her own head, usually described as the sound of an explosion, roar, waves crashing against rocks, loud voices or screams or a ringing noise.

This noise usually occurs within an hour or two of falling asleep, but is not the result of a dream and can happen while awake as well. Perceived as extremely loud, the sound is usually not accompanied by pain. Attacks appear to change in number over time, with several attacks occurring in a space of days or weeks followed by months of remission.

Sufferers often feel a sense of fear and anxiety after an attack, accompanied by elevated heart rate. Attacks are also often accompanied by perceived flashes of light (when perceived on their own, known as a “visual sleep start”) or difficulty in breathing. It is not thought to be dangerous, although it is sometimes distressing to experience.

The cause of the exploding head syndrome is not known, though some physicians have reported a correlation with stress or extreme fatigue. The condition may develop at any time during life and women suffer from it slightly more often than men. Attacks can be one-time events, or can recur.

The mechanism is also not known, though possibilities have been suggested. One is that it may be the result of a sudden movement of a middle ear component or of the eustachian tube. Another is that it may be the result of a form of minor seizure in the temporal lobe where the nerve cells for hearing are located. Electroencephalograms recorded during actual attacks show unusual activity only in some sufferers, and have ruled out epileptic seizures as a cause.

This syndrome can also cause the sufferer to feel an extreme rush or adrenaline kick going through his or her head, sometimes multiple times. In most cases, it occurs when they are in a state between asleep and awake. Some sufferers report familiarisation with the subsequent fear or panic element such that they no longer consciously experience it.

Symptoms may be resolved spontaneously over time. It may be helpful to reassure the patient that this symptom is harmless. Clomipramine has been used in three patients, who experienced immediate relief from this condition.

The dream argument is the postulation that the act of dreaming provides preliminary evidence that the senses we trust to distinguish reality from illusion should not be fully trusted, and therefore any state that is dependent on our senses should at the very least be carefully examined and rigorously tested to determine if it is in fact reality.

While people dream, they usually do not realize they are dreaming. This has led philosophers to wonder whether one could actually be dreaming constantly, instead of being in waking reality (or at least that one can’t be certain that he or she is not dreaming). Having received serious attention in René Descartes’ Meditations on First Philosophy, the dream argument has become one of the most popular skeptical hypotheses.

Dreaming provides a springboard for those who question whether our own reality may be an illusion. The ability of the brain to trick itself into believing a neuronally generated world is the real world means at least one variety of simulated reality is a common, even nightly event.

Those who argue that the world is not simulated must concede that the mind, at least the sleeping mind, is not itself an entirely reliable mechanism for attempting to differentiate reality from illusion.

This could be seen as a challenge to those who claim a simulated reality requires highly advanced scientific technology, since, if dreaming really is a form of virtual reality, the only apparatus needed to construct a simulated reality capable of fooling the unconscious mind is a human brain.

In Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking-Glass, Alice finds the Red King asleep in the grass. Tweedledum and Tweedledee tell her that the Red King is dreaming about her, and that if he were to wake up she would “go out—bang!—just like a candle.”

Edgar Cayce was an American psychic. He is said to have demonstrated an ability to channel answers to questions on subjects such as health or Atlantis, while in a self induced trance. Though Cayce considered himself a devout Christian and lived before the emergence of the New Age Movement, some believe he was the founder of the movement and had influence on its teachings.

Cayce became a celebrity toward the end of his life, and the publicity given to his prophecies has overshadowed what to him were usually considered the more important parts of his work, such as healing and theology. Skeptics challenge the statement that Cayce demonstrated psychic abilities, and conventional Christians also question his unorthodox answers on religious matters such as reincarnation.

Throughout his life, Cayce was drawn to church as a member of the Disciples of Christ. He read the Bible once for every year of his life, taught at Sunday school, recruited missionaries, and is said to have agonized over the issue of whether his supposed psychic abilities and the teachings which resulted were spiritually legitimate.

Cayce’s methods involved lying down and entering into what appeared to be a trance or sleep state, usually at the request of a subject who was seeking help with health or other personal problems. The subject’s questions would then be given to Cayce, and he would proceed with a reading. At first these readings dealt with the physical health of the individual. Later readings on past lives, business advice, dream interpretation, and mental or spiritual health were also given.

When out of the trance he entered to perform a reading, Cayce did not remember what he had said during the reading. The unconscious mind, according to Cayce, has access to information which the conscious mind does not. After Gladys Davis became his secretary in 1923, all readings were transcribed and his wife Gertrude Evans Cayce conducted the readings while Cayce was in a trance.

Cayce was one of the early dream interpreters who contradicted Freudian views by saying that dreams can be of many different kinds with many levels of meaning, and that lack of interest is the reason for poor dream recall. He stated that only the dreamer knows the meaning of his dream, and that a dream is correctly interpreted when it makes sense to the dreamer and moves him forward in his life.

His mature period, in which he created the several institutions which would survive him in some form, can be considered to have started in 1925. By this time he was a professional psychic with a small staff of employees and volunteers. The readings increasingly involved occultic or esoteric themes.

Cayce said that his trance statements should be taken into account only to the extent that they led to a better life for the recipient. Moreover, he invited his audience to test his suggestions rather than accept them on faith.

The Rainbow Serpent is an important mythological being for Aboriginal people across Australia, although the creation myths associated with it are best known from northern Australia.

The Rainbow Serpent is seen as the inhabitant of permanent waterholes and is in control of life’s most precious resource, water. He is the underlying Aboriginal mythology for the famous Outback “bunyip”. He is the sometimes unpredictable Rainbow Serpent, who vies with the ever-reliable Sun, that replenishes the stores of water, forming gullies and deep channels as he slithered across the landscape, allowing for the collection and distribution of water.

Dreamtime stories tell of the great Spirits during creation, in animal and human form they molded the barren and featureless earth. The Rainbow Serpent came from beneath the ground and created huge ridges, mountains and gorges as it pushed upward. The Rainbow Serpent is known as Ngalyod by the Gunwinggu and Borlung by the Miali. He is a serpent of immense proportions which inhabits deep permanent waterholes.

Serpent stories vary according to environmental differences. Tribes of the monsoonal areas depict an epic interaction of the Sun, Serpent and wind in their Dreamtime stories, whereas tribes of the central desert experience less drastic seasonal shifts and their stories reflect this.

It is known both as a benevolent protector of its people and as a malevolent punisher of law breakers. The rainbow serpent’s mythology is closely linked to land, water, life, social relationships and fertility. There are innumerable names and stories associated with the serpent, all of which communicate the significance and power of this being within Aboriginal traditions.

The myth of the Rainbow serpent is sometimes associated with Wonambi naracoortensis, a large snake of the now extinct megafauna of Australia.

The soulcatcher was an amulet used by the Medicine man of the Tsimshian, Haida and Tlingit tribes of the Pacific Northwest Coast of British Columbia and Alaska. It is believed that all soulcatchers were constructed by the Tsimshian tribe, and traded to the Haida and Tlingit tribes.

Soulcatchers were constructed of a tube of bear femur, incised on one side, and often ornamented with abalone shell. Bears have powerful shamanic connotations among the people of the Pacific Northwest Coast. Soulcatchers were decorated with  a serpent, land otter, or bear head at both ends of the tube, and an anthropomorphic face in the middle. This form may represent a mythological land otter canoe, imbued with shamanic power. The soulcatcher was plugged at both ends with shredded cedar bark, to contain the lost soul or hold the malevolent spirit of a patient. The amulet was usually worn as a necklace. They range in size from six to eight inches in length.

Sickness incurable by secular herbal means was believed to be caused by soul loss. Dreaming was thought to be the soul leaving the body and traveling to the spirit world. If the soul was unable to return to the body by morning due to disorientation or supernatural interference chronic illness would follow.

To cure the patient the shaman would wear the soulcatcher as a necklace. He would then travel to the spirit world by calling helper spirits using trance music and employing helper spirit masks and staffs. Shaman would also work in groups, constructing a representation of a land otter canoe of shaman and spirit boards or flat totems as a vehicle to travel to the spirit world. Once the missing soul was located, the shaman would suck the soul into the soul catcher, and return to the patient. The soul would then be blown back into the patient. Another use of the soulcatcher was for sucking malevolent spirits out of a patient in a similar manner.

A dreamcatcher is a handmade object based on a willow hoop on which is woven a loose net or web. The dreamcatcher is then decorated with personal and sacred items such as feathers and beads. It originates from the Ojibwa or Chippewa group of Native Americans. It is known as asabikeshiinh, the inanimate form of the word for spider, or bawaajige nagwaagan meaning dream snare.

During the pan Indian movement of the 1960s and 1970s dreamcatchers were adopted by Native Americans of a number of different Nations. They came to be seen by some as a symbol of unity among the various Indian Nations, and as a general symbol of identification with Native American or First Nations cultures. However, some Native Americans have come to see them as tacky and over commercialized due to their acceptance in popular culture.

Traditionally, the Ojibwa construct dreamcatchers by tying sinew strands in a web around a small round or tear shaped frame of willow in a way roughly similar to the method for making snowshoe webbing. The resulting dreamcatcher, hung above the bed, is then used as a charm to protect sleeping children from nightmares. Dreamcatchers made of willow and sinew are not meant to last forever but instead are intended to dry out and collapse over time as the child enters the age of adulthood.

The Ojibwa believe that a dreamcatcher changes a person’s dreams. According to Terri J. Andrews in the article Legend of the Dream Catcher, about the Ojibwa nation, only good dreams would be allowed to filter through. Bad dreams would stay in the net, disappearing with the light of day.

It’s recommended to hang the dream catcher above someone sleeping to guard against bad dreams. Good dreams pass through and slide down the feathers to the sleeper. Another legend states that good dreams pass through the center hole to the sleeping person. The bad dreams are trapped in the web, where they perish in the light of dawn.

In the course of becoming popular outside of the Ojibwa Nation, and then outside of the pan Indian communities, dreamcatchers are now made, exhibited, and sold by some New Age groups and individuals. According to Philip Jenkins, this is considered by most traditional Native peoples and their supporters to be an undesirable form of cultural appropriation.

The official portrait of Ralph Klein, former Premier of the Canadian province of Alberta and whose wife Colleen Klein is Metis, incorporates a dreamcatcher.