Can someone change their dreams?

1. Can someone change their dreams?

2. My project • I chose to see whether someone can influence their dreams positively or negatively. • My main purpose was to give people a tool to be able to combat nightmares. • People have a fear of nightmares in general and I hope to be able to help them with this problem.

3. How? • By performing activities the night before I have found that people are able to influence their dream pattern. • Examples playing video games, watching television, reading a book, working out, really any of these are valid choices.

4. Why? • Night Terrors: Feelings of great fear experienced on suddenly waking in the night. • My little brother suffers from these. This is why I am pursuing this research project.

5. Ways to keep track • I recorded all of this in two ways: • First I used a dream journal which I have pictures of on the next page. • Second was the use of my blog to make sure that I stayed current and my memory refreshed throughout the project.

7. Support • An article in livescience.com has shown that video gamers have an ability to be able to control their dreams. • I would say that I have always been a video gamer, I spend many hours a week playing games and nights when I play I have the most vivid dreams. The dream depends on the type of game that I play also.

8. Problems • The main problem that I face is recording my dreams each morning. Even a month into this project I still struggle with this. • The other problem that I have is that trying to do a different thing each night gets pretty difficult just because people are creatures of habit. • This is the only way though to develop some kind of pattern is by doing the same activity sometimes.

9. Background • I became interested in dreams last year in my English class I felt like now was the best time to pursue this research. • When I was younger I was also always curious why I had dreams and why they turned out the way that they did. I still don’t entirely know why they turn out or begin the way that they do, but now I know how to influence what can occur in my dream. • This isn’t necessarily the same thing as lucid dreaming which is actually controlling the dream, but just to affect whether it is a positive or negative dream.

10. Outcome • In the end of this project I have come to the conclusion that it is possible to help combat nightmares. • By doing positive activities right before bed like watching a funny movie, playing a non-violent video game someone is able to have more positive dreams. • This does not completely help get rid of nightmares, but it greatly reduces the likelihood of them.

11. Outcomes con’t • I don’t necessarily know that this will help cure my brothers night terrors, but I hope that I am able to at least decrease the frequency that they happen. • Being a video gamer or someone that immerses themselves in a virtual world often is the easiest way to help make this work. • I hope everyone is able to learn something from my research and that it can at least help a few people.