cavernio (![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} cavernio) wrote,@ 2007-01-04 21:14:00 |
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Sleep
My pitiful excuse for a livejournal or blog or whatever you want to call something that's supposed to be updated on a regular basis is becoming even more pitiful. I guess that's what happens when you get a significant other and there's holidays so you actually get to see most of the people who might read your blog anyways.
Anyways, on CBC's Ideas tonight, there was the first of a 2 part thingy about sleep. I missed most of it, but probably caught most of the last 20 minutes of it, in time to hear that different cultures have different sleep patterns, but that its hardly been studied at all.
The guy doing the narrating had apparently undergone some sort of sleep experiment which I'm guessing was essentially just spending his time being focussed on sleeping and recording stuff. At some point in the experiment, he'd wake up in the middle of the night first only once, and then a few times afterwards, and be completely and utterly relaxed, and he'd drift in and out of dreaming while being in this relaxed state. It seemed that it was a very novel experience for him, which is a little surprising because this seems to happen to me all the time (although perhaps I'm not quite as relaxed as he was.) It happens if I get to sleep in, for instance, especially when I know its perfectly fine for me to be sleeping in that day. Actually, I think the times when it's been the most relaxing are the times when I've foolishly decided to screw life and all obligations, usually after going through the terrible feeling of, you know, having to DO something. It's actually kinda amazing how I managed to do that, go from a state of despair to one of utter relaxation, which I was probably only be able to do because I truly did throw off absolutely all cares and troubles and meanings; I certainly haven't developed this state in the past while. (Anyways, that entire section should be in parentheses, and not just this sentence-I do that all the time, nest thoughts into other ones. Wasn't there a UNB prof who did that while lecturing all the time?)
As I was saying, I've entered into states which I'm sure are very similar to what the narrator/presenter was talking about, and I do recall the moment where, for awhile, I became quite good at entering that state from waking, as opposed to waking up and entering it. I thought it might've been something akin to meditation, because it happened after I had listened to 1, fairly short song, over and over for at least an hour. The little I know about meditation, which I'm sure is largely stereotype, is that people often hum or chant to enter themselves into that state, that the repition of sound helps something out. I wonder if what the guy was talking about is akin to meditation. I also wonder about the EEG readings (he must've been hooked up to EEG), and I wonder if the pattern is close to the one when people meditate. It probably is, and is probably already known to be so, and I'm just too lazy to look it up; there are only a handful, 4 or 5, categories of brainwaves.
I also heard on Ideas that not only sleep but resting as well is correlated with increased levels of prolactin. Not minute increases, but apparently something fairly strong as well. Not that this means much in and of itself, (random chemical x increases when you're sleepy and sleeping, who would've guessed something like that would happen!), but it made me think about Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. CFS is exactly what it says, and is one of these disorders/diseases which apparently know one knows of a cause or anything, and I hadn't heard about prolactin when I'd read about CFS before, but apparently, there is research out there showing that people with CFS respond stronger to some chemical which causes prolactin release than others.
As I've said before on my livejournal I think even, I like sleep. I don't quite like it as much as I did a year and then some ago, but its still very enjoyable.
Tomorrow night, Ideas will play part II of the series, and they said it would involve stuff about lucid dreaming. I've had lucid dreams myself, but mainly to the extent that I know I'm dreaming. In fact, I've had lucid dreams where even though I've figured out I'm dreaming, the dream still takes over, like my conciousness is too lazy or doesn't care of the fact that I'm dreaming, and I often lose or forget that it was a dream, yet I realize what actually happened when I wake up. Partially on the topic of lucid dreaming, awhile ago Nathan said he was able to fall asleep while remaining concious, and felt his body shut down and said it felt awful. From other people's ramblings on the internet, that seems the general consensus when they've done that or that happened accidentally before. I tried for awhile there to fall asleep and remain concious, but I couldn't do it. I dunno, unless I had heard of it, I would've said that you just can't 'fall asleep' unless you DO lose conciousness, that they always go hand in hand, but I guess I'm wrong. It certainly seems that my conciousness slips into random thoughts before my body enters into sleep often. I had actually forgot to keep trying to do that, and I'll probably try and fail again tonight. People say the counting method, where you keep yourself conscious through counting, is a good way to do it, but I can count in my head without me being conscious of it, the same way there can be a song in my head without me really being conscious about it. In fact, years ago, when I walked home from school all the time, for the heck of it I once decided to count while walking. I did that for a few days, and it quickly became second nature to me, and at times when I didn't mean to be doing it, I'd find that I'd be counting in my head and could be as high up as in the 300's before I realized. This I think has put a black mark on the counting method for me. However, from the only Richard Feyman book I'd read, he talked about him counting in his head not aloud like most people do (ie: normal people hear the numbers), he saw the numbers. (What I believe he was talking about in the book was something which psychologists have done for years and still do now in an attempt to figure out how things work in the mind, is that when doing multiple tasks, if one requires the same 'resources' as another, the task will become harder and more time consuming, whereas if the person can multi-taks while taking no loss to accuracy or time, the 2 things are then called separate processes). I tried doing that, counting through seeing, and that still failed, but I think its got a much better chance at working for me because that is very much not automatic. I think the main thing is, is that I'm not fully sure of HOW to fall asleep while remaining conscious. It just seems that if I focus on doing something, I'm just going to stay awake, but that if I don't focus, I'm just going to let my thoughts trail into oblivion. I have no idea how it feels, and I have no idea if I'm close or not. There's been times where it kinda feels like I might be falling asleep, and then I start focussing on the feeling of it, and then I'm just awake. Or else, I can almost feel different levels of consciousness, and I'm not really sure what 'level' I should be in. Apparently, I keep choosing the 'sleep' level :-p In anycase, I still want to experience remaining conscious while being awake, and will probably try sporadically at it for quite a long time.
Well, that's my un-pre-written, un-proofread rambling for now.
My pitiful excuse for a livejournal or blog or whatever you want to call something that's supposed to be updated on a regular basis is becoming even more pitiful. I guess that's what happens when you get a significant other and there's holidays so you actually get to see most of the people who might read your blog anyways.
Anyways, on CBC's Ideas tonight, there was the first of a 2 part thingy about sleep. I missed most of it, but probably caught most of the last 20 minutes of it, in time to hear that different cultures have different sleep patterns, but that its hardly been studied at all.
The guy doing the narrating had apparently undergone some sort of sleep experiment which I'm guessing was essentially just spending his time being focussed on sleeping and recording stuff. At some point in the experiment, he'd wake up in the middle of the night first only once, and then a few times afterwards, and be completely and utterly relaxed, and he'd drift in and out of dreaming while being in this relaxed state. It seemed that it was a very novel experience for him, which is a little surprising because this seems to happen to me all the time (although perhaps I'm not quite as relaxed as he was.) It happens if I get to sleep in, for instance, especially when I know its perfectly fine for me to be sleeping in that day. Actually, I think the times when it's been the most relaxing are the times when I've foolishly decided to screw life and all obligations, usually after going through the terrible feeling of, you know, having to DO something. It's actually kinda amazing how I managed to do that, go from a state of despair to one of utter relaxation, which I was probably only be able to do because I truly did throw off absolutely all cares and troubles and meanings; I certainly haven't developed this state in the past while. (Anyways, that entire section should be in parentheses, and not just this sentence-I do that all the time, nest thoughts into other ones. Wasn't there a UNB prof who did that while lecturing all the time?)
As I was saying, I've entered into states which I'm sure are very similar to what the narrator/presenter was talking about, and I do recall the moment where, for awhile, I became quite good at entering that state from waking, as opposed to waking up and entering it. I thought it might've been something akin to meditation, because it happened after I had listened to 1, fairly short song, over and over for at least an hour. The little I know about meditation, which I'm sure is largely stereotype, is that people often hum or chant to enter themselves into that state, that the repition of sound helps something out. I wonder if what the guy was talking about is akin to meditation. I also wonder about the EEG readings (he must've been hooked up to EEG), and I wonder if the pattern is close to the one when people meditate. It probably is, and is probably already known to be so, and I'm just too lazy to look it up; there are only a handful, 4 or 5, categories of brainwaves.
I also heard on Ideas that not only sleep but resting as well is correlated with increased levels of prolactin. Not minute increases, but apparently something fairly strong as well. Not that this means much in and of itself, (random chemical x increases when you're sleepy and sleeping, who would've guessed something like that would happen!), but it made me think about Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. CFS is exactly what it says, and is one of these disorders/diseases which apparently know one knows of a cause or anything, and I hadn't heard about prolactin when I'd read about CFS before, but apparently, there is research out there showing that people with CFS respond stronger to some chemical which causes prolactin release than others.
As I've said before on my livejournal I think even, I like sleep. I don't quite like it as much as I did a year and then some ago, but its still very enjoyable.
Tomorrow night, Ideas will play part II of the series, and they said it would involve stuff about lucid dreaming. I've had lucid dreams myself, but mainly to the extent that I know I'm dreaming. In fact, I've had lucid dreams where even though I've figured out I'm dreaming, the dream still takes over, like my conciousness is too lazy or doesn't care of the fact that I'm dreaming, and I often lose or forget that it was a dream, yet I realize what actually happened when I wake up. Partially on the topic of lucid dreaming, awhile ago Nathan said he was able to fall asleep while remaining concious, and felt his body shut down and said it felt awful. From other people's ramblings on the internet, that seems the general consensus when they've done that or that happened accidentally before. I tried for awhile there to fall asleep and remain concious, but I couldn't do it. I dunno, unless I had heard of it, I would've said that you just can't 'fall asleep' unless you DO lose conciousness, that they always go hand in hand, but I guess I'm wrong. It certainly seems that my conciousness slips into random thoughts before my body enters into sleep often. I had actually forgot to keep trying to do that, and I'll probably try and fail again tonight. People say the counting method, where you keep yourself conscious through counting, is a good way to do it, but I can count in my head without me being conscious of it, the same way there can be a song in my head without me really being conscious about it. In fact, years ago, when I walked home from school all the time, for the heck of it I once decided to count while walking. I did that for a few days, and it quickly became second nature to me, and at times when I didn't mean to be doing it, I'd find that I'd be counting in my head and could be as high up as in the 300's before I realized. This I think has put a black mark on the counting method for me. However, from the only Richard Feyman book I'd read, he talked about him counting in his head not aloud like most people do (ie: normal people hear the numbers), he saw the numbers. (What I believe he was talking about in the book was something which psychologists have done for years and still do now in an attempt to figure out how things work in the mind, is that when doing multiple tasks, if one requires the same 'resources' as another, the task will become harder and more time consuming, whereas if the person can multi-taks while taking no loss to accuracy or time, the 2 things are then called separate processes). I tried doing that, counting through seeing, and that still failed, but I think its got a much better chance at working for me because that is very much not automatic. I think the main thing is, is that I'm not fully sure of HOW to fall asleep while remaining conscious. It just seems that if I focus on doing something, I'm just going to stay awake, but that if I don't focus, I'm just going to let my thoughts trail into oblivion. I have no idea how it feels, and I have no idea if I'm close or not. There's been times where it kinda feels like I might be falling asleep, and then I start focussing on the feeling of it, and then I'm just awake. Or else, I can almost feel different levels of consciousness, and I'm not really sure what 'level' I should be in. Apparently, I keep choosing the 'sleep' level :-p In anycase, I still want to experience remaining conscious while being awake, and will probably try sporadically at it for quite a long time.
Well, that's my un-pre-written, un-proofread rambling for now.
