Bed time history
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Bedtime History is a series of educational, relaxing stories for kids and families. Learn about inspirational characters such as Jackie Robinson, Sacajawea, Neil Armstrong, and Maya Angelou. Other topics include space exploration, current events, and great feats of engineering such as The Transcontinental Railroad.
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Climbing Mount Everest
Climbing Mount Everest
Learn about the history of people who have climbed Mount Everest and the local sherpas who have helped them do so.
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Climbing Mount Everest [No Ads]
Learn about the history of people who have climbed Mount Everest and the local sherpas who have helped them do so.
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New Year's Eve Around The World
New Year's Eve Around The World
Learn how people celebrate New Year's Eve across the world.
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New Year's Eve Around the World [No Ads]
New Year's Eve Around the World [No Ads]
Learn how people celebrate New Year's Eve across the world.
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Christmas Traditions Q&A
Christmas Traditions Q&A
Discover a few answers to questions about Christmas traditions with us.
What is figgy pudding? What are sugar plums? Why do we decorate Christmas trees?📢 Donate and get a shout-out from Breck!
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Christmas Traditions Q&A [No Ads]
Christmas Traditions Q&A [No Ads]
Discover a few answers to questions about Christmas traditions with us. What is figgy pudding? What are sugar plums? Why do we decorate Christmas trees?
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Sleep phases: what they are, what they affect and how to get enough sleep
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Doctors say Updated on September 12, 2022, 14:44
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Human sleep is cyclical and consists of phases. Each of them is responsible for certain functions - from the development of cognitive skills to general health. When the body has gone through all the phases in a dream, in the morning we feel cheerfulness and a surge of strength. Lack or disturbance of sleep, on the contrary, worsens well-being, affects memory and the ability to think clearly, and chronic sleep deprivation is fraught with serious neurological disorders. We understand what sleep hygiene is and in which phase it is better to wake up in order to feel good. nine0003
Contents
- What is the sleep phase
- What are the
- How to get enough sleep: the rules
- How to control
What is sleep phase
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In sleep, a person restores the balance between the neuronal centers of the brain
The sleep phase is one of the stages in the sleep cycle, characterized by a certain activity of brain neurons, changes in muscle tone and eye movements.
During the night, a person sequentially goes through two phases - fast (REM) and slow (NREM), which, in turn, consists of three stages. Phases and stages follow each other, forming a cycle of up to about 110 minutes each. nine0003
The sequence of these stages in healthy people is the same, but their quality and duration vary. This is due to many factors: age, gender, bad habits, stress levels, medications and diseases, including provoking frequent awakenings - sleep apnea or restless leg syndrome (RLS).
Vladislav SinitsynPhD, neurologist "SM-Clinic" in Ivanovo
“The physiology of sleep is not fully understood. It is a dynamic process that affects almost every system in the body, from the brain to metabolism and immunity. Among the main mechanisms that determine sleep, the following are distinguished. nine0003
- Circadian rhythms. This is just one of the varieties of biorhythms that, in the context of sleep, determine the mode of wakefulness and night rest.
The periods of the circadian rhythm can vary significantly from person to person. Some go to bed early and get enough sleep early in the morning, others go late and cannot get up early. Correction of the biological clock is carried out in the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) of the anterior lobe of the hypothalamus, which is located above the optic chiasm of the brain. For example, some people with CCN damage sleep erratically during the day because they cannot match their circadian rhythms to the light-dark cycle [1]. nine0014 - ** Melatonin ** - sleep hormone. Its concentration gradually increases with the onset of twilight, reaching a maximum by four or five in the morning. Then its level slowly decreases, and the person wakes up. Even dim lighting at first glance can delay the synthesis of melatonin and thus disrupt sleep.
- Autonomic nervous system (ANS). When the sympathetic component of the ANS predominates, the metabolism is accelerated, falling asleep is difficult, and sleep is disturbed.
The parasympathetic nervous system helps the body prepare for rest. In different people with different types of higher nervous activity, the ANS works differently. nine0014
With age, sleep parameters change: its duration decreases, it becomes fragmented, and the slow phase is reduced. Thus, the sleep characteristic changes even if there are no health problems.
Daytime sleep at any age is not equivalent to nighttime sleep. Melatonin is produced only at night, during the day our body has a higher temperature, which also affects sleep. In addition, it can exacerbate health problems, as the body does not fully implement the recovery program. nine0003
What are the phases of sleep
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Phases and stages of sleep alternate in a certain sequence
First comes the slow phase, followed by a shorter period of the fast phase. Then everything is repeated, a total of four to six times a night. The slow phase consists of three stages, which are replaced in turn, and one of them, the second, is repeated twice.
A typical sequence of stages and phases looks like this: N1, N2, N3, N2, REM [2]. nine0003
Stages of non-REM sleep
- N1 - the shortest period of falling asleep, which lasts from one to five minutes. The body is not yet completely relaxed, while the heartbeat and breathing begin to slow down. It's easy to wake someone up.
- N2 - a person spends almost half of his sleep in it. It is characterized by a slowing of breathing, a decrease in body temperature and a complete cessation of eye movements. At this stage, the brain is most actively processing memories, translating them into long-term memory. This is how we remember what we have learned. nine0014
- N3 - during this period, the main rest and recovery of the body occurs, including the strengthening of immunity and other functions [3]. Stage N3 is the stage of deep sleep, so waking up a person going through this phase is the most difficult.
Vladislav Sinitsin:
“If you interrupt your sleep in the slow phase, then, in addition to worsening your general well-being, your concentration will be disturbed, irritability will appear, and your working capacity will decrease.
”
REM sleep
The first time it occurs not earlier than an hour and a half after the person fell asleep. With each new cycle, its duration increases. In total, REM sleep takes up 25-30% of the time. It is in the fast phase that a person sees dreams and develops key cognitive skills, such as learning or creativity [4]. On the advice of experts, it is impossible to artificially shorten the fast phase, since the body is preparing for awakening and vigorous activity, the connection between consciousness and physiological processes in the brain is turned on. nine0003
How to get enough sleep by sleep phases: rules
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Changing the basic characteristics of sleep phases can affect thinking, mood and overall health
We cannot fully control our sleep cycles, but there are steps we can take to improve the quality of our sleep. Sleep Hygiene is a set of simple rules that will help you fall asleep and sleep better.
Lada OleksenkoExpert of the Butterfly Children Foundation, psychiatrist, State Budgetary Healthcare Institution of the Moscow Region "LCCH"
“The following recommendations should be followed.
nine0003
- Melatonin, which is produced only in complete darkness, is responsible for the quality of sleep. There should not be any light sources in the bedroom - a night lamp, light from a lantern in the window, a TV turned on, etc.
- The body prepares for sleep gradually, so in the evening you need to reduce physical activity and limit the use of gadgets to calm the nervous system.
- It is desirable to go to bed and get up at the same time, even on weekends and holidays. This is the key to healthy sleep in accordance with biological rhythms. nine0014
- Ventilate the room. The optimum temperature in the room is +18 °C.
- It makes sense to abstain from alcohol and smoking before going to bed. The latter, according to doctors, is a sure way to insomnia. Caffeine also impairs falling asleep and interferes with deep sleep.
- Look after the bed. Use comfortable mattress, blanket, pillows and bedding. Change them regularly, avoid synthetic materials.
"
How to control sleep phases
Vladislav Sinitsyn:
“Today, there are technologies that help determine what phase of sleep a person is in, as well as identify its quality. For this, an electroencephalogram (EEG) is used, which shows the difference in brain activity. In addition, in order to sleep correctly in phases, you can use the options of various sleep calculators and specialized mobile applications. But in them, as a rule, the average rate and duration are calculated: 70% - slow sleep, 30% - fast. It is impossible to increase one phase of sleep at the expense of another. But, following the general rules, you can prolong slow sleep. nine0003
Lada Oleksenko:
“To feel alert and rested, you need to wake up in the fast phase. The reliability of various gadgets that calculate the wake-up time is no more than 80%. You can do it yourself. For example, during the week go to bed at the same time, and get up at different times. So, by your own feelings, you can understand in which of the phases you woke up.
After that, you can calculate how many minutes you have in one cycle and how many of them you pass per night. nine0003
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Nadezhda Gurina
You may be interested in Why does the brain never sleep? Where is the human soul located? How are waking up and falling asleep related to electricity? Can sleep be a weapon? Finally, do dream control gadgets work?..
nine0002 Sleep is just as busy for our body as being awakePhoto: Dieter Spannknebel/ Getty Images
Our interlocutor is a leading Russian somnologist, member of the American and European scientific societies for the study of sleep, chief researcher at the Institute for Ecology and Evolution them. A.N. Severtsov RAS Vladimir Kovalzon.
— Vladimir Matveyevich, tell me first: what explains the recent boom in discoveries in the field of somnology? Which ones are the most important? nine0141
— In general, somnology is one of the most rapidly developing sciences today.
Discoveries are every year, but about once every 10 years, the entire scientific paradigm of ideas about wakefulness and sleep changes. This is primarily due to the emergence of new methods for studying the functioning of the brain. An example: we used to be able to turn off large areas of the brain very rudely, but today, thanks to new technologies, it is possible to precisely regulate the work of specific neurons. Thanks to this, it became clear that the brain does not work at all as we thought. It does not look like either a computer or a neural network, but rather resembles an analog machine: the whole brain consists of blocks that interact with each other, despite the fact that there is no visible connection between them. nine0003
— How has this changed our understanding of sleep?
— A digression is required to explain. Back in the middle of the 20th century, a special formation was discovered in the brain, which was believed to cause wakefulness. Due to the fact that neurons are active inside this center, we do not sleep, we have muscles that allow us to sit up straight, get up, walk, and so on.
Damage to this area has been associated with various types of coma. And in 2011, physiologists, using the latest methods, began to specifically turn off this center in cats and ... nothing happened. We decided that the experiments were incorrect, but the result was repeated on mice, on other animals. And then they took up this system again. At the end of last year, amazing results were published. It turned out that the system itself consists of several blocks, and there is a very tiny part in it, it is this part that is associated with a coma, as soon as it was touched during destruction, a coma occurred in animals in a few days. After extensive research, the same structure was found in humans. It turned out that only 2 cubic millimeters of brain tissue is responsible for our consciousness! Despite the fact that the human brain itself is huge - it even hardly fits into the cranium. nine0003
Point of consciousness
— So this point includes our consciousness?
— Yes, in lectures I say that this is the place of “localization of the soul”.
Imagine how finely everything is arranged! Just like in a fairy tale, where Koshchei's death is hidden at the tip of a needle. In fact, the human consciousness is located on such a tip of the needle. And if this microscopic block is destroyed, a person will never come out of a coma, although the rest of his brain and other body systems will work normally. nine0003
— And where is such an important part located?
- In the very geometric center of the brain. At the same time, apparently, in right-handers it is shifted to the left hemisphere, and in left-handers - to the right. After the opening of this center, scientists decided to trace what this area of the brain is functionally connected with, what begins to work simultaneously with it. And it turned out that along with it, two other very small zones are turned on - an accumulation of special neurons, about which nothing really was known before. They are called by the name of the discoverer - von Economo neurons.
These are rather strange nerve cells: they are huge in comparison with others and they are approached by dendrites from all layers of the cortex, which, as you know, is responsible for higher nervous activity. It turned out that these two zones are associated with different aspects of our consciousness. The work of the first zone means that a person woke up from a dream, that is, he realizes that he is not sleeping. And the second zone is conditionally responsible for self-awareness of who we are. In my opinion, this is the greatest discovery in the history of brain research. nine0003
- Do animals also have such zones?
- Mice, dogs and cats do not. They appear only in those animals whose brains weigh more than 300 grams, and there are few such: dolphins, elephants and great apes. These are known to be the most intelligent animals. But if we compare, then in humans the number of such strange neurons is incomparably greater.
— And how does this complex system behave in sleep? Where does consciousness go at this time?
- This is an interesting question.
Previously, it was believed that sleep, unlike wakefulness, had a fairly simple structure. But now it is clear that this is not the case. Unlike coma or anesthesia during falling asleep, the switching off of von Economo neurons occurs very carefully and accurately, so we do not fall asleep in an instant. This is understandable from the point of view of evolution: if our ancestors fell asleep instantly, without having time to hide, they would all be destroyed by predators. nine0003
Clusters of nerve cells scattered throughout the brain and spinal cord release a cascade of biochemical substances. As a result of the most complex work of different groups of cells, consciousness turns off gradually. But how exactly they coordinate their actions and how they are connected with each other, there are no answers yet.
What does the brain do when we sleep
— You were talking about new methods. Do they give an understanding of what the brain does in a dream? And why is it so important for a person to sleep for a significant part of his life? nine0141
— I’ll clarify right away: we still don’t know exactly why a person sleeps, although there are hundreds of theories about this.
To begin with, let me remind you: our sleep is a cyclical process. Each cycle lasts an hour and a half. If, say, a person is awakened at the end of this cycle, he will feel rested. But you still need to sleep 5-6 such cycles per day.
And within each cycle, sleep is of two types: slow or orthodox, when a person conditionally sleeps calmly and breathes evenly. And sleep is fast, paradoxical, which in an adult takes about 15-20 percent of the time of total sleep. nine0003
Now, most of the theories have to do with slow sleep. It is already clear that during sleep we turn on completely different genes that work during wakefulness. They are responsible for the synthesis of a number of molecules and proteins associated with the regulation of internal organs. In particular, genes associated with cholesterol metabolism work differently, for some reason cell membranes are formed at night, fat metabolism is regulated, etc. As for the brain itself, there is also a lot of new.
So, it became clear that during deep slow sleep, the brain washes out toxins from itself. nine0003
— How does this happen?
- It was believed that the cells in the brain are located very close to each other. But a couple of years ago they realized: there is a space between them, through which intercellular fluid flows. During sleep, a lot of proteins are synthesized in the brain, and in the course of this, breakdowns often occur, “ugly” molecules are formed that “clutter up” the brain. So, during slow sleep, the intercellular fluid is pumped through the channels and washes away the fragments of such molecules, in fact, toxins, into the cerebrospinal fluid, from there to the liver and kidneys. nine0003
Moreover, it has recently become clear that the ions contained in these tubules play an important role in the transitions from wakefulness to sleep and vice versa. If potassium accumulates in the interstitial fluid and the concentration of calcium with magnesium falls, awakening occurs.
And vice versa. That is, some sleep functions are associated with the restoration of electrolyte balance.
— Why does an organism that is not allowed to sleep die rather quickly? What breaks first?
- The answer to this question has appeared quite recently, although the famous work on sleep deprivation (deprivation. - "O" ) was done by one of the founding fathers of somnology, Allen Rexchaffen. He and a group of colleagues came up with a carousel on which the rats were not allowed to sleep, despite the fact that they did not experience other stresses. Despite this, the animals died, and for many years the researchers could not figure out why. The answer was received only at the beginning of the 21st century: it turned out that rats were dying from ... sepsis, that is, from blood poisoning. Lack of sleep leads to the entry of intestinal microorganisms into the body, which is usually prevented by cells of the immune system. So sleep is necessary for the normal functioning of the immune system - this is one of the new interesting theories that my colleague from the USA, Jim Krueger, is developing today.
nine0003
Why do we need dreams before birth
— It's all about slow sleep. And what has become known about the fast, the one in which we see dreams?
- With regard to REM or paradoxical sleep, there is nothing at all incomprehensible. Until now, this is the greatest mystery of neuroscience. Maybe the next generation of biologists will figure it out.
— Dreams, it turns out, are also unclear why they are needed?
- About dreams - a separate conversation. The vast majority of human dreams are negative. As a rule, the more stable a person's nervous system is, the fewer dreams he remembers. nine0003
REM sleep itself is an evolutionarily very ancient state. Maybe that's why it is so much in newborns and children who are still in the womb.
- So we dream before birth?
— It is difficult to give a definite answer, but we know that at the 6-7th month from conception, the child begins to have muscle twitches. He does not yet have wakefulness during this period, but there is a so-called activated sleep.
- It turns out, some kind of pre-wakefulness, training before waking up? nine0141
— No, he then passes not into wakefulness, but into REM sleep. There is a hypothesis that REM sleep at this time is needed for the formation of the nervous system.
— What is it based on?
— It is known that if some systems in our body are not stimulated, they will not develop. For example, if the eyelids of kittens are sewn up after birth, and embroidered after a few months, then their eyes will be formed, but they will never be able to see. Because at the right moment, the eyes did not receive any external stimulus. Apparently, REM sleep is a powerful stimulus for the nervous system to start up and work. After birth, REM sleep takes 8 hours, just like slow sleep. As the nervous system matures, REM sleep becomes less and less, and in the end it remains the same as in adults - an hour and a half per night. nine0003
— Why do we need those hour and a half as adults?
- This question remains completely incomprehensible.
In fact, REM sleep is the strongest stress, and why adults need such a powerful shake-up of the whole body every hour and a half of sleep is not clear. There are many conflicting facts. On the one hand, there are experiments when rats deprived of REM sleep died. On the other hand, today it has been proven that almost all antidepressants suppress REM sleep. Scientists already know about three dozen patients who have been taking pills for years and who have completely suppressed REM sleep. At the same time, they live quite normally, their mental activity is not disturbed. nine0003
You see, during REM sleep, a person's heart rate is irregular, breathing is irregular, the body temperature is at a minimum... For the elderly, this is a very dangerous time. It is known that the daily peak of spontaneous deaths occurs precisely in the early morning, at 4–5 o’clock, when we have a peak in REM sleep. And the longer a person sleeps at a time, the longer this phase will be in the morning. By the way, it is during REM sleep that we stop producing a number of very important neurotransmitters, primarily serotonin and norepinephrine, the lack of which causes depression.
nine0003
— So long sleep can cause depression instead of the desired rest?
— Yes, if a person has a congenital low level of these substances, and during long REM sleep they fall even more to a critical level, then it is already difficult to get out of this state.
— Maybe he needs to get up earlier?
— Yes, and by the way, this is one of the most effective ways to treat depression. In the formation of this disease, as it turns out, sleep mechanisms play a big role. Therefore, by the way, it is so difficult to model depression on the same laboratory mice, which, although they sleep more during the day than at night, still more evenly throughout the day. nine0003
Bioclockwork
— What should a person's ideal dream look like then? How to sleep to feel good?
- In theory, we should sleep the way our genes tell us. That is, twice a day, or maybe even better three. Reduce the duration of sleep at night, be able to have small periods of sleep around noon and in the afternoon.
Then we would have evened out our sleep cycles and there would not have been these long gaps in REM sleep in the morning. So the idea of a siesta in some countries is very physiological and useful. nine0003
- Are you saying that if you leave a person alone, he should, in theory, sleep according to the same regimen as preschoolers?
— Yes, and the ancient man apparently did just that. But in general, the cyclical nature of our sleep is closely related to another concept - the biological clock. They are responsible for our timing. This unique mechanism was discovered not so long ago. It is a tiny pair of formations with a complex structure, located in the hypothalamus, in which the work of special clock genes is launched. A person has very few of them - about 20.
- How does this watch work?
— This is a very beautiful mechanism, a kind of biochemical cycle. Simplifying, we can say that genes synthesize mRNA (one of the main macromolecules of the body, contains information about the structure of proteins.
- "O" ), which leaves the nucleus into the cytoplasm of cells, proteins are synthesized there, which combine, return back to the nucleus and block the synthesis of the next portion of proteins. Then they break up and everything starts all over again. This amazingly precise mechanism ticks silently from the moment of conception to our death. Similar systems originated at the dawn of evolution, so all living organisms have them, up to primitive yeasts. nine0003
- And how long does it take our clock to complete a revolution?
- That's a good question. The fact is that our bioclocks do not fit into the Earth's day: to complete the molecular biochemical transformations of the cycle, they need about 25 hours. As a result, the work of the body begins to lag behind the local time of day, and the so-called desynchronosis gradually sets in, which can cause many diseases. The most obvious example of a mismatch between the internal clock and the outside world is jet lag.
When we fly across multiple time zones, we need to align our internal clocks with the local time. Our brain registers the time of sunrise and sunset and sends signals to the molecular clock mechanism to adjust the internal clock to the external one. nine0003
— And what to do with the daily lag of the internal clock?
- They need to be restarted. Interestingly, nothing affects this system - neither hunger, nor stress, nor temperature, nor food, only light. To restart the bioclock, you must always get up after sunrise, move the curtain and look at the sun and the sky for at least a few minutes. This is a very important thing for the health of the body as a whole.
- Well, with our time zone and gloomy climate, this is problematic. nine0141
- In 2011, a law was passed that the whole country was 2 hours ahead of the sun. It was a disaster. Schools were inundated with complaints: children cannot be woken up, they sleep in class. We went to the Duma twice to explain: it is vital for a person to get up after sunrise, or at least minimize the time when we wake up after dark.
It is these morning hours after sunrise that are critical for a person, and the fact that he will spend more time in the evening with electric light is not so important. As a result, the arrows were moved back, but still Moscow is 1 hour ahead of its standard time. nine0003
— And, in theory, children need to somehow organize a routine so that they do not get up after dark?
— Yes, it is especially important to do this between the end of November and the beginning of February to minimize the time you have to get up in the electric light.
- But surely there are special lamps that can emit a wave of the desired length?
— Yes, but they cost under $30,000. These devices emit 680 nanometer wavelengths, the kind of light that can reset our biological clock. In Moscow, at least two clinics have such lamps; they are very successfully used to treat seasonal depression, especially in menopausal women. It is often possible to do without any medication.
nine0003
— What about the northern peoples who live without electricity for half a year?
- This topic is poorly understood, but it is interesting. Aboriginal peoples are adapted to such conditions, their genetics are changed, the immune system works differently, the bioclock system itself is greatly reduced. And the reindeer living in the same territory do not have this system at all. True, for a person from a different time zone, such an environment will be a lot of stress.
Sleep as a weapon
- Sleep, you explain, is vital. Does this mean that the military has an interest in him?
— Similar technologies are being developed. The most striking example is the story related to the sleep deprivation of one of the units of the Iraqi army during Operation Desert Storm. I was working in France at the time, and the operation was described in detail in the local press, when the coalition bombarded Saddam Hussein's soldiers with sonic bombs for three days, preventing them from sleeping, and then attacked at four in the morning, when people were at their peak of sleepiness.
As a result, the Americans won the battle without a shot: Iraqi soldiers fell to their knees and asked to be allowed to sleep, they were simply "raked up", their weapons were taken away and they were fenced with barbed wire. At the same time, the Americans gave their soldiers some drugs that invigorated better than caffeine. nine0003
— Are there any? And how much can you suppress sleep with chemicals?
- Not for long. It is known that before the Second World War, the now banned amphetamine, which then could be bought without a prescription, was actively used to stimulate the psyche. It is known that Hitler used it during the landing on Crete in 1941. The drug was distributed to skydivers without warning about the dosage, and some began to jump without parachutes. Then they proved that this is the strongest poison that kills neurons. nine0003
Of the psychostimulants, commonplace coffee has the best effect on the brain: our brain likes coffee for some reason. Now caffeine and its analogues are prescribed for Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease.
— Have sleeping pills become less harmful lately?
— Now on the market are third-generation sleeping pills, the so-called Z-drugs, which, of course, are much less dangerous than the old ones, but in general they all act on the same system in the brain associated with inhibition reactions. And for some reason, the brain does not like this very much: sleeping pills destroy these inhibition receptors over time. By the way, ex-Minister of Health of the USSR Yevgeny Chazov said that Brezhnev, who suffered from insomnia, took strong sleeping pills in huge doses, contrary to the recommendations of doctors. As a result, it was from many years of taking sleeping pills that Brezhnev's motor skills of the tongue were disturbed. He did not understand this and all the time thought that the matter was in the wrong dentures. Then, literally in a year, his memory deteriorated, his intellect fell, that is, there was a rapid degradation. Current drugs are not so destructive, but in general, nothing has fundamentally changed .
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— Is it possible to train the body to sleep as much as necessary, like Napoleon or Lenin?
- These are all myths. The need for sleep is dictated by genes: we should sleep exactly as much as our body needs. On average, this is 6-8 hours, but there is a small percentage of short-sleepers whose need is limited to 4 hours a day.
- Gadgets appear that supposedly promise to control dreams. How do you feel about them?
- The first gadget of this kind was invented by American psychophysiologist Stephen Leberge. With the help of the practice of lucid dreaming, he promised, you can invent yourself a trip to outer space, discover new worlds, experience incredible erotic adventures. Löberge himself, however, uses the technology to treat US Army veterans who are plagued by nightmares after participating in the endless wars that America is waging far from its shores. The general meaning is that he trains people to turn nightmares into something pleasant.
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Vladimir Kovalzon, somnologist
Photo: PhotoXpress.ru
— Does it even work? Let's say dream control glasses?
— The principle is this: special sensors are built into the mask that detect rapid eye movements during REM sleep. They give a thermal impulse to the eyes, a person understands that he is sleeping, and gradually learns to simulate a dream for himself. The topic is very popular: when I recently gave a lecture on lucid dreams in Moscow, the hall for 2,000 people was packed. But I disappointed the listeners by saying that lucid dreams are a dangerous thing. People who have begun to practice this sit down, while lucid sleep, judging by the electroencephalogram, is not a normal dream. It turns out that we violate the structure of our sleep. And for people who have hidden schizoid traits, this can even become a trigger for the onset of schizophrenia ...
— Does it look like a hypnotic state?
- Doesn't look like it at all! Hypnosis is possible only in a state of full wakefulness: on the electroencephalogram we see a state of relaxed wakefulness, and if a person drinks at least a little, he no longer succumbs to any hypnosis.
