Good mood, sweet dreams; bad mood, nightmares. A dream works as the mood thermometer of a person at the time of its occurrence.  An unknown or an identifiable event that took place the previous day triggers a dream. It spurs unconscious and subconscious desires or forbidden wishes that set off an electrical discharge in the brain. The individual’s mood steers the nervous impulse through a specific pathway in the brain. Here, it collects images from the memory stores and composes scenes with them. For example, if you feel amorous, you could enjoy an erotic dream. If you are sad and anxious, you can endure an embarrassing, nude experience. Apprehension brings about situations of being lost in strange places. Happiness gives rise to pleasant dreams, and fear and depression to horrifying scenes like car crashes or never-ending falls. Self-criticism and self-deprecation cause shameful foul scenes, and indifference, images of daily routine.

You may wonder how these nocturnal scenes come about. Like a washing machine, our sleeping brain cycles four to six times through four quiet stages at night. This tranquility gets interrupted by five to ten minutes of waking-like excitability and rapid eye movements (REM) every ninety minutes. Dreams occur during this stage. We can dream up to six times every night. Dreams are hard to recall. Their contents sink into oblivion in the blink of an eye and often skip consciousness. Several years ago, I worked on my novel The Stranger’s Enigma, which was based on dreams. I roused after each one and jotted down a few sentences that would remind me of the entire episode. The next morning, I wrote it out in my diary. I recorded at least two to three dreams every night and sometimes five or six. I followed this routine for two years before I wrote the book.

Dreams resemble a movie production:

1. The initial idea or trigger: it happens in the previous twenty-four hours: a thought, a sensation, an object, a scene, an image, an occurrence. Most stimulants escape our attention since a prominent one seldom results in a related nocturnal scene. 
2. The casting: dreams feature the dreamer as the principal character. Seldom does somebody else, a friend, or a pet have the leading role. 
3. The setting or location varies. The nocturnal scenes may occur in your house, your hometown, the home where you grew up, your favorite destination. 
4. Film-like scenes depend on the sleeper’s emotional state. Happiness gives rise to pleasant images, and fear and depression to horrifying scenes.
5. The plot or screenplay: most dreams make no sense because we have a sketchy memory of them. But if we remember the entire episode, the plot becomes clear. 
6. The central message: Like mood thermometers, dreams reveal and measure our inner emotional state: depression, anxiety, fear, happiness, indifference. Some doctors derive further information from interpreting the dream scenes, a task that remains controversial. 

It would sadden me to spend the nights–almost one-third of my life in the silent inner loneliness of dreamless sleep. I fancy our dormant brain needs exuberant sensations and vibrant scenes as much as we desire an animated conversation, an engaging book, or an excellent movie to brighten up our waking hours. Otherwise, sleep would resemble a coma. Can a wholesome dream life lead to a healthier mind? I believe so. A sweet dream can put a smile on our faces and set the tone for our upcoming day.

My name is Louis Villalba. I am the author of “The Stranger’s Enigma,” the first novel of the series “A Stranger in Dreamland.” The second, “Born of Dreams,” will be published in the next few months. I am a retired clinical professor of Neurology, certified by the Board of Psychiatry and Neurology, and a board-certified clinical neurophysiologist.

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