Last week I was invited to appear on the local radio show "Coal Region Connections" with my longtime friend Mark Marek to discuss local folklore and legends, but a few callers had some questions about dream experiences they had.

The subject interests me, and I would like to share in a bit more detail how I feel about the experience of dreaming, and in the process we may answer some questions you might have about dreaming. The opinions I am providing are my own based on my own experiences and not necessarily reflective of anyone else.Traditionally dreams are the succession of images and sensory experiences we have while sleeping. When we sleep at night, we move through different stages of sleep from a light sleep into deeper sleep states. At any stage we can dream, but the most vivid dreams are recalled when we are experiencing rapid eye movement sleep.Neurobiologists find that brain activity in REM sleep is similar to being awake, which is why these dreams become more memorable. Dreams can last a few seconds to several minutes, and scientists have learned that the longer we sleep, the longer the dream periods tend to be, increasing from 30 or so seconds early in the night up to 10 to 15 minutes toward the end of the night.Almost as long as people have dreamed, philosophers, psychologists and psychiatrists have tried to explain what our dreams mean.Theories have ranged from dreams being just a series of random images used to occupy our conscious mind to keep us from waking to being the subconscious mind's attempt to explain things that we may be suppressing or filtering out of our waking day. The interesting thing about this theory is that it would probably require us to remember our dreams in detail, but studies have shown many people who have not been taught how to recall dreams tend to forget them soon after waking.Like most, I have experienced those dreams that seemed so clear when I experienced them only to quickly fade from my mind as I woke up from my slumber.Before we get into my take on dreams, there is one other phenomena I want to mention, which is lucid dreaming.The idea behind lucid dreaming is that the dreamer becomes aware he is dreaming during the experience, and with that knowledge he or she is able to mold and shape the dream to his or her own fancy. I do not think our caller Kate was lucid dreaming because she did not indicate she was controlling her dream. In contrast, she seemed very certain she was awake during her encounter with her loved one.I can classify my dreams into four categories. I have had the normal, run-of-the-mill dreams in which bizarre images please, scare or make me wonder. These are the types of dreams that we tend to forget on waking but while sleeping they are like living in a fantasy world.If I become lucid during these dreams, they can be quite fun, even though I don't remember them in the morning other than I had a neat experience.The second category of dreams I have experienced are precognitive dreams that I have written down in a journal just to be sure of the details. I do not care what others have written about the subject as my personal experience has shown me that occasionally dreams do come true.Fortunately they have been dreams in which I was a detached third party and not directly involved. Why? I am not sure. My latest dream in that vein was one in which I rounded a turn on a highway and found myself in a construction zone in which there was a crash resulting in pieces of a red car scattered on the highway.The next day we went to Allentown, and as I approached the curve, there was a sign for an emergency work zone. Upon reaching the zone it was down to a single lane and on the side of the road was a damaged red car with some loose pieces on the side.The next type of dream I experienced was different from those which I have read. I have had several occasions in which I have dreamed about loved ones who have passed away and were important to me. I have had several dreams with my grandparents and my son and a few with my aunt and uncle. As with the precognitive dreams, these dreams are distinctly different in that I can recall all of those dreams in detail even though the earliest ones occurred decades ago while I cannot recall my crazy "regular" dreams without the aid of a journal.The other important difference is that they have given me knowledge in some cases that I did not have previously that turned out to be true. This is what places me in the camp of believing the spirits of our loved ones can communicate in our dreams if we let them.The final category is a dream type I have had only two or three times in the past five years, and this one is probably the most difficult to understand. If I had not experienced it myself I still would not believe it. This type of dream I have experienced I would refer to as a metaphysical experience in which a voice would lead me through images and explain metaphysical concepts to me. They start and end abruptly, but I do not ever forget them.These types of dreams lead me to believe they are more complex than we understand, and if you train yourself to remember them, perhaps you will find one or more of these experiences in your dream world as well.Till next time …