RE: Steem Bounty | Do you wake up or open your eyes first? Which do you think happens first?
Good question.
For me, I wake up and leave my eyes closed, and i start going into some really active lucid dreaming. Sometimes my thoughts about the day coming up start running wild, and my subconscious doesn't know how to calm down my conscious mind from worrying about potential problems I might eventually run into later in the day.
Even with all that, sometimes I open my eyes and stare at the painting on my wall, and I am only half awake, and I can easily close my eyes and start lucid dreaming some more, or fall fully asleep again.
It usually takes me up to an hour to fully wake up. First flop the arm over, then tilt the head a bit. Gotta get the blood flowing through the veins that were compressed when I was sleeping. It's a process!
Woe to the fool who wakes me early! They will be the focus of all my ire for the day. I swear I was genetically designed for scowling. No, I am not a morning person.
same here
It often takes me a while from the moment I wake to the moment I feel like opening my eyes and starting the day
Thanks for replying
Call me strange but I came up with the weirdest theory after this question kept popping back into my mind. Even stranger, the idea came to me when I was half asleep, half awake. Keep reading if you are curious...
Based on the theory that inside we all have two brains: an inner reptilian brain, our evolutionary origin animal brain, that only thinks instinctual thoughts, and an outer brain, the evolved brain, that is capable of more human-like rational, logical, creative, conceptual, emotional thoughts.
My theory is that the inner brain goes to sleep, like a reptile/animal when the lights are off, and it feels safe enough to truly go into a restful sleep to recover energy. While the inner brain is asleep, the outer brain remains awake and continues to think. This is what dreams are. It imagines thoughts and ideas to help rationalize what is going on even though the visual senses are now off. In a way, the outer brain forgets the body is asleep and begins to rationalize what is going on and believes it is still awake and seeing things. Even the faintest memories are recalled automatically, because it is too hard to think of nothing. Memories of the past, or thoughts of the future may form visual thoughts, or the mind can use creative thoughts to imagine seeing new things.
When stuck in memory recall, this is why sometimes dreams end up in a continuous loop, because it hasn't recognized that it is viewing a memory, and it thinks it is looking at something real that it does not know how to deal with. The brain is viewing a memory imprint, but does not have the true sight to change what it sees. Sometimes the mind can awaken slightly enough under stress, like a nightmare, and realize it can ignore the false visions, and think of other thoughts that are more calming.
When waking up, the outer brain may not instantly recognize which reality it is in. It might even have the sense of still seeing the "unseen" dream world within the imagination, and now also seeing the visual world. As the inner/instinctual brain begins to awaken and recharge instinctual abilities, like movement of the body, the outer brain begins to recognize that the dream thoughts are not related to the senses of the physical body. Slowly it rationalizes that the sense of the physical body are real, and the thoughts of the mind are merely thoughts.
Yet we never really wake up to understand the why our brain has dual operation, often conflicting with itself every day in our decision-making processes. It is because of the hungry/selfish mind of the inner animal within us competing for dominance with the rational/conceptual mind.
Maybe this is something that's already been theorized, though I have heard many other outlandish ideas about the Third Eye and other dimensions of mental awareness. Explaining the dual nature of the brain though seems to make a lot of sense to me.
If you read this far, thanks for reading!
Wow
That's an interesting theory
This is the first time I'm hearing of the two brains theory. Sounds like some deep psychology stuff
I'm inclined to follow your thoughts though. I once had a weird dream where a snake entered my apartment. For days I was scared Cox it felt so real.
Good one there