Why We Dream: The Transformative Power of Our Nightly Journey Kindle Edition

I like dreams. Dreaming, attempting to interpret dreams, unconsciously developing weird short ideas, hearing about others’ dreams – all of it is fun. While I thinks dreams can teach us, and that our unconscious mind helps us sort through problems and memories, I also like the mystery of dreams. Why is Person X on my mind? What’s with all the snakes? Why am I always close to water? Is flying cool or terrifying? (It’s both.)In the past I’ve read some books on dream interpretation and lucid dreaming, but they read more like hokey quackery or copied and pasted Wikipedia entries than useful resources. I’ve been looking for a credible book exploring both the science and mystery of dreams. Alice Robb’s book fits that description.In Why We Dream, Robb explores the context, history, and science of dreams. She provides a brief but useful history on both the soft and hard science of dreaming, including why the study has been both in and out of fashion over time. (If you’re interested, one of the most interesting and powerful areas of research appears to be in dealing with trauma.) She also explores dreaming’s role in problem solving and creativity.With that foundation firmly in place, Robb discusses her own experiences with becoming aware of her dreams, keeping a dream journal, joining a dream interpretation group, and lucid dreaming. I liked the self-experimentation section of the book and have applied it to my own life, somewhat accidentally. After having learned from the book at which stages of the REM cycle we’re most likely to remember dreams, I’ve started waking up at those times automatically – kind of hoping that stops happening. Although, I definitely remember and record more dreams, now.Why We Dream is a credible introduction into the science and possibility of dreams. Use it as a springboard to dig into peer-researched dream articles, find dream apps and online communities, or even to head off to experience a tropical dream retreat.

Why we dream is ultimately a bit of a disappointment with its overreliance on personal anecdote, absence of detail and somewhat sloppy editing.In a chapter on dreaming and creativity, Robb tells us that “people who don’t remember their dreams are less creative than people who do.” What is her evidence for this? A study in which sixteen people claimed they didn’t remember their dreams, and those people ‘had families and held down jobs.’ What was the evidence that they were devoid creativity due to lack of dream recall? They had no self reported ‘creative outlet in life’. (Pg. 84) While that description obviously in no way implies a lack of creativity, it also does not address that many people who do remember dreaming must be themselves devoid of a creative practice. Additionally, the source for this evidence was “conversation with author”.This is followed by five or six anecdotes about famous authors having dreams that suggest story and plot directions. From these five or six anecdotes we are told to surmise that dreaming solves creative difficulties. I suppose I will have to have (and remember) a dream to make sense of that logic. Later we get a laughable understatement – that by the time Stephen King wrote “It” he had ‘some professional success’.The author writes about stories her friends told her in this book. A section on page 125 begins “My friend Kathy has been struggling with migraines for eight years…” The author also writes that she once dreamed that a man she dated was no good for her, so she broke up with him. These are hugely trivial anecdotes, which are suggestive of nothing. I have to question the editing to allow such mundane material into the final manuscript.Here’s a real nugget, from page 143: “The mere presence of food in dreams can be a sign of an eating disorder.” You can literally substitute any noun other than ‘food’ in that sentence and it remains true. This is rigorous research?The subpar editing is evident as well in the author describing two different infants as “Benjamin Button like” twice in the book, a hundred pages apart. Did this really pass without raising a yellow flag?Ultimately, if you are looking for any new science on dreaming, brain studies and peer reviewed research based on modern discoveries, you won’t find them here. If you read the excellent  Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams  and are looking for an exposition on under-reported dream science, this will leave you disappointed. So who is this book for?If you want to read anecdotes about dreams and learn some techniques to perhaps induce a lucid dream or affirm the value of a dream journal, you might see some value here. If someone telling you what they think dreams mean appeals to you, this will entertain you. However, if you want to learn “Why We Dream”, if you’re interested in new science or brain studies, you will leave disappointed.

Robb's firsthand exploration of the science of dreams is fun and informative, with just the right amount of personal narrative mixed in to give the story heart. She's a wonderfully adept writer and an assured guide through this somewhat mysterious field, bringing the right balance of wonder and skepticism to her inquiry. The reader is treated to many surprising insights into the nature of sleep and dreams—I especially liked her writing on how dreams can help us work through difficult life events like deaths and breakups—and for those who would like to try lucid dreaming this is a great resource. I've managed to use some of her techniques to help me remember my dreams, though I have yet to try lucid dreaming. There's also some delightfully interesting characters in here as well. A great read!

I've been interested in dreams since I began reading Carlos Castenada's books in 1972. Alice Robb brings a lot of the history, beliefs, theories and latest science about our dreams together in a very interesting, well organized and well written book. It is a fascinating read and you will never look at your dreams in the same way again. Highly recommended.

Alice Robb's book is meticulously researched and extremely well written. This is a life-changing work. I highly recommend it and suggest that if you don't have a dream journal already that you begin one as you read. The results will astound you.

It all got a little repetitive and convoluted with too many themes and topics - I am interested in this subject but I think the book could have used a bit of editing for clarity.

Insight into my mind - priceless !

The book is not all that well organized and doesn't really seem to get to the point. It is just a compilation of historical musings without a framework. Couldn't really get past the 4th chapter.