FOURRecurringpatternsofdreamcontent areaffectedbydailylife The content of our dreams can be directly influenced by our daily life. Often, our dreams reflectthepeople,placesandthingswecareabout the most when we’re awake. This is “continuity hypothesis,” a term that suggests dreams are affected by your daily concerns, activities and beliefs. FIVELUcidself-awarenessisathing, anditcanhappeninyourdreams Dreaming has the mind’s full range of metacognitive powers. Metacognition is the awareness and understanding of your thought process. In both sleep and dreaming, the mind engages in many of the same activities as when you are awake, including reasoning, comparing, remembering and monitoring your feelings and thoughts. Lucid self-awareness, or lucid dreaming, is an example of this. In a lucid dream, it’s believed the dreamer is aware they are dreaming and able to freely remember the circumstances of waking life, to think clearly and to act deliberately, all while experiencing a dream world that seems vividly real. 15