July 4, 2006

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Conscious Thoughts Persisting Through Dreams

Last night I went to bed with an Oingo Boingo song called "Capitalism" stuck in my head. I'd been listening to Oingo Boingo (composer Danny Elfman's funk/punk/new wave band from the 80's and early 90's) earlier in the night, and loving it. They are so damn infectious and fun. So I got that song stuck in my head, and went to bed with it running through my brain after having consciously been singing it for a while.

While asleep, I remember having dreamt at least two different dreams. When I awoke, the song was still in my head. It just continued along as if I'd never even gone to sleep.

It's unusual that my conscious thoughts survive the context shift from wakefulness to sleep and then back, continuing unimpeded on the other side. Sure, if Im thinking about something before I go to bed, I can generally recall it in the morning with little effort. But in this case, it never stopped. I can't really know whether or not the song was also playing in my head all night, through my dreams, making the characters therein groove to the funky beats. I can't really know if my conscious thoughts persisted through the night or were put on pause. But it sure makes me curious.

When we go to sleep, do we suspend our consciousness, invoke subconsciousness, then suspend subconsciousness again in order to wake up? Or do the two co-exist persistently, and we merely shift from perceiving the conscious to perceiving the subconscious? It seems apparent to me that our subconscious is also lurking, alive but suppressed somewhere, while we are awake. But it is much less apparent to me that our conscious mind does the same while asleep. But if it does, think of the possibilities! If only we could access our conscious mind during sleep, we could achieve such amazing peace by living out all of our fantasies and fears, and practicing for our waking state. I suppose that's the pinnacle of lucid dreaming: permitting one's conscious mind full access to one's subconscious mind. Or is the other way around, our subconscious occasionally gaining access to the dormant conscious?

I don't know. It's something to ponder tonight while sleeping. Perhaps when I wake up, I'll have the answer (as has been shown to occur quite often, supporting the persistent conscious mind theory). When you dream, dear reader, do you ever dream lucidly? Can you ever consciously control your dreams? How much of your conscious mind do your dreams have access to? Do you ever wake up thinking the same thoughts with which you went to sleep? Do you think you think those thoughts all night, or merely invoke them again upon waking? So many questions...

Incidentally, my libertarian and conservative friends would love that song. Wait, do I have conservative friends? Shout-out in the comments if you're a conservative who actually reads my blog. Excerpted lyrics and a link to download "Capitalism" are below, as well as another conservative Oingo Boingo song that seems to advocate the death penalty ("Only A Lad"), and for a minor! But before you go gushing to Michelle Malkin, you should know that the first track on the album is called "(I Like) Little Girls," and seems unapologetically to praise pedophilia, and "Nasty Habits" praises private deviant sexual proclivities. You win some, you lost some.

"There's nothing wrong with capitalism There's nothing wrong with free enterprise Don't try to make me feel guilty I'm so tired of hearing you cry There's nothing wrong with making some profit If you ask me I'll say it's just fine There's nothing wrong with wanting to live nice I'm so tired of hearing you whine"

"You're just a middle class, socialist brat
From a suburban family and you never really had to work
And you tell me that we've got to give back
To the struggling masses (whoever they are)
You talk, talk, talk about suffering and pain
Your mouth is bigger than your entire brain
What the hell do you know about suffering and pain..."

Sample: Oingo Boingo - Capitalism.mp3
Sample: Oingo Boingo - Only A Lad.mp3

Posted at July 4, 2006 5:37 AM | Comments (2)

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