During sleep we have REM phases (Rapid eye movement) with wave groupings at the 4-7 cycles per second; described as Theta waves.

With REM phases in sleeping the body’s muscles are effectively paralysed (So that the dreams cannot be acted out) while the heart beat and breathing fluctuate as they would during emotional upsets in waking life. REM sleep in adult humans typically occupies 20–25% of total sleep, about 90–120 minutes of a night's sleep. During a normal night of sleep, humans usually experience about four or five periods of REM sleep; they are quite short at the beginning of the night and longer toward the end.

REM sleep can be referred to as paradoxical sleep, meaning there are no dominating brain waves.

Babies require far greater amounts of their sleep time devoted to REM allowing the formation of neural connections and nervous system development.

Animals born fairly mature, such as sheep (whose REM sleep is only 1% of their daily sleep), have less REM sleep than animals that continue to grow and develop more after they are born, such as humans.

It should be noted that while you are totally active and awake, your brain tends to operate at the Beta level which is an oscillation range of 14 to 30 cycles per second, As you relax and drift towards day dreaming then you can be in the Alpha wave zone of 8-13 cycles and with even greater relaxation your mind enters a region that correlates with a relatively large quantity of brain wave patterns of 4-7 cycles which is the theta range.

The Beta level corresponds to a focus of concentration by the mind upon the outside or perceptually separated world, and the Alpha and Theta levels correspond to a more internally focused, self-reflective state.

Observations

Interestingly during what is termed “day dreaming” we seem able to achieve the (near) same wave patterns as REM sleep, is it possible that these achieve the same outcomes? The only difference being that restful thought is not quite as relaxed as REM sleep? In effect it is additional "daytime" REM type processes?

If REM sleep lacks dominating wave patterns and aids neural connection development is it possible that intuitive types require greater introversion simply because their minds are developing? Contrast this to more sensing types that may have lower demands for this…? (Simply because "divergency" of thought is likely to need far greater numbers of connections to other centres)

With animals it is considered that REM sleep allows them to run through innate automated actions and practice / improve those as it is important to their survival, is day dreaming a similar activity where thoughts are rehearsed to the point where they become embedded in the subconscious and thus innate? Is the visualisation in daydreaming not just this?

If we consider the notion that the mind has life long plasticity (In effect can slowly change) then is introversion and restful thought an almost precondition to have a distributed mindset? (Divergent rather than convergent i.e. inclusive perspectives rather than procedural sensing efficiency)

If the Theta level thought processes are more akin to internally focused, self-reflective states then is it possible that introverted Intuitives are precondition to wave thought patterns at this level as opposed to extroverts whom might operate more at the Beta levels? Are introverts actually over stimulated by extroversion as it burns out their capacity to maintain the Beta levels rather than the notion that they are drained by extroversion?

Next post will discuss Reptiles and Secondary visual cortex implications….

“Reptiles have rapid eye movements during sleep, but they are not accompanied with brain waves similar to those of humans during REM sleep. This partial REM sleep may be a clue in the evolution of REM sleep and dreaming”

“During dreaming, the primary visual cortex is inactive, while secondary areas are active. This is similar to when subjects are asked to imagine or recall a visual scene, and different from what happens when they are actually seeing the scene”.