Dr. Matt Walker

Aphasia, yeah, sort of.

And here it's atonia, absence of the tone in your muscles.

Why would the brain do this?

Well, the brain paralyzes your body so your mind can dream safely.

You would imagine how quickly you could be popped out of the gene pool if, just like you described, you thought, I can fly.

So you get up out of your bed and you go to the window and you launch.

Probably not going to end well, depending on what floor you're on.

So

This absence of muscle tone, this physical incarceration that we have is one of the things, by the way, that defines REM sleep from when you are awake.

Because if all I was doing in my sleep lab was recording your electrical brain activity

And I was in the other room and I was just looking at your brainwaves.

As you go into REM sleep, I would not be able to tell, are you in REM sleep or are you awake?

Why?

Because the electrical brain activity is so similar when you are in REM sleep.

relative to when you're awake.

And what that tells us is that REM sleep is an incredibly active cerebral condition.

Your brain is just firing away.

In fact, some parts of your brain can be up to 30% more active when you're in REM sleep than when you're awake.

Stunning, particularly emotional brain centers.

So it's a stunning state of paradox.