How does a global population respond to an invisible, fatal virus? They quarantine, distance themselves, stock up on necessities, close the world, and oddly enough; they dream.

Dreams are the result of the subconscious processing of information while asleep. Often, this can be information that people are not keen on handling in conscious daylight hours, particularly intense and negative emotions. This allows a lot of the stresses in life to take a major toll on dreams.

The Coronavirus pandemic, in particular, has had a huge negative influence on people’s lives across the globe. This may be causing some very intense and negative emotions for a lot of people, therefore inducing more intense and vivid dreams.

A combination of prolonged isolation and intense dreams may also result in people remembering their dreams more often. While these dreams may seem frightening or odd, it is important to remember that the brain and body are just trying their best to keep up with the situation.

Weeks of home lockdown, hearing stories of the virus, and feeling cut off from seeing or experiencing it or anything else? It is scary. It has been scary for a while, and it will be for a little while longer. Dreams may begin to reflect that fear, whether they provide ease or not. Hopefully, this subconscious processing of that

fear, however, could also make it easier to find the simple quarantined pleasures of the day, like learning a new recipe or finding a great new tv show.

The pandemic, and the quarantine it’s yielded, will not last forever; and neither will these dreams. However, there is comfort and power in knowledge, so understanding where these dreams are coming from could possibly provide that. There is also comfort in the fact that no one is going through this fight alone; not even when they are dreaming.