做噩梦：大脑的解压方式

导读：许多人压力大的时候晚上往往会做噩梦，虽然半夜被噩梦惊醒的感觉并不好，但这或许是大脑在帮助你释放压力……

We all know the feeling of waking up in the middle of the night with a pounding heart and sweaty palms. Relax， you say to yourself—it was just a bad dream. Well， it may be that you really should relax， because nightmares might actually be good for you.

According to New York magazine， bad dreams can improve your mental health. A bad dream tends to be based on a real-life concern， for example， an approaching test or a fear of a person. To eliminate these worries the brain turns the dream into a story in the form of a bad dream.

How does this help your mental health？ A bad dream enables you to distance yourself from your anxieties， and turn something youre worried about now into a memory. The result is that when you wake up youre able to move forward and face the future.

A study featured in The Atlantic magazine， showed something similar. In a survey of more than 700 French students taking a medical school entrance exam， over 60 percent had negative dreams about the test the night before. These included not finishing on time， leaving a question blank， or being late. Those who reported dreams about the exam， even bad ones， did better on it than those who didnt， suggesting that nightmares do in fact prepare us for the future.

“We think nightmares are so common that they have some purpose to process stressors，” Anne Germain， director of the Sleep and Chronobiology Center at the University of Pittsburgh， told CNN.

So， the next time you lie awake at night after a bad dream， remember that it may be the brains way of putting your fears behind you and readying you for the future. Although a nightmare may make you afraid in the short term， it might be helping you to move on from the bad stuff you might be facing in the real world. Perhaps we should try to accept our nightmares rather than allow them to keep us awake. After all， lack of sleep causes far more problems than nightmares do.

我們都知道那种半夜惊醒的感觉——心脏怦怦乱跳，手心里全是汗。你会这么对自己说：没关系，只是一场噩梦罢了。没错，或许你的确应该放松下来，因为噩梦事实上可能对你有益。

据《纽约》杂志报道，噩梦能够改善你的心理健康。一场噩梦多半来源于现实生活中的忧虑，比如，一场即将来临的考试，或者害怕一个人。为了排除这些忧虑，大脑会将这些事情以噩梦的形式呈现出来。

这如何帮助你的心理健康呢？一场噩梦能让你远离焦虑，将你现在所担心的事变成回忆。最终当你醒来时，你就能够继续前行，面对未来。

《大西洋月刊》刊登的一项研究表明了相似的结论。在接受调查的700多名即将参加一场医学院入学考试的法国学生中，超过60%的人在考试前一晚做了不好的梦，包括时间到了没有写完卷子，漏写了一道题，或迟到了，等等。这些称自己做了关于考试的梦，甚至是噩梦的学生，比那些没有做梦的学生在考试中发挥更出色，这表明噩梦的确帮我们为未来做好准备。

“我们都觉得噩梦没什么特别的，但其实它们能够处理压力源。”匹兹堡大学睡眠与生物钟学中心主任安妮·杰曼在接受美国有线电视新闻网采访时表示。

因此，下次当你半夜从噩梦中惊醒时，记得或许这是大脑在让你放下恐惧，帮你为未来做好准备。尽管噩梦短时间内会让你害怕，但它或许能够帮助你从现实世界中遇到的坏事中走出来。我们或许应当试着接受自己做的噩梦，而不是害怕得睡不着觉。毕竟，睡眠不足引发的问题要比做噩梦多得多。

Word Study

eliminate /?'l?m?ne?t/ v. 排除;消除

Credit cards eliminate the need to carry a lot of cash.