Slate’s new pop-up blog “The Drift” discusses the author’s “trippy, totally bonkers” dreams while using melatonin as a sleep aid.
These dreams, I should note, are not just normal dreams kicked up a few notches in intensity. They are a different type of dream—more akin (I am told) to a lysergic hallucination than a typical oneiric vision. My melatonin dreams are bursts of energy and excitement: sometimes fast-paced and fragmented, sometimes lucid and evocative. I have woken up from a melatonin dream with a deeper understanding of a friend or family member, or a great insight into a persistent problem, or that relieved, glazed sensation of stepping off a roller coaster. I wake up feeling refreshed, with yesterday’s thoughts neatly compressed, sorted, and filed away.
