“Sleeping on it” has long been one of the best pieces of advice when faced with a difficult decision or a complex problem. A good night’s sleep has a way of helping us sort through our options and identify solutions that were invisible to us the day before.
Exactly how sleep works its problem-solving magic is more of a mystery, but it’s well known that getting enough high-quality sleep can improve your memory. Further, when you learn a new skill, the memories are vulnerable until they are “solidified” in your brain. It appears that sleeping plays a key role in this process, which may explain why infants, who are constantly learning new skills, require so much more sleep than adults.
But new research is revealing there’s another part of sleep that also makes a mark on your brain, and its ability to solve problems, and that is your dreams.