Not Falling Asleep = Possible Dream?

[Phayzon]

I'm not sure if this has been brought up before but it's a quick thought that came to mind when reading about WILDs (specifically a thread that discussed that the focus should be on falling asleep and not awareness) But, let's say you just came back from an exhausting day and hit the bed at 11 PM. Unfortunately, to add onto a crappy day, you find yourself unable to fall asleep. You try to sleep in comfortable positions, you toss and turn, etc. You finally get up to maybe clear your head, flip your pillow, etc. and look at the clock: 3 AM. At this point you may groan and complain about how you're getting no sleep and you have to wake up early in the morning. But, maybe, this is or was actually a dream? In your mind you were not in bed more than an hour, but the clock obviously says otherwise. Maybe, somewhere along the line of finding a comfortable position or tossing and turning you fell asleep and transitioned into a dream without noticing, and thus you either got up and checked the clock while in a dream, or woke up after dreaming about your horrible situation of not getting any sleep. My take on it is that some cases of not getting sleep maybe similar to false awakenings: you assume you didn't fall asleep but your mind may have tricked you into thinking so. Thoughts?

[Michael]

Measurement and perception of time is relative, and there are different levels of dreaming/sleep just like there are different levels of being awake.

[dolphin]

This type of dream you're referring is known as a continuum.