The Brain Never Sleeps: Why We Dream and What It Means for Our Health

We all dream, but do we know why we dream? Discover what goes on behind our eyelids and what it means for our health.

Do you have common recurring dreams of missing an exam, even though it has been years since you were in college? Do certain people keep showing up in your dreams? How can you stop your dreaming brain from fixating on the same preoccupations and concerns? We spend every night of our lives dreaming, yet we remain unaware of the power and possibilities of accessing the inner sanctum of our minds.

In The Brain Never Sleeps, Karen van Kampen guides us on a journey through dreamland, sharing how we can reclaim this other realm of thought and experience to improve our well-being. Our dreams are as real to us as our waking experiences. They have the power to influence what we think, feel and do. With our dreaming brain operating in a different mode, disconnected from the demands and distractions of daily life, we brainstorm new ideas, face our fears and uncover insights into ourselves. Van Kampen, whose father opened one of the first independent sleep laboratories in North America, acts as a unique and informed guide, combining first-person narrative with highly accessible science journalism.

Van Kampen investigates neuroscience and psychology to reveal the connection between our waking and dreaming lives while also exploring what happens when people get stuck in between--the mixed brain state of parasomnias including sleepwalking and night terrors. Through the fascinating stories of dream scientists, we learn how dreams boost learning, spark creativity and process emotions. Van Kampen conducts her own dream experiments with expert researchers as her guides. The Brain Never Sleeps propels us into the next frontier of dream engineering where we can guide our dreams with the hope of improving our well-being. Her toolkit at the end of the book offers simple ways to use dreams to improve our waking and dreaming lives.

The Brain Never Sleeps is a personal and enlightening journey that will change how we understand and value our nocturnal wanderings.

Author: Karen Van Kampen
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 02/24/2026
Pages: 288
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 0.95lbs
Size: 9.10h x 6.10w x 1.20d
ISBN: 9781668077979

About the Author
Karen van Kampen is an author and award-winning journalist who specializes in health and science. Her fascination with dreams began at the age of nine when she became her father's first sleep lab "assistant," helping him practice electrode hook-up and testing. She is the author of The Golden Cell: The Quest for the Next Great Medical Breakthrough, and her writing has appeared in many publications including The Globe and Mail, National Post, Calgary Herald, and Reader's Digest. She enjoys teaching creative nonfiction writing at the University of Toronto.