When I’m falling asleep I often see intricate, complex fractal-like patterns. I figure it’s part of the dream process. Does this happen to most people? If so, is there a name for it? And why patterns (as oppossed to, say, blobs or pink elephants or random stuff)?
Honest to God that happened to me once when I was stoned.
That is a common occurance. It is usually a precursor to REM sleep. I can’t find the website for it but it used to be linked to www.lucidity.org which talks more about that occurance.