It often helps to tell a trusted adult about your bad dreams. Just talking about what happened might make you feel better. Remember, nightmares are not real and they can’t hurt you. Dreaming about something scary does not mean it will happen in real life.

A nightmare, also called a bad dream, is an unpleasant dream that can cause a strong emotional response from the mind, typically fear but also despair, anxiety or great sadness.

Violent dreams can be a warning sign As if nightmares weren’t bad enough, a rare sleep disorder — called REM sleep behavior disorder — causes people to act out their dreams, sometimes with violent thrashes, kicks and screams.

Dreams feel so real, Blagrove says, because they are a simulation. When you are on drugs or having a hallucination, you have a reality to compare your experience to. By contrast, when you are sleeping no such alternative exists. Only about one in 20 times do we catch ourselves dreaming and start lucid dreaming.

In Christian cultures, and religions, a kiss symbolizes a goodbye, sometimes only temporary, but other times a permanent one. It can also be considered a betrayal, like when Judas kissed Christ and betrayed him.

To dream of a kiss denotes love, affection, tranquility, harmony, and contentment. Perhaps the dream is telling you that you need to inject some more romance into your waking relationship. To see others kissing in your dream suggest that you are too involved in someone else’s personal lives and relationship.

A kiss is the touch or pressing of one’s lips against another person or an object. Depending on the culture and context, a kiss can express sentiments of love, passion, romance, sexual attraction, sexual activity, sexual arousal, affection, respect, greeting, friendship, peace, and good luck, among many others.

A kiss can be a heavenly messenger for change. In the 16th century, the Rosicrucian’s Christian Rosencreutz (a Spiritual being said to be overshadowed by Buddha, Mani, Zoroaster, and the Christ) was legended to bestow a ‘kiss’ or touch from the invisible spiritual world to awaken the soul to destiny.

Open mouth and tongue kissing are especially effective in upping the level of sexual arousal, because they increase the amount of saliva produced and exchanged. The more spit you swap, the more turned on you’ll get.

It can mean that he is affectionate about you and he is kissing you on the cheek as a sign of endearment. On the other hand, it might mean that he likes you just as a friend and he is keeping his distance.

French kisses can be more stimulating than kisses without the tongue since the lips, tongue, and other parts of the mouth are powerful erogenous zones that contribute to sexual arousal.

A forehead kiss is a social kissing gesture to indicate friendship and/or to denote comforting someone. A forehead kiss is a sign of adoration and affection. In some Arabic cultures, the forehead kiss is a gesture of apology as well as a sign of acknowledgment of grievance on the part of the person being kissed.

Hand-kissing is a greeting gesture that indicates courtesy, politeness, respect, admiration or even devotion by one person toward another. A hand-kiss was considered a respectful way for a gentleman to greet a lady. Occasionally, after kissing the hand, the greeter will draw the hand to his own forehead.

The kiss of death (Italian: Il bacio della morte) is the sign given by a mafioso boss or capo that signifies that a member of the crime family has been marked for death, usually as a result of some perceived betrayal.

Cheek kissing is a ritual or social kissing gesture to indicate friendship, family relationship, perform a greeting, to confer congratulations, to comfort someone, to show respect. In a cheek kiss, both persons lean forward and either lightly touch cheek with cheek or lip with cheek.

“A forehead kiss indicates that you aren’t just seen as a sex object,” says Steinberg. It’s a compassionate, non-sexual way for your partner to communicate their adoration and respect towards you.

Kissing stimulates your salivary glands, which increases saliva production. Saliva lubricates your mouth, aids in swallowing, and helps keep food debris from sticking to your teeth, which can help prevent tooth decay and cavities.

General Guidelines (No Matter Where You Are) In most countries where cheek kissing is the norm, you usually offer your right cheek first. No big deal if you both go in opposite directions — just laugh it off. Generally speaking, an air kiss is an air kiss. When in doubt, avoid planting your lips on the other person.

Greeting with a kiss isn’t just a ‘French thing’ First things first, while many Anglo-Saxons believe that kissing as a greeting is unique to France, the practice is common in a wide range of European and Latin countries, as well as Russia and certain Arabic and sub-Saharan nations.

The oldest evidence of a kissing-type behaviour comes from Hindu Vedic Sanskrit texts from over 3,500 years ago. Kissing was described as inhaling each other’s soul. In contrast, Egyptian hieroglyphics picture people close to each other rather than pressing their lips together.

1500 B.C.

At its most basic, kissing is a mating behavior, encoded in our genes. We share the vast majority of those genes with the mammalian species, but only humans (and occasionally our close primate relatives like chimps and bonobos) kiss.

Its exact origins are unclear but it is likely to have originated during the time of Catherine de Médicis, the 16th century French queen from Florence. Wild, unfounded, rumours of her court’s sexual deviancy circulated among her French subjects, many of whom hated this Italian queen.

Saliva carries minuscule traces of the virus, but this isn’t considered harmful. Saliva contains enzymes that break down the virus before it has a chance to spread. Kissing, even “French” or open-mouth kissing, won’t transmit HIV.

More than you might think. A kiss might seem like a natural thing to do for most of us, but the scientific jury is still out on whether it is a learned or instinctual behaviour. Approximately 90 per cent of cultures kiss, making a strong case for the act being a basic human instinct.

Here’s what the science says.

• It boosts your ‘happy hormones’
• Which helps you bond with the other person.
• And has a tangible impact on your self-esteem.
• It also relieves stress.
• And reduces anxiety.
• It dilates your blood vessels, which helps reduce your blood pressure.
• This can also help relieve cramps.
• And soothe headaches.