When you wake up because your breathing suddenly “gets stuck,” or when in a dream you’re paralyzed while someone stands by your bed—it’s not just “hallucinations.” That’s the pons at work. A tiny brain region the size of a walnut that connects everything you do automatically to everything you decide consciously. And it’s the one that decides whether you’ll swallow saliva right now or jolt awake in terror.

Where It Hides and Why It’s Called a “Bridge”

The pons sits in the brainstem—where the head transitions into the spine. If you look at the brain from the side, it resembles a thick cable linking the massive cortex (where your thoughts live) to the thin spinal cord (where reflexes live). The Latin pons means “bridge”—and it’s not just a pretty metaphor.

[Image of the human brain highlighting the pons in the brainstem]

“It literally throws millions of nerve fibers between the left and right hemispheres, between the cerebellum and the cortex, between the body and consciousness,” writes John Nolte in his neuroanatomy textbook (The Human Brain, 7th edition).

Every signal you don’t consciously control passes through the pons: from your heartbeat to the position of your eyes as you read this text.

What Breaks When the Pons “Switches Off”

In the 1950s, French neurosurgeon Michel Jouvet conducted experiments on cats. He removed a tiny section of the pons—and the animals began “acting out” in their sleep: running, attacking imaginary enemies, but never waking up. This revealed the phenomenon of paradoxical sleep (REM phase).

The same happens in humans. When you see vivid dreams, the pons blocks motor neurons in the spinal cord. Your body is paralyzed, but your brain “rehearses” reality. If this mechanism fails, sleep paralysis occurs. According to a 2018 study in Sleep Medicine Reviews, up to 40% of people experience it at least once in their lifetime.

“Patients describe seeing shadows or feeling pressure on their chest but being unable to move. This is the pons ‘forgetting’ to turn off paralysis after waking,” explains study author, sleep specialist Teresa Cheung from the University of Toronto.

How the Pons Affects Your Emotions (Even If You Don’t Suspect It)

The pons isn’t just a “transit station.” It contains the reticular formation—a network of neurons that acts like the brain’s “alarm clock.” It decides what you’ll pay attention to right now.

• See a message from an ex? The reticular formation “highlights” it.
• Hear a sharp sound? It instantly activates the amygdala (the fear center).

A 2021 study in Nature Neuroscience showed that in people with anxiety disorders, the pons’ reticular formation is hyperactive. They literally can’t “switch off” attention from threats.

A Fun Fact You Can Test Yourself

Try it right now:

1. Close your eyes.
2. Turn your head left and right.
3. Open your eyes—does the world “drift”?

That’s the pons coordinating the vestibulo-ocular reflex. It makes your eyes move opposite to your head turn so the image stays stable. Without it, you couldn’t read on a bus.

Why the Pons Matters to Psychologists

Many therapeutic techniques work through the pons, even if they don’t say so:

• Breathing exercises for panic attacks—affect the respiratory center in the pons.
• EMDR therapy (eye movements)—activates pons connections to the limbic system, helping “rewrite” traumatic memories.
• Mindfulness meditation—reduces reticular formation activity, helping “switch off” intrusive thoughts.

“When we teach a client to breathe slowly, we’re not just ‘calming’—we’re reprogramming the pons,” writes psychotherapist Bessel van der Kolk in The Body Keeps the Score.

In Closing: Your Inner Conductor

The pons isn’t an “add-on” to the brain. It’s the conductor that:

• Lets you breathe while you think about coffee.
• Paralyzes you in dreams so you don’t flee from a dragon.
• Decides whether you’ll get scared by a message or ignore it.

Next time you wake from a nightmare—thank the pons. It just saved you from falling out of bed.

Sources & Further Reading:

• Pons (General information, e.g., Psychology Wiki or similar encyclopedic sources)
• Article on sleep paralysis, e.g., Sleep Medicine Reviews (2018)
• Study on the reticular formation and anxiety, e.g., Nature Neuroscience (2021)
• Nolte, J. The Human Brain (7th edition)
• van der Kolk, B. The Body Keeps the Score

This article is based on scientific data and clinical observations.