Dreaming

FingerBlaster

Every morning, for years now, I've been waking up with no memory of my dreams. When I was younger I could remember my dreams, but now I cannot and I hate it.

Does anyone know how to fix this?

Anonymous

Keep a diary about your dreams... You likely remember them when you first wake up, but you can't remember them afterward.

ReclaimPublicSpace

Anonymous wrote: »

Keep a diary about your dreams... You likely remember them when you first wake up, but you can't remember them afterward.

also before you go to bed at night, tell yourself that you're going to remember your dreams. think about how much you want to remember them before you fall asleep.

keep the journal and a pen right next to your bed or under your pillow. You want as little hassle as possible to be able to reach it--the more you move, the more neurons in your brain start firing, which wakes you up more.

If you tell yourself you're going to remember your dreams long enough, eventually you'll wake up and the first thing on your mind will be the dream you just had.

As you're writing it down in your journal, use present tense: "I walk through the door and see my friend Mickey. He's sitting at a table with the cast of Fraggle Rock playing cards." Don't use past tense.

Unknown

^ Pretty much what he said.

Seriously, improving your dream recall with a dream-journal works SO well. Plus, it can induce lucid dreams and stuff. Awesome!

Silosighbin

ReclaimPublicSpace wrote: »

also before you go to bed at night, tell yourself that you're going to remember your dreams. think about how much you want to remember them before you fall asleep.

keep the journal and a pen right next to your bed or under your pillow. You want as little hassle as possible to be able to reach it--the more you move, the more neurons in your brain start firing, which wakes you up more.

If you tell yourself you're going to remember your dreams long enough, eventually you'll wake up and the first thing on your mind will be the dream you just had.

As you're writing it down in your journal, use present tense: "I walk through the door and see my friend Mickey. He's sitting at a table with the cast of Fraggle Rock playing cards." Don't use past tense.

Agreed. Nothing much else I can add.


Memories of dreams tend to decay quite quickly unless specific conscious attention is given to them. And that is why you keep a dream journal, but you need to make sure this is the first thing you do as you wake.


I've documented a wide array of dreams I've had and now whenever I review these writings I can easily recall their details. The memories are in there. It's just the pathways of recall (Neuron pathways/firings) that deteriorate, making it harder to remember.

Caesar

Opiates, alcohol or sleep deprivation. I always get vivid dreams using any combination of those 3 methods.

Greenbull

Silosighbin wrote: »

I've documented a wide array of dreams I've had and now whenever I review these writings I can easily recall their details. The memories are in there. It's just the pathways of recall (Neuron pathways/firings) that deteriorate, making it harder to remember.

I agree with this. The few dreams I've written down I can remember almost as clearly as the morning I had them.

JustAnotherAsshole

Take melatonin.

Daily

During the day, when you're doing anything really, eating, talking to that old lady in the queue, jacking off to Jessi Slaughter, taking a shit after overdosing on Taco Bell, just ask yourself "am I dreaming?" Do this at least 10 times a day, but don't keep thinking about it. Just ask it (in your head) and confirm that you're not, by pinching yourself or something, and then going back to posting CP on 4chan. Apparently, after doing this for a while, you'll start doing it in dreams, which will upstart your lucid experience (knowing you're in a dream, and ultimately controlling it in some cases). This will allow you to remember your dreams vividly, but only as soon as you wake up. So a dream journal is requisite if you want to go back and lol at your subconscious.

Steppenwolf

Watch Inception, shit will blow your mind to the seventh degree.

Imaginarium

it's like remembering anything else, stimulate your memory and you'll be able to remember your dreams. also, try sleeping for longer.

chompchompchomsky

An interesting factoid, when we are in REM sleep, we review things which we repress in waking life- bad memories, thoughts about yourself and your life, and you repress them again when you wake up.

Daily

Another interesting fact is that when we dream we do not create faces. The faces we see in our dreams are only ones that we have seen, even if we do not know or remember them. We have seen hundreds of thousands of faces throughout our lives so our dreams are constantly supplying an endless amount of faces we've come across (this doesn't have to be real life...includes pictures of historical figures/celebrities etc).

chompchompchomsky

Cooooooollllll!!!!!!

Imaginarium

chompchompchomsky wrote: »

An interesting factoid, when we are in REM sleep, we review things which we repress in waking life- bad memories, thoughts about yourself and your life, and you repress them again when you wake up.

The conscious/unconscious dichotomy really needs to be thrown out the fucking window of thought ASAP, because it totally doesn't work. There are no set boundaries between being awake and being asleep. Any psychic inhibition could likely be correlated to inhibitory chemical & chemical changes.

There is actually an endless variety of states of consciousness, which is amazing to think.

JustAnotherAsshole

Daily wrote: »

During the day, when you're doing anything really, eating, talking to that old lady in the queue, jacking off to Jessi Slaughter, taking a shit after overdosing on Taco Bell, just ask yourself "am I dreaming?" Do this at least 10 times a day, but don't keep thinking about it. Just ask it (in your head) and confirm that you're not, by pinching yourself or something, and then going back to posting CP on 4chan. Apparently, after doing this for a while, you'll start doing it in dreams, which will upstart your lucid experience (knowing you're in a dream, and ultimately controlling it in some cases). This will allow you to remember your dreams vividly, but only as soon as you wake up.

Shit works. ^

I was farming poppies last night.