Dream Recall?

[Dilman]

Everything about lucid dreaming says you need to enhance your dream recall, and the best way to do that is to have a dream journal - I have one, and I had a dream my first night of trying to lucid dream. I wrote it down, and remember it, but now, it's been 4 nights since then, and I haven't remembered a single dream. How am I supposed to improve my dream recall if I can't remember any dreams at all?

[Paul C]

I noticed this alot as well when I first started to develop my own dream recall. At first there was not much success in remembering anything, but soon enough, using a range of simple techniques I slowly improved (and still am).

Although I haven't experienced lucid dream yet myself (or, at least, haven't remembered any) I can list a few things that I've learnt:

In your waking life try to remember everything in order that you did throughout the day, as accurately as possible. By improving your memory you therefore benifit from a better dream recall.

Do reality checks whenever you can within waking hours. Such as, looking at the palms of your hands for a few moments, reading text, looking away, and reading the same text again, because within your dreamworld such things as text and clocks aren't very consistant and usually appear distorted or unreadable if focused on for long periods of time/ looked at ever so often. Through habit, naturally, you will do the same checks within your dreams as well.

Simply asking yourself something along the lines of "Am I dreaming?" constantly throughout the day will also increase your chances of attaining lucidity while dreaming. Like before, this will create a habit that will carry over when you're alseep (at least that is the idea).

Much like the one above, just by placing notes around your house asking the question "Are you dreaming?" will reinforce the thought pattern of being aware of your current surroundings. This is the most recent one I have applied in my efforts to gain a complete lucid state within my dreams.

And while you're at it, practice visualisation meditation to get a better grasp on remembering certain aspects of a dream and gain better clarity, which could help in some ways to improve your dream recall.

And of course, keep writing! regardless of how vague your memory might be of a dream (or what you think the dream might have been).

Abundant memories to you!
And if you achieve a lucid dream before me, congratulations to you all the same.

[RandomJohn]

Also, when starting out, you don't have to recall every single detail. If you have a feeling, or an image, or anything at all, then write it down. If you have nothing, then say "I remembered that I had a dream."

[Pooka]

If you wake up in the middle of the night, a REM cycle probably just ended, and there's a better chance of remembering the dream you had then than in the morning. If you keep a notepad by your bed, scribble down a few details to expand upon in the morning.

I'm re-improving my dream recall (I slacked off for a few months), and I find that as I get back into the swing of writing my dreams down, bits and pieces of them will occur to me all day. If you have any indication of what order you dreamt them in, try to write them down like that. I often find that I'll remember another dream that came after my recorded ones.

I like to record things that occur to me as I record my dreams, like 'eagles obviously can't be that big, if that happens again, it's a dreamsign!' and stuff. I also record if I approached or attained lucidity, in case I can repeat approaches.

Good luck with your dream recall! I started out with remembering one or two dreams a night and right now I'm at four or five plus scraps, so it definately becomes easier as you go on.

[Paul C]

Originally Posted by RandomJohn

Also, when starting out, you don't have to recall every single detail. If you have a feeling, or an image, or anything at all, then write it down. If you have nothing, then say "I remembered that I had a dream."

Nice, that'll be useful as well.

Also liked your idea of writing down notes of dreamsigns as well. All useful.

[Dilman]

So, anyways, just so happens I remembered a dream last night.:P I didn't remember until I got in to the shower though.xD Anyways, hoppeed out of the shower a wrote down every little detail. I don't think I've remember dreams this close together before. I'm also doing the reality checks; I'm keeping a penny in my pocket as a reality check, and also, I'm asking myself," Am I dreaming?" every time I can remember to.

[Paul C]

Speaking of dreamsigns. I had a dream just this morning that involved breathing under water for a short while. For whatever reason I didn't consider that out of the ordinary, so there's one dreamsign to note for future reference.

But thinking about dreamsigns later on, I got the idea that you could deliberately insert dreamsigns within visualisation practices. Then running through the planned scenario until your encounter the dreamsign, which you then react to by going through a series of reality checks, making habit.

Or, if you don't want to go through that much effort, look for dreamsigns when you're awake. Forget who came up with that idea.

[Pooka]

Good job, Dilman! I do most of my dream-recording in the morning, but for the past two days, dreams have occured to me as late as seven in the evening.

I've been practicing the 'hold your nose, close your mouth and try to breath' reality check over the past few days. It certainly gets me some strange looks at school, but as all my classmates are already convinced I'm mad, it doesn't bother me much. I also have the word 'dream?' written on my hand, and I keep checking to see if it's there, or if the writing changes. The hard part is thinking that these are possible-- I know if I get in the habit of thinking it's silly, I'll think that way and doom myself in dreams.

That's a great idea about the dreamsign visualizing, Paul. I'm going to try it tonight. In dreams, whenever I encounter money, the bills are always in very strange denominations, like $9 or $11 bills-- that's the dreamsign I think I'll look out for.

[Paul C]

[quote=Pooka;11617]
I've been practicing the 'hold your nose, close your mouth and try to breath' reality check over the past few days. It certainly gets me some strange looks at school, but as all my classmates are already convinced I'm mad, it doesn't bother me much. I also have the word 'dream?' written on my hand, and I keep checking to see if it's there, or if the writing changes.

Heh, I like your idea of just writing 'Dream?' by itself, a very direct approach. Simple is memorable. And the impact is made even greater by having it on your hand, I'm tempted to do it myself.

A habit I should revisit again is reading a few of my past dreams in my journal before going to sleep, as well as continued visualization exercises.

[Pooka]

Originally Posted by Paul C

I got the idea that you could deliberately insert dreamsigns within visualisation practices. Then running through the planned scenario until your encounter the dreamsign, which you then react to by going through a series of reality checks, making habit.

Wow, Paul! I tried this practice this morning, during the 'waking' part of a wake-back-to-be routine, and it produced a lucid dream! In my dream, just like in the visualization, someone handed me an $11 dollar bill, and I realized how odd that was. A few reality checks later, I was lucid!

Thanks for posting your idea!

[Paul C]

That's great! I find it hilarious that I haven't ever had a lucid dream myself (at least, don't remember) but helped you to. Hmm... I need to keep practicing.

And no problem, I'll be sure to share anymore I might remember.

Edit: Okay, while I'm at the computer, I'll tell anyone who's interested what my main dreamsign will be. Considering that recently I saw a magnificent pheonix in one of my dreams, I'll visualise spotting one either flying or just plainly walking up to me. And because the pheonix is one of my all time favourite mythological creatures, the impact of seeing it will be strengthened. And after seeing it I will go through my reality checks.

On that note, Pooka, what and how many reality checks did you use in which to gain lucidity?

[Pooka]

In my dream, I looked at my hands and noted that the word 'dream?' had disappeared from my palm. I also wasn't wearing my glasses in the second lucid dream, but my vision was perfectly clear-- in real life, my vision starts to blur about four feet from my face, so that was a major sign.

Good luck with your phoenix-spotting! I'd sincerely recommend the wake-back-to-bed approach for inducing lucid dreams.

( And sorry that we've hijacked your thread, Dilman!)

[Dilman]

Over the last few days I've remembered dreams, but then didn't write them down, and forgot them! But I can remember that I actually had a dream, before it was just nothing, is my dream recall improving?

And I definately need to write them down as soon as I remember them, something I had to learned the hard way, by forgetting two dreams.

[Paul C]

Originally Posted by Pooka

Good luck with your phoenix-spotting! I'd sincerely recommend the wake-back-to-bed approach for inducing lucid dreams.

( And sorry that we've hijacked your thread, Dilman!)

I'll need to look up the wake-back-to-bed approach, sounds promising.

And we were just keeping the thread warm for Dilman.

Speaking of Dilman...

Originally Posted by Dilman

Over the last few days I've remembered dreams, but then didn't write them down, and forgot them! But I can remember that I actually had a dream, before it was just nothing, is my dream recall improving?

I often don't make enough time for myself in the morning in which to write down dreams if I have a morning lesson on. Although I remember most details of the dream throughout the day, writing them down straight away is far more effective.

At the moment though, I don't have a consistant dream recall. I could remember up to 3-4 dreams some nights, but other times I only remember the latest dreams, or parts of them. So just a matter of practice and patience.

Patience is a given, considering that most of us only use our normal sleeping hours to remember dreams.

[yesyesyes]

The wake-back-to-bed approach is very good for dreams in general too because a while back I was having a streak of not remembering any dreams and I did it and I remembered a nice long dream!

[Pooka]

That's good, Dilman! It sounds like you're improving already.

Like Paul said, my dream recall isn't totally consistent. I find that I can't remember my dreams as well after nights when I'm stressed or worried about the day ahead, or on mornings when I'm pressed for time. Maybe you could use the extra time on weekends to sleep in a bit and wake up at your leisure. ^^ It's not lazy-- it's bettering your dream recall skills!

[BillPerry]

I've been playing with 3 different methods of dream recall:

1)Dream Journalling (a classic)
2)Simply holding the intention to remember more
3)Rapid-Fire description

The first 2 are really basic. #3 is kinda awesome. I got this idea from Image Streaming. Basically, describe, as fast as possible without pause, your surroundings. Once this becomes an ingrained habit, you'll start doing it in dreams and eventually start describing stuff that can't POSSIBLY happen. Increases chances of noticing the dream state.

Bill
Http://www.lucidblog.com