Remembering Dreams

Why should you bother remembering your dreams?

1. Your dreaming mind has access to information that is not readily available to you when you are awake. Your dreams may reveal your secret desires and subconscious feelings.

2. In remembering your dreams, you will have an increased knowledge about yourself, bring about self-awareness and self-healing. Dreams are an extension of how you perceive yourself. They can be a source of inspiration, wisdom, and joy.

3. Learning to recall your dreams may help you become a more assertive person. In remembering your dreams, you are expressing and confronting your feelings.

4. Remembering your dreams can help you come to terms with stressful aspects of your lives.

So, What steps you need to take to remember your dreams?

Remembering your dreams will require some effort on your part. But what your dreams can offer and tell you about yourself will be well worth it. Here are some tips in helping your dream recall:

1. Before going to bed, keep a clear mind. Tell yourself that "I will remember my dream when I wake up". This is actually a proven and effective way to help dream recall. Having too many thoughts on your mind can distract you from remembering your dream in the morning.

2. Have a regular bedtime and wake up time. Make this your routine. Going to bed and waking up at a regular time every day aids in dream recollection.

3. Avoid alcohol consumption and taking medication before going to bed. These things may hinder you from remembering your dream. Eating fatty foods too close to bedtime can also divert bodily resources away from the brain. and hider dream recollection.

4. Keep a pencil/notebook or tape recorder next to your bed so that it will be within reach as soon as you wake up. You want to make recording your dreams as easy a task as possible. Having a small lamp by your bedside is also a good idea should you wake up in the middle of the night and want to record your dream immediately.

5. Upon waking from a dream, lie in bed for awhile keeping your eyes closed. Wake up slowly and stay relaxed. Hold on to the feelings you have and let your mind wander to the images of what you have just dreamt. Were you frustrated, terrified, or happy?

6. Record your dream immediately. Make it a habit that this is the first thing you do. Talking about your dreams to friends or participating in forums and chats also help you remember.

Your Dream Journal

1. Select a notebook specifically to record your dreams in. A nice fancy journal or a blank bounded book may encourage you to use it. However a plain spiral notebook or paper pad will suffice. Keep it by your bedside where it is easily accessible. Dream details fade quickly after awakening so it is essential to record the dream immediately.

2. Keep a consistent dream format. Date your dreams. It doesn't matter if you use last night's date or the next morning as long you keep it consistent.

3. Write in the PRESENT tense as if the dream is still occurring before your eyes. This helps to recall your dreams by putting you back into the moment of your dream.

4. Write down every possible details of you dream. Location, colors, sounds, objects, characters, and your emotions are all important aspects of your dream. You may want to ask yourself the following questions.

What are the significant images or symbols in your dream?

Where was the dream located?

How did the dream make you feel?

How does your dream parallel a situation or experience in your waking life?

5. Grammar, spelling and punctuation are not important when recording your dreams. Just get the dream down on paper before it slips away and record everything that you remember even if it may only be fragments. As you start writing, more and more pieces of the dreams will come to you. Because we are not able to write faster than what we are thinking, it may be a good idea to record your dreams on tape first. However it will still be a good idea to go back and record the dream on paper.

6. When something is hard to describe in words, draw a quick sketch of the imagery. Color pencils or crayons may help depict your picture more clearly.

7. After you have recorded your dream, make a little footnote on any major concerns or issues that is going on in your waking life. As your journaling grows, you will hopefully see a correlation and pattern between your dream and reality.

8. Lastly, put a title on it.

9. Highlight keywords and symbols that stand out.

Interpreting Your Own Dreams

Now that you have written your dream down on paper, it is time to disassemble it.

1. Identify the characters in your dreams. Ask yourself who these people are and what qualities they represent for you. Many times the people in your dreams represent aspects of your own self. Seeing your mother in your dream, may represent your own maternal characteristics. It may also mean that particular qualities that you see in your mother, you see in yourself as well.

2. Ask yourself why you are having this dream at this particular time. Draw from your real life events and situation that is occurring at about this same time.

3. Consider the puns that appear in your dreams. The subconscious mind likes to make use of humor, metaphors, and slang in making its meaning known. For example, when you see a plane in your dream it could mean that you are feeling plain. Or if you dream that you are making dinner reservations, it could mean that you are reserved or hesitant about.

4. Circle or highlight any words you believe to be symbolic. Ask yourself, what does this word mean to you. Consult our dream dictionary to further guide you into your interpretation. Sometimes looking up its symbolism will help make the dream more clearer and stimulate your own thinking about the symbol.

source: http://www.dreammoods.com/

Every person dreams an average of 7 dreams a night but not everyone remembers them. I remember most of my dreams... 3 or 4 a night and they're so much fun, so much so that I can't wait to go to sleep sometimes! 😛 So full of adventure and action! Devils, cartoons, I run and drive super fast and jump from many floors up or building to buildings, I dream deserts and oceans animals and monsters and tarantulas sometimes I can fly and swim and ghosts and dark places and mansions and people who I have never seen before (those I could see super clear, if I could draw I would do it with ease) and and and ! lol I always have some funny, weird or fun dream to talk about the next day 😛 And sometimes I just dream about what is currently going on and sometimes I even dream my fears and then I can't deny them to myself... well that sucks ha ha Dreaming is fun 🙂 And you'd think that I'd wake up scared sometimes but somehow MOST of the time I know that I'm dreaming... almost always, what sucks is that once I introduce a character... like say a dinosaur I can't get rid of it anymore 😢 Trust me if you can control your dreams... please take my advice and forget the whole dinosaur thing!

I don't remember dreams for anything but I know I have them because the way you "feel" when you get up is always different that you can't find a reason for lol.I have to wake up during it or immediately or write them down as soon as I wake up to actually pull off "remembering" them cause it starts to disappear rapidly if it wasn't too frieghtening or whatever(a dramatic dream in otherwords).

Have those thumbs been naughty? 😉 lol jk

Im sure I dream cause,boyfriend says I sometimes talk in my sleep and stuff-dreaming but I won't remember anything when he asks what I dreampt about.I don't like paralysing dreams more than anything lol,I don't have too bad of nightmares normally besides being paralysed in a dream.From what I heard thats something to do with waking up but not ready to wake up,can't remember if its your mind or body that does it though.I'd have to look it up again to know for sure.