Remembering Dreams

Beachbum, you ar enot alone - even I dont remember my dreams at all (well 99% of the time)

I never remember dreams until one morning last week when I woke up absolutely freaked out. I obviously had been dreaming, at least let's hope I was, and remembered being in Iraq as a female SWAT-type. I was on a rescue mission and was getting my boss back from terrorists. I could fly a helicopter, I was Arnold Schwartzenegger (but a hot-babe!) and I even commandeered the airplane when more terrorists pulled some knives. Somewhere in there I got my throat cut and still managed to land the plane in Boston, where I promptly dissappeared with my team of rescuers (who were all in love with me).

Hmmm, I need to get that down on paper ...

That dream sounds like a hollywodd script !!

Yeah that's what freaks me out!

I remember lots of my dreams. Almost every morning I remember at least one, but if I have time to lie there thinking, I can sometimes remember three or four. I like dreams, I like trying to figure out what they mean and why the heck I dream some of the things I do.

What I'd like to know is why some people don't remember dreams and others remember them vividly. Am I an anomaly or is it the rest of you?

You can train yourself to remember your dreams. When you awaken, before turning on TV, radio, before speaking to anyone, ask yourself what did you dream. Without new stimuli to block your memory, the chances are better that you will remember. But you have to train yourself to ask that question the moment you awaken.

I learned to remember my dreams as a kid because my father asked every morning, "What did you dream last night?" So, in order to please him, I taught myself to remember them. Not just one dream per night but several and long after he stopped asking, I still remembered them daily.

I like to analyze dreams more for entertainment than anything. Some truly believe that our dreams can guide us through life, help us to make important decisions and I guess that's possible but dreams can be so complex and misrepresenting that I can't see relying on them for anything more than nighttime entertainment.

Heev, the dreams I remember are often scripted -- literally, they've sometimes got stage directions.

But I rarely remember them; usually I only remember them if I've been drunk or high or very, very tired and have had less than, say five hours of sleep. Anything more than that, and forget about it.

The gf remembers lots of dreams, though. I've noticed that I sleep most deeply in the middle of the night, but I'm easy to wake up in the morning. She's easy to wake up in the middle of the night, but a complete log in the morning (when she wakes up and remembers her dreams). So perhaps it has to do with what stage of sleep you wake up in. Maybe if you're allowed to complete your sleep cycle (and your dreams are not interrupted by waking) you are less likely to remember them.

For the gf and I to be a model, though, it would have to be the case that different people have different sleep cycles...

Guatum, that could just mean you're a freak like me.

Heeven, can I have your dream. Action, hot chicks, helicopters. Cool. One question: Why are you trying to save your boss? Weird, man.

eoe, I've tried doing that, but had no success. I'm with PD's theory on when and how you wake up. I wake up rather quickly and am immediately aware of what's going on around me. Time, strange noises, whether my son's moving or awake, etc. I wonder if waking suddenly can squash the memory before I have time to even consider if I've had one.

Same can't be said for the morning erection, though

I remember one dream I had during puberty. I dreamed that life is **** and death is worse. I never had to remember another one after that.

Life is a dream to me.....

I remember several of my dreams. A couple of them, I turned into published short-stories. Others, into an essay on a dream city.

I've kept track of them since I was a young teenager. Each one with its proper title: "The Doors of Perception", "Kindertotenlieder" and "At the Movies With Brezhnev" are some of the titles.

There have periods (months, maybe more than a year) in which I don't remember dreams. I have the feeling those have been calm periods in my life.

Lately, I've been remembering a lot.

So your dream is sh!t.

My dreams also fade quickly but keeping a pad by the bed and writing down key words can yield a lot.

I've discovered that there seem to many parallel "story lines" going on simultaneously sharing common linguistic and visual forms. Also dreams can sometimes be recalled by a later "trigger".

Why is this in General News?

I saved my boss because I actually LIKE him! He would be the second boss throughout my career that I've actually liked!

and that, friends, is newsworthy.

He's also HOT, but that was another dream ....

Remembering Dreams
I remember dreams occasionally. The most vivid as a child I went right to the top and was chased around the house by no less than the Devil. This was a recurring dream that stopped each time when I woke covered in sweat. It stopped totally when I had enough and finally faced him and faced him down. The dream was so real I even smelled him. When I not only faced him but advanced toward him he appeared confused and disappeared never to return.

Dreams of different natures appeared once in a while and I learned I could control the outcome and content of dreams as if I were a second person aware that the dream was just that and need not be feared.

That's happened for me also. Only a few times. It's like I manage to break through the dream conciousness and realize that I am dreaming and then I'm able to control the outcome.