Mortal Mist
Workshops and Projects => Workshop Archive => Dream Recall - June 2009 => : Luminous June 01, 2009, 06:19:36 AM
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This thread is for questions and answers related to dream recall. If you have a question, post it here!
You can also ask questions in your workbooks if you want to, but if you do, please let me know in this thread as I might miss it otherwise.
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Do you think we might benefit from practicing some kind of improve your memory type techniques Lumi?
Icelus was saying in his/her workbook that he/she wanted to have as good recall of a dream as remembering what happened yesterday.
I often struggle to remember what happened yesterday so I wondered if the quality of our 'remembering/memory capability' would need to be worked on?
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Do you think we might benefit from practicing some kind of improve your memory type techniques Lumi?
Icelus was saying in his/her workbook that he/she wanted to have as good recall of a dream as remembering what happened yesterday.
I often struggle to remember what happened yesterday so I wondered if the quality of our 'remembering/memory capability' would need to be worked on?
Yes, that might very much be. However, it is generally believed that dreams go straight into our long term memory unless you wake straight up from the dream. This indicates that if you have a decent long term memory, then your dream recall might be better.
Not much is known about just how dream recall works in our brains, so I'm not sure how possible it is to remember all your dreams as if they happened yesterday. I consider myself to have very good dream recall, but I still rarely remember a dream coherently from beginning to end.
You say in your workbook that you are a heavy sleeper, so in such case, you will want to focus on long term memory.
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Do you think that WBTBs help or hurt recall, or does it just depend on the person?
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Do you think that WBTBs help or hurt recall, or does it just depend on the person?
WBTB definitely helps recall! When you wake up during the night, you are more likely to remember the dreams you have had so far, and it's much easier to remember them as well. Just write down what you can remember when you wake up to WBTB.
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Q: I was shocked when I first saw your stats, not because of the 2k lucids, but because of only 12 dreams O_O. Are you pretty much at a point where you are that familiar with the DreamWorld that when you find yourself in a dream, you just know you are dreaming?
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1. Are there any foods we should avoid in order to improve our recall? I'd also be interested to learn about those that have the opposite effect.
2. By 'heavy sleeper', do you mean people that need strong external stimuli to wake up?
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Q: I was shocked when I first saw your stats, not because of the 2k lucids, but because of only 12 dreams O_O. Are you pretty much at a point where you are that familiar with the DreamWorld that when you find yourself in a dream, you just know you are dreaming?
Yes. I've been having lucid dreams since I was 3, so that gives me 23 years of experience. But training my dream recall by keeping a dream journal has really helped me remember lucid dreams that I would otherwise have forgotten!
1. Are there any foods we should avoid in order to improve our recall? I'd also be interested to learn about those that have the opposite effect.
2. By 'heavy sleeper', do you mean people that need strong external stimuli to wake up?
1. I don't believe that any type of food has a significant effect on recall. But you will not want to eat a big meal before bedtime, that might have a negative effect. And it's not good for your sleep anyway. ;)
2. Pretty much, yes. And heavy sleepers tend to not wake up that often, if at all, during the night.
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2. Pretty much, yes. And heavy sleepers tend to not wake up that often, if at all, during the night.
I see lol. That makes me a heavy sleeper, then.
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Why do you feel that it's important to give your dreams titles in your jounal? You mentioned that in the dream journal thread.
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Why do you feel that it's important to give your dreams titles in your jounal? You mentioned that in the dream journal thread.
Because it helps the memory of that dream to "sink in", and when you have to title your dreams, you also have to think through the general theme/plot of that dream, which is also good for your dream recall.
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Jeremy Taylor says that putting a title on a dream can be a very important step for a dreamer. Sometimes I will leave a dream untitled until I've gotten a chance to work through it - exam the elements and themes to see if anything strikes a chord. Then I'll title it and it will mean much more to me than if I simply title it the first thing that pops up.
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I get it. I'll start doing that. :)
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I have to sleep on a very uncomfortable couch most nights; what can I do to improve my recall in this situation?
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I have to sleep on a very uncomfortable couch most nights; what can I do to improve my recall in this situation?
Do you feel that the uncomfortable couch is hindering your dream recall? I wouldn't think that it would matter... Other than following the workshop and keeping a dream journal, you would then have to find somewhere more comfortable to sleep...
You should also be sure to get enough sleep. If you have sleepless nights because of the couch, that's yet another reason to try to make it more comfortable, and get the rest you need. Sleep deprivation pretty much kills dream recall, and the remedy for that is to get enough sleep.
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A question for you in my workbook Luminous if you wouldn't mind :content:
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A question for you in my workbook Luminous if you wouldn't mind :content:
Answered! :content:
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I noticed something very interesting last night. I already knew that your sleeping position could affect your dreams, but I wasn't exactly sure which position would be best. Normally I try to sleep on my right side, but last night I made a special attempt to sleep on my back. I ended up remembering 5 dreams total, 4 of them being fairly lengthy. So my question is, how do each of the sleeping positions (left side, right side, back, stomach, and fetal position) affect recall?
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I noticed something very interesting last night. I already knew that your sleeping position could affect your dreams, but I wasn't exactly sure which position would be best. Normally I try to sleep on my right side, but last night I made a special attempt to sleep on my back. I ended up remembering 5 dreams total, 4 of them being fairly lengthy. So my question is, how do each of the sleeping positions (left side, right side, back, stomach, and fetal position) affect recall?
No one knows. It might be individual, or it might not make a difference. I usually sleep on my left side or on my back. But it looks like sleeping on the back did the trick for you! :D
As Naiya and I mentioned in the Dream Yoga workshop, the Lucidity Institute is running an experiment similar to this, but they are trying to find out if sleeping position affects dream content or lucidity.
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I do seem to have a correspondence between sleep position and chance of getting lucid, but it never has seemed to affect my recall. I'm going to have to give that a try and pay more attention.
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I do seem to have a correspondence between sleep position and chance of getting lucid, but it never has seemed to affect my recall. I'm going to have to give that a try and pay more attention.
Please let us know how that goes! :D
Maybe we could do some sort of MM study on this, like we have done before?
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I seem to recall someone suggesting that if you slept on your right side the blood would pool in that hemisphere and your dreams would be more right brained, or vis versa. Kind of a non issue for me though, if I need to roll over to fall asleep then I need to roll over to fall asleep.
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Does that mean the blood pools in my a$$ all day? :D
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Does that mean the blood pools in my a$$ all day? :D
I was thinking that, Sam. Thank you for voicing it!
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:rofl:
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:coffeescreen:
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Not exactly a question, but something recall-related I stumbled on this morning.
I woke with no recall, and gave up after about 45 minutes of effort. Later, I was thinking about my day and evening, which led to my wife and I going to dinner and me having a pulled pork quesadilla - which led to remembering there was something about pigs in one of my dreams, which led to recall not only of that dream but of a couple others.
Seeing as the events of our days sometimes have a way of sneaking into our dreams, perhaps reviewing the events of the prior day and evening might be a good last resort when no recall is forthcoming.
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Seeing as the events of our days sometimes have a way of sneaking into our dreams, perhaps reviewing the events of the prior day and evening might be a good last resort when no recall is forthcoming.
A lot of the content of my dreams does seem to come from events that are in my short term memory and that happened in the few days (maybe up to a week) before the dream. For example last night I dreamt about being on a tour bus with Radiohead. Yesterday evening I was reading about all the tour dates Radiohead will be putting on this year.
Reviewing the events that happened in the last few days is a cool idea indeed, and one I will be trying. However I imagine it can be a bit difficult when such tiny things in real life (spending 30 seconds checking a tour) can become such massive dream elements, whilst much more memorable or important events of the day can sometimes never come up at all.
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That is a good point indeed - and yet just brushing past the evening's events led me to the pigs. It wasn't like I singled out "pulled pork" and then tried to remember my dream. I'm thinking that a quick review just might shake something loose.
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I'm thinking that a quick review just might shake something loose.
Absolutely. I like the technique, and the more recall induction methods we have the better!
PPIR - Pulled pork induced recall :D