Joan's dream journal

[Joan Sola]

I start my dream journal today! I'm just on my second night of trying and my attemps to dream recall are somehow poor by now. I'll enter one post per night. Hope it gets better!! Some practical stuff: I just got "MP3 Alarm Clock" for my Mac -- just a multiple alarm for my laptop -- and set it to wake me up twice a night, at 3:30 and 5:00. If I don't get too tired during the day I'll set it to three wake ups per night! "MP3 Alarm Clock" for Mac is cool and it wakes you up with the music you want. You need a mouse click to turn it off, so position the pointer at the right place before going to sleep and you'll get less bothered (and less awake) during you dream recalls. Use the notebook's mouse button for the click, not the regular mouse's one: this way you don't risk moving the pointer out of the STOP button in MP3 Alarm Clock. I sleep with a (paper) note book and a pen (the note book is in my bed). I write without seeing anything, and in a very lazy position. In the morning my writing looks really funny but it is readable, so that's good enough for a recall method. The next day the small sentences written on the note book are enough to bring up enough memories to reconstruct at least the situation. My first dreams recalls are not stories but situations that last merely a couple of seconds. I hope I'll get clearer and longer memories with some practice. When this happens, I'll need to get more wrinting done. I'm also a little stressed these days and this probably doesn't help, but anyway: It's fun, I feel like starting something big, important and highly beneficial!! My experience on lucid dreaming (LD) and dream control (DC) is the following: LD: I have been able, without any intention, to realize that I was dreaming. This happened usually during nightmares, when everything was screwed up and I was in panic, somehow I could tell to myself: alright, that's clearly a dream, now you can take control and do something. My goal was to awake from the dream and to do so I knew that the only thing I had to do is scream. I usually succeeded, but my scream was actually heard on the real life... :-O. It is shortly ago that someone told me to change my goals, not to wake up but to do any other thing, to change the dream. That's why I'm here. DC: I have been able to fly for long. I flew with my feet in front, like when you lay on a sofa or you fly with a paraglider, and all maneuvres were slow, like if I had a very high innertia and were difficult to control. A few times I have been able to fly by shaking my arms and adopting a bird position, with my head in front and facing down. I was also able to glide like this. My weight and gravity was not a problem, I could take off easily, it's just that everything took a lot of determination and was done slowly. Once flying, I could go really high and stare at the people from above. I felt kind of superior. On day I decided to start flying in the real life and I started hang-gliding. Surprisingly, my flying dreams stopped. Years after they came back, but now they are very rare and the last one I can remember must be at least one or two years ago. Flying was not during LD, I did not have the conscience of being dreaming, but I remember having some sort of control, this strong determination to do it, without which flying would have been impossible.

[Joan Sola]

#1.1: I just remember being in a small supermarket in San Francisco, probably in the Mission. #2.2: A receptionist is sitting on his office wheeled chair. He turns back as to say something about something somebody else and I have been discussing. We are actually inside the help desk of this receptionist, that's why he turns back. I don't know why, who is this guy, who I was talking to, what were we talking about, what was the receptionist's comment, or anything. After recalling these two dreams, I feel on one hand disappointed for the small amount of recalled info, but on the other hand glad to see that I have been actually dreaming (Usually I don't remember my dreams unless they are really bad and weird - and they are often nightmares then - but not always). #1.1 I actually don't remember really, it's so fuzzy, but it's written on my notebook!

[Joan Sola]

#2.1: I am with a cute woman, standing by an open door. Maybe a party or some social event. I am dressed more elegant than usual (this is easy) and feel sort of proud of it. I dress in yellow and dark gray. She is very close to me, we kind of like each other but we are not a couple or anything. It's like these first magic moments when you feel this atraction, not sexual, something else, I feel I will fall in love. She might be somebody from college, she looks pretty much like her, but at the same time she is not her. I don't know exactly. In case she is, her name in real life is Mireia Calopa (and I hope she is not reading this!!). We make some comments on the way I dress. She is happily surprised of it, I am proud as I said. #2.2: I can't remember. I was too lazy to write it down and now it's gone. Writing really helps! Today I start posting this journal.

[Joan Sola]

I set up the alarm clock for three times a night, at 3:00, 4:30 and 6:00.

[Joan Sola]

#3.1: I am climbing. There is a step which is difficult to protect. As protections already set by someone else, I see a white sling strangely wrapping a big piece of rock (the size of one person), and a "nut" built with a small stone and a piece of rope. Both very weak and somewhat dangerous. That's all. #3.2: My notebook reads: "At my sister's place there are fleas". I don't remember this dream now. The sentence is true, though :-O. #3.3: I am in a mountain hut, a refuge for mountaineers. I try to take a picture with my camera, but the camera is playing a video and refuses to do its job. I try a couple of times by changing the camera mode from play to shot, but no result. This is the first "not working mechanism" since I started my journal. I think I realized it at the time my dream was vanishing and I was waking up.

[Joan Sola]

I posted at the newbies area for some advice. I got these hints: * set the alarm between 4:30 and 5:00 hours after going to sleep to improve tha chances of getting a REM. * don't move, don't open my eyes, and try to remember the dream by asking backwards "what was going on before this? and before? etc" * don't try too hard, just write the journal and be patient and constant. I am searching for a better alarm clock to avoid too much distraction at wake ups.

[Joan Sola]

No luck tonight. I messed up my alarm clock and I had to move a lot to switch it off. My dreams vanished quickly and I didn't write anything.

[The Cusp]

No luck tonight. I messed up my alarm clock and I had to move a lot to switch it off. My dreams vanished quickly and I didn't write anything. They only vanish if you give up trying to recall them. Try to focus on the lingering feeling they leave behind, and try to come up with a Who, Where, What to match it.

[Joan Sola]

You are right, I have not been so motivated tonight. Some other things were bothering me and it was difficult to focus on dream recall, to get enough suggestion, etc. when I went to bed. I'll try again! I see that some dreams are related to events happening on the same day, and I wonder if recalling them would be beneficial to find a way to stop bothering about some problems in the real life... any experiences on this?? That would be great!!!

[The Cusp]

I see that some dreams are related to events happening on the same day, and I wonder if recalling them would be beneficial to find a way to stop bothering about some problems in the real life... any experiences on this?? That would be great!!! I think it's more events that have an emotional impact on you that show up in your dreams. I know a lot of time I'll see things in my DJ that I didn't even realize were bothering me.

[Joan Sola]

Yeah, so for instance my sister called me before yesterday, and in the night I dreamed of me being at her place. But I did not dream about her, just I was there, and there were fleas (I actually know I was there because at her place there are fleas!!). so if things have to appear so modified with respect to reality, I dont know how can I bring my worries to my dreams, or how can I learn from my dreams about the things that bother me... I actually don't remember being worried in any of my dreams. I remember being scared (kind of an *extreme* worry), but not worried. This may be a key, being scared in a dream and facing the situation without escaping could mean facing a real-life problem, or getting more confident on doing it.

[Joan Sola]

There's a dream I had this weekend. I was camping and sleeping awfully for the floor was so hard. This allowed me to have easier recalls. I had an experience of NEAR-LUCIDITY, but it did not fructify.