The power of "What was I just dreaming?"

LaBerge recommends asking yourself "what was I just dreaming about?" when you wake with no dreams immediately on your mind. I've done this consistently over the months of LD practice when reaching for recall upon waking with no dreams already in memory, and it almost always works. I did it again this morning, and went from zero recall to about 10 scenes eventually, one scene after the other coming flooding in.

I started wondering about how this works. It could be that by asking this question consistently right before reaching for dream recall sets up a trigger that your mind recognises over time to provide the memories when you ask this question. An interesting possibility. I highly recommend this technique for aiding dream recall.

Yes. It's a good technique. I do this for a long time (didn't read about this technique, i just like doing it). Sometimes i get late for work because i stay there, in my house, remembering one scene, then another, then the entire dream... and then i loose my train for work.

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I started wondering about how this works.

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I dont claim to have the answear to this, but I would say that Intention brings the magic with this type of recalling. When ever I look back on anything that I have acomplished that went as planed or even better as expected. I then will often have a really strong sense of that my intention was totally flawless and spot on, during that moment of action that went as planed. And the power of intention allmost always suprise me as if it just happened for the first time. Intention is magic! :wizard:

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Originally Posted by FryingMan

I started wondering about how this works. It could be that by asking this question consistently right before reaching for dream recall sets up a trigger that your mind recognises over time to provide the memories when you ask this question. An interesting possibility.

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It works because normally dreams are stored in short term memory. So when you wake up and take a few minutes to remember what you were dreaming about, you are sifting through a messy short term file bin and extracting some good information to place into your long term memory. Just because you don't remember any dreams immediately after waking doesn't mean those memories are not already present. They are definitely still there in your short term memory and it merely takes a bit of effort to sit quietly and remember, otherwise it becomes unlikely those memories will remain. So your theory that the question is a trigger to remember those memories...well, yes, of course it is. Or not the question so much as the directed intention to recall that accompanies asking yourself this question :)

Aloud?

Sometimes, yes.

i might try this. i think today in class i was sitting there and wondered "what DID i dream?" because i woke up abruptly and that causes me to forget my dreams, but when i thought that BAM i kind of remembered some of them.

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Originally Posted by nina

It works because normally dreams are stored in short term memory. So when you wake up and take a few minutes to remember what you were dreaming about, you are sifting through a messy short term file bin and extracting some good information to place into your long term memory. Just because you don't remember any dreams immediately after waking doesn't mean those memories are not already present. They are definitely still there in your short term memory and it merely takes a bit of effort to sit quietly and remember, otherwise it becomes unlikely those memories will remain. So your theory that the question is a trigger to remember those memories...well, yes, of course it is. Or not the question so much as the directed intention to recall that accompanies asking yourself this question :)

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Short and long term memory is actually a bit of myth, memory isn't cut up into neat categories like that. "Memorising" things is in fact very easy, it's the retrieval part that's the problem, most of your memories are in "long term" storage, but the connection to them degrades without use. This is why it sometimes takes a while for you to remember something, think of your brain as a kind of network of roads and a memory is a place, if the memory doesn't get much use or you haven't built enough roads to it while memorising then it's really difficult to get there.

When you ask "what was I just dreaming about?" it sets a very specific intention and your brain goes into search mode looking for any relevant memories. I think it works well probably because of how specific you're being, there is such a thing called "interference" where similar memories get confused and you retrieve the wrong one. For example if you see 2 red objects and you think "what was a red object I saw" you might get both of the objects or just one of them. If you think "what was the last red object I saw" you'll likely get just one red object because of the extra chronological criteria.

Another example is even if you don't remember a dream when you wake up, you might remember it later if you see something that reminds you of the dream, this can happen even an hour later!

If you'd like to learn more about memory and memory techniques check out these links.

Art of memory - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Mnemotechnics.org: Memory Techniques Forum and Brain Training

It works quite nicely. I asked out loud after assessing, what I have with just taking a searching, wordless look inside, like I usually do - and yepp - details and even whole scenes came back to me, which weren't accessible before I used actual words to unearth them. Interesting. I'll keep that up, me thinks.

A belated congrats on this interesting thread, FryingMan... it's amazing how memory is so simple (Nina) yet so complicated (Memm), both at the same time. It's also amazing how important it is to dreaming, and life in general, yet we so rarely talk about it here.

... Oh yeah, and also I use pretty much the same method as what you list to recall dreams, BTW, and it's always worked quite well for me!

There's something I've experienced a lot with my dream recall that kind of supports the fact that someone (into lucid dreaming, most likely) usually can remember their dreams, but struggle retrieving those memories. Sometimes I'll wake up, not remember any dreams, and do my day-to-day business, then suddenly several hours later I see something or hear something that triggers a moment of deja vu. It can be anything, from my dog's tail wagging to my dad saying "We'll be leaving soon," playing a game in a certain manner or getting on DreamViews. It's the feeling of, "This happened very recently...but I felt differently about it when it did." I basically grab onto this feeling of deja vu before it fades, focusing on whatever caused it, and try to think, "where have I seen this before?" (Perhaps right here is the kind of stuff you're talking about--asking yourself this brings the intent to remember it.)

Then it hits me: looking at my dog with his tail wagging, but almost in slow motion with my vision blurry. Or logging onto DreamViews, but all the text is kind of fuzzy, as if something isn't quite right. Then I start remembering what happened after that, and what happened before that. I recall the entire dream, and then I end up recalling other dreams because I realize in some way how they could be connected. An entire night's dreams, from lucid to non-lucid, recalled because of that one little instant of deja vu already several hours after I woke up.

Then, of course, I rush to write it down before I forget everything again. :chuckle:

I know it's only deja vu, but it's very much a 'wow' moment for me everytime, to go from not remembering a fragment to suddenly 3 dreams or more because of something I saw on television or because I was watching a bird in the sky. I'm curious to hear if anyone else experiences something like this. I know it's a little bit off-topic, but I figured I'd mention it since we're talking about memory and dream recall here. It's a very interesting experience for me.

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Originally Posted by StephL

It works quite nicely. I asked out loud after assessing, what I have with just taking a searching, wordless look inside, like I usually do - and yepp - details and even whole scenes came back to me, which weren't accessible before I used actual words to unearth them. Interesting. I'll keep that up, me thinks.

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That's great that it helped the very first time! I think if you use it consistently it will keep getting more and more effective.

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Originally Posted by Maxis

I know it's only deja vu, but it's very much a 'wow' moment for me everytime, to go from not remembering a fragment to suddenly 3 dreams or more because of something I saw on television or because I was watching a bird in the sky. I'm curious to hear if anyone else experiences something like this. I know it's a little bit off-topic, but I figured I'd mention it since we're talking about memory and dream recall here. It's a very interesting experience for me.

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This is actually fairly rare for me. I do sometimes have delayed recall, but most of it comes in within an hour of getting out of bed. Usually when in the shower, somehow all kinds of thoughts and memories come to me in the shower. I may have had one middle of the day recall event within the last year, but I can't remember (haha) for sure.

I am really excited about trying this! I've found quite often lately that I wake up knowing I was just dreaming, but I can't seem to jolt my memory.
Thanks FryingMan, I'll let you know how it goes!

^^ Hope it works well for you, I'm sure it will! Give it some time, try to do it every time you wake up if recall doesn't come in immediately (and even if it does, you can always ask, "what *else* was I dreaming about?")

This reminded me to watch some TED Talks about memory. I never thought of improving memory skills for lucid dreaming, pretty stupid of me. Here are 2 links to Youtube videos https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6PoUg7jXsA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ebJlcZMx3c

OH GOD THIS ACTUALLY WORKS!!!!!! thanks frying man I did this today and remembered 2 dreams and one of them was lucid!!

Thanks a bunch man :)