Vivid Dreams

[distantJ]

I have always hear that we dream the entire time we are sleeping, however I rarely remember dreaming at all, even immediately upon waking. Therefore, when I do remember a dream, it tends to stick with me and bother my thoughts for quite some time afterward.

One dream I remember was in high school, which for me was many many years ago. I had a dream I was following a classmate who was an evil prophet and eventually killed someone to protect this boy's life. Very Children-of-the-Corn-esque.

The next time I remember vivid dreams, I had a series of dreams that were truly horrifying. Death, destruction, apocalyptic type dreams where I was trying to run but instead wading through bodies and gore. That was while I was pregnant with a daughter who died at full-term, though nothing was wrong with her. Her death was a cord accident, so no prior warning.

Another time, I had a series of dreams about a man I knew. In the dream, we were both single (and neither of us actually were single at the time of the dreams) and I had very vivid dreams about the stages of our dating, the struggles, the decisions on whether to marry, the struggles when we decided to do so, etc. Oddly, he and I were both eventually single later, but never did have the desire to date. And no, I didn't tell him about my dreams! Though at the time I was having them they caused me a LOT of distress and guilt.

The dream I posted on the interpretations board is a dream I had recently and like the others, it has really been nagging at my thoughts since I almost never dream.

So my question is...How often do you remember dreams? Are they always very vivid like the few I have described here, and,  are you like me and rarely remember them, so when you do, you must seek meaning in them?

I have a feeling that were I to dream more, or remember my dreams, whatever the case may be, it would be beneficial to my waking life. But even when I wake before the children and really try to think about it, I cannot remember having dreamed at all! Is there any way to focus more energy on remembering my dreams, and to encourage more vivid dreams? Does it "mean something" that I either don't dream, or don't remember having had dreams?

[annathedreamer]

Hi 

My dreams have more functions or purposes than other resources or means I use to find my way through Life. Perhaps you use other ways than dreams?

And so intention or purpose is everything to me, for I have given them also the function to communicate with parts of Life (mine or others) which reaches beyond what my little self knows or sees or understands.
And so to me it is also a willingness to bow to Something more than I am.

I do not know how many articles you have read on Tony's website already, however here are a few which makes a nice start:

http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/dreams-%e2%80%93-what-are-they/

http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/forgetfulness-of-dreams/

http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/remembering-2/

http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/a-creative-relationship-with-your-dreams/

Good luck!!

- anna -

[Tony Crisp]

DistantJ - I think Anna has given excellent links, but it is wrong that we dream all the time we sleep.

After approximately an hour and a half from falling into deep sleep, an exciting change occurs. We return to level two and REM’s occur. Suddenly the brain is alert and active, though the person is asleep and difficult to wake. This level has been called paradoxical sleep because of this fact.

Voluntary muscular activity is suppressed and the body is essentially paralysed. Morrison has pointed out that although the brain is transmitting full muscular activity messages, these are usually suppressed by an area of the brain in the pons. But bursts of short actions occur, such as rapid eyeball jerks, twitches of the muscles, changes in the size of the pupil, contractions in the middle ear, and erection of the penis. It will be that similar excitation occurs in the vagina. Also, ‘autonomic storms’ occur, during which large erratic changes occur in heart rate, blood pressure, breathing rate, and in other autonomic nervous system functions. These are the changes accompanying our dreams. REM sleep in the diagram shows the short periods of dreaming.

 
If we slept for eight hours, a typical pattern would be to pass into Delta sleep, stay there for about seventy to ninety minutes, then return to stage two and dream for about five minutes. We then move back into Delta sleep, shown as stage 4, stay for a short period and shift back to level two, but without dreaming, then back into level three. The next return to stage two is longer, almost an hour, with a period of dreaming lasting about nineteen minutes, and also a short period of return to waking.
There is only one short period of return to stage three sleep that occurs nearly four hours after falling asleep. From there on we remain in level two sleep, with three or four lengthening periods of dreaming, and returns to brief wakefulness.

So in an average sleep period we would dream five or even six times.  The average amount of body shifting is once every fifteen minutes.

The diagram doesn't work in this answering, but you can see it in http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/science-sleep-and-dreams/

Tony