Thread: Question about remembering multiple dreams

They're usually about different things, although they can be similar if a particular schema is active. Try to rewind the dreams in your head and see if you can find a good place where you might think the dream ends and a new one start.

Also usually when I remember multiple dreams it is because I made an effort to remember a dream during one of the wakings in the middle of the night. All of us wake up during the night, but most often we just drift back to sleep and forget that we even woke up let alone what we dreamed. When I wake at 1am now, I put in an effort to try to remember the dream, I write in my dream journal, and then try to go back to sleep for more. The danger of that of course is that I may wake up too much and have trouble falling asleep again. However, sometimes I barely wake up even through the writing of the journal. And then in the morning I am surprised to read a dream journal entry that I obviously wrote but no longer remember.

Sometimes though I do remember more than one dream upon awakening in the morning, and in my mind I can tell them apart as separate dreams. Of course it is also possible that I sometimes cannot tell separate dreams apart, and that I count two REM cycles as one dream in my memory if they were on the same theme (a continuation dream), but if that ever happens than I am unaware of it.

As joanna says, I also make an effort to get up at night and see if I remember a dream. If I do, I write it down. Sometimes I do remember what seems like more that one dream. It's really hard to tell if it was one, or more dreams, especially if they are similar theme.


*Moved to Dream Signs and Recall

You can really be sure that it's different dreams when they are in different REM cycles(if you can detect that ofcourse, as JoannaB said before: waking up at the end of each REM helps with that), telling dreams apart within single REM is often difficult though, especially when they get linked.
Though worth mentioning that quantity is not the only thing to be concerned about, because one good long dream is often better than bunch of small ones.

Thanks, guys. I'll try to write my dreams down when I wake up between dreams.

I just want to mention that if you have trouble writing down a dream in its entirety (waking up too much to fall back to sleep, being too groggy), just writing down a few key words or short sentences to jog your memory helps, as well as noting what time you woke up with each entry. When you wake up in the morning, look at the key words you scrawled at your notebook. Often, the entire dream will come flooding back.

Another thing I want to add about writing a few key notes so you can go back to sleep and potentially recall more dreams is to add things like:

-Your emotions
- Significant and easy to pick out points in the dream that were eye-catching
- Beginning, Middle, and End

You don't want to end up writing "T rex and bunnies with fire hydrant," because you'll most likely forget how you felt in the dream, if you can't remember how it feels, or how you reacted to that dream, you won't have an easier time to recall them.

And even with taking time to rewind your dreams, there's chance of distortion. Just see what you can know now when you close your eyes and relax and speculate on what comes into your mind. It takes time, and sometimes you might remember a dream that happened in the middle of the night, then the most recent one, and then the earlier ones. It's not so linear as you may think, but when you take advantage of what comes to mind and you know it's a dream you're recalling, you'll have better chances of recalling multiple dreams.

Sometimes you might have random Eureka moments and think "Oh! Now I remember this one too!" When I was remembering certain dreams, I usually hanged on the emotions and how I reacted that helped me keep them in reserve when I was busy recalling one dream at a time. That ability would extend to the whole day, and because I would have small bits written down, I could extend on them quickly. It's just about consistency really, and knowing there's going to be times you want to take a few days off, and that's perfectly fine. Just do what's right for you, and it'll come by gradually.

Sometimes it really can be difficult to tell the difference between two similar dreams. You may even wake up briefly and then re-enter the same dream. If you can't tell whether or not it was one dream or two separate ones, just go with your instinct. Your initial thoughts about these things tend to be pretty accurate.

As for remembering more dreams, there are plenty of tricks you can use. One that works really well for me is to look through pages of random images directly after waking up. Many times certain pictures will instantly trigger dream memories that I never would have otherwise remembered. If you don't have the time or the means to do this, then simply try listing random words in your head. This can work even better, because you are likely to list words that lie in your subconscious memory of the dream.

Keep a distinct emotion attached to them. Assign aliases. Train yourself to think about kittens when you think about one dream. For another, think about puppies. Also, journal directly after waking.