posted on Dec, 1 2008 @ 11:32 PM
This may help, it almost always works for me.
Normally I sleep 5 hours per day, sometimes less, rarely more. And I too do not usually recall any dreams after awakening, probably because I sleep so
deeply when I do. But I did find a technique to invoke, or rather remember, some really vivid dreams. Sometimes they are quite lucid dreams too.
What I'll do before bed is to set my alarm clock to awaken me about 3 or 3.5 hours after I go to sleep. When the alarm goes off I'll get up for 30
minutes, but for no longer. During that 30 minutes, while I'm still quite sleepy, I'll drink a couple tall cups of strong coffee (I'll keep it
ready made and hot in a thermos so I don't waste time making it while I'm up). I'll also suck down a couple cigarettes. The point here is to
stimulate the mind while still quite sleepy. If you don't drink coffee or smoke, you will have to find alternate stimulants (maybe those Monster or
Rockstar energy drinks will do the trick).
After 30 minutes, but no longer, I'll go back to bed (don't forget to empty your bladder first, ha). Because I'm still quite tired, and because the
coffee hasn't really kicked in yet, I'll drift back to sleep almost immediately. What then follows, and probably because of the stimulants and
possibly having previously tricked my brain into going into wake-up mode, are very lucid and vivid dreams during the next couple hours of sleep.
Now, you may need to adjust these times and stimulants to suit yourself, but I've mentioned this to others and they say variations of this method has
worked for them. It probably has something to do with stimulating the mind while still needing a bit more sleep.
Good luck. If you figure out a technique that works, I'd like to hear about it too.
Oh, if you have an audio recorder, maybe an MP3 player/recorder with microphone, keep it handy near your bed in case you wake up from a dream. Make
note of it before falling back to sleep. Sometimes we'll have dreams that awaken us at night but forget about them before morning. I've found some
surprising recording in the morning.
[edit on 1-12-2008 by Divinorumus]