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I admire the vows of poverty taken by monks to simplify their lives, but it seems like certain possessions would be difficult to give up altogether. We keep objects with irreplaceable sentimental value on display to remind us of people, places, and events in our past and rekindle the memories of our experiences.
I would more easily part with consumer electronics, I think, than permanently dispose of certain memorabilia, but perhaps detachment from the past benefits the monastic pursuit.
This morning I remembered two or three of my dreams, but I made a conscious decision while waking up not to record them in my dream journal. I’ve done this a few times before, too, usually when I don’t ever want to reread the dream. By doing so, though, my written record becomes less representative of my dreams as a whole.
I used to forget my dreams all the time, but now when I lose a significant one it’s almost like a memory fading away.
I sometimes wonder how the process of remembering affects our dream recollection. During a dream, we seem to tolerate nonlinearities and non sequiturs more than in waking life. When we try and remember our dreams, then, we create links between events, feelings, and locations absent from the original dream. Certain phrases and descriptions in my dream journal developed while I lay in bed remembering, after the dreams themselves have passed. Improved dream recall reduces this somewhat, yet some dream gaps remain difficult to reconcile to a waking memory.
I recently started contributing to Memory Cemetery, a place for human memories and dreams to rest. I enjoy the interesting collection of diverse recollections from across the globe, and it seems like a good place to share some of my more interesting dreams.
As my dream journal entries have become more regular and longer, I have noticed a distinct change in the way I remember dreams. At first I worked simply to not lose track of dream events and sequences, but now my dreams are becoming memories in the same sense as my memories of waking life. Dreams experiences are real events, as far as our minds our concerned, allowing us to spend each night in exploration and activity.
This can also led to some minor confusion in remembering whether conversations with some people occurred in real life or not. Anyone else run into this problem?
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