It's all about the biological processes taking place in our body and subconscious. If we are lucky, we recall a vivid episode of a dream, although it happens that we remember some dream for many years, and some are forgotten immediately after waking up.
Our dreams directly depend on the phase of rapid eye movement, REM, during which we observe signs of wakefulness: we can twitch, toss and turn, our breathing and blood circulation change. While in this state, we observe dreams - this phase lasts an hour and a half.
Blood flows to the cortex, which is responsible for the content of dreams, and the limbic system, which processes the emotional state.
On the other hand, the frontal lobes of the brain, which are responsible for critical thinking, are resting.
That is why we blindly accept everything that happens in meaningless dreams until we wake up.
Memorizing what we dreamed at night is most interfered with by morning rituals. For example, an alarm clock leads to a sharp increase in nore-adrenaline (the hormone of wakefulness), and this makes it difficult to remember what we just saw in a dream.
Many people remember dreams from the first minutes of sleep, when we are not yet completely asleep, but are no longer awake. Typically, this stage lasts the first 5-10 minutes.
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But what if we still want to remember what we saw in a dream?
Avoid alarms, at least on a weekend: morning rituals and sharp rises make it impossible for you to remember a dream. Try staying in bed longer on weekends.
A calm, slow awakening will help you review what we saw at night and remember it.
Another tip: while falling asleep, just think that you will remember your dreams and will remember them when you wake up. Scientists say that even this simple method works.