I was just browsing through this morning’s batch of questions from aspiring newbies, and something occurred to me. While the standard response from an experienced member usually contains the appropriate solution (undoubtedly a popular technique for the specific case at hand), it’s often presented generically. It lacks technicality. Sure, rubbing your hands helps the dream to remain stable, but why is this so? We’re distributing the most effective and practical advice, but it’s not always apparent how the particular technique is actually going to work.
It might just be me (wouldn’t be the first time), but I like to go a bit further and find out comprehensively how things work, and likewise, why they don’t. Anyway, a veteran topic that continually reemerges is memory. More specifically, why is it so hard for some people to remember their dreams?
The simple answer is that memory and consciousness work together. Before that makes sense, we need to look at the 2 fundamental tasks of memory: Retrieving and Storing.
As you might know, memory works on the basis of association. In order to retrieve something from memory, you have to ‘find’ it by tracing a string of associated memories until you arrive at the required information. This isn’t as obvious in the case of proficiently memorized information, like names (where the association is much stronger than some arbitrary detail), but it does still occur - it’s just been transformed into a subconscious routine.
Anyway, we can witness this association even without intentionally searching for some distant memory. Think of a song you listened to yesterday. Nothing specific, just the first one that comes to mind. Without realizing, you’ll probably also be able to picture what you were doing while you were listening to it, and where you were. These other bits of information are stored and ‘linked’ to that song, so you inadvertently recall these useless details automatically.
You don’t have a choice in what becomes linked to what, but you can use it to your advantage. In a more on-topic example, reality checks are designed to be associated with some common daily activity so you always remember to do them. If you suddenly think to question your state each time you see a dog, you’ll have a greater chance of doing this automatically in a dream. Developing the association between RCs and dogs is the tedious part - but it’s just an example.
If you let them, these associations will go on forever. For example, someone might say “Picture a cat”. Presumably, you’d then think of a cat. If you have a cat, you might see your cat. You might then be reminded of something that your cat did recently, or that you plan to do with it in the future. If this includes buying something for it, you might suddenly start thinking about money, which might lead you to remember you were going to withdrawal some cash from the bank later today. All from thinking of a cat. These memories aren’t directly linked, but if you follow the association string long enough, you’ll eventually find anything.
You’ve all been the proud owner of a memory for quite a number of years, so I’m probably not telling you anything new. In summary, the above describes how memories are retrieved from the brain. Unlike computers, which use an address to represent each available location, our memories are scattered, unbound, and can only be accessed by following associated links.
Now, the key to why we don’t remember dreams comes in the next part - storage.
Everything that happens to you during the day will be stored in memory, and linked involuntarily to whatever else was happening at that moment. Unless something unusual happens, most of it won’t even make the transition from temporary (short-term) to permanent (long-term) memory. Short-term memory only holds information for a brief moment (usually only a few minutes) until something else replaces it. I didn’t want to use the term ‘replace’ there, because it implies the old memory is overwritten, which isn’t the case. Instead, the old memory never establishes a link to an ‘anchor’ memory, and so is lost, isolated, in your mind.
Turning short-term memories into long-term, or permanent memories, is a conscious activity! This is the key to the problem of why we don’t recall dreams easily. If you don’t consciously turn the dream memories into long-term memories as soon as you wake up, they’ll likely be lost forever. It’s not unheard of to suddenly recall a dream several days later - it just indicates that at least some connection still existed from an obscure reference.
I usually average 5 to 8 dream memories per night, and as I’ve said before, this is due to waking up several times during the night. If you sleep 8 hours without waking up at all during that period, you’ll probably only remember the dreams that occurred in the last 30 minutes. You might remember something from earlier (it’s not a perfect system that works to the clock) - but it’d be safe to bet the most vivid memories were from only a short time ago.
The actual process of consciously processing your dreams upon waking is responsible for converting those memories to long-term storage. This action builds additional associations to the memories, and grounds them to something solid. Writing them down in your journal builds even more. Even if you never read back over them, the simple action of writing something down invokes a conscious intention to develop long-term links to that memory.
Well, that’s my theory. As usual, leave a comment if you want to discuss it further.
There are many people out there that have trouble with prolonging lucid dreams, including myself. I guess it might have something to do with dream stability. I have heard of ways to make dreams stable; like you mentioned, rubbing hands and spinning, and explainations about why these methods work. However, as far as why you don’t need these methods to prolong lucid dreams… I don’t know of any theory, sorry.