Christine Hoeflich

Besides paying attention to your intuition and inner nudges, you can pay attention to your dreams and by doing so, unleash the power of your dreams (which will go a long way toward helping you solve your and your family’s problems and fulfill your higher purpose). This is because dreams are one of several ways the Divine uses to communicate with us, and if we pay attention we will gain the perspective and the assistance of the Divine.

However, not many people remember their dreams and not long ago a reader of my articles emailed, asking me what to do so that he could remember his dreams. “Can you give me some insight into dreaming? I do not and cannot remember my dreams. I was told this is not normal. Why can’t I remember my dreams?” he asked.

I can understand his frustration. Earlier in my life, I usually would not remember my dreams, either. When I did remember a dream, it would usually only be the last part of it. And even then, I would not notice the details that some other people claimed to be able to notice–things like color, for instance.

But then as I began to reconnect to my higher self (sometimes called my true self, my authentic self, my inner self, my soul) I began to pay more attention to my inner feelings, and this is what helped develop my capacity to remember my dreams. (Reconnecting to your higher self develops you in a number of ways, and remembering your dreams is one of them.)

Besides reconnecting and paying attention to your higher self, I recommend the following tips for remembering your dreams.

• Anticipate that you will have dreams and that you will remember them. Get yourself a notebook that’s specifically for your personal growth: your new insights and dreams. Keep this notebook by your bedside, along with a pencil or pen and be ready to write in it when you wake from with a dream, even if you only remember a few things about it.
• As you get ready to retire for the night, ask your higher self to guide you while you are sleeping. You might ask your higher self a question about the day you just had, or about something that’s bothering you at the moment. For example, “How do I go about solving that thermodynamics homework problem? Give me some insight into how to set up the problem so that I can solve it.” Then relax and fall asleep, knowing that your higher self will be working on the solution while you are asleep.
• When you awaken in the middle of the night with a new or helpful insight, put the light on (or have a small flashlight by your bed) and make notes in your dream/insight notebook. Do not miss the opportunity to develop the capacity to make new neural connections and access new insights. More often than not, you will not remember the new insight in the morning unless you write it down.
• When you are dreaming and you begin to notice that you’re dreaming, it usually signals that you will soon awaken from your dream. Do not try to awaken; don’t even move. Just go over what happened in your dream. Keep going over what happened in your mind until you find yourself fully awake and ready to get up. At this point pick up your dream journal and write in as many details about your dream as you can remember. If you want to remember your dreams, do not put off writing in your dream journal until later in the day. Do it immediately.

Note for the first tip above: intention and anticipation may seem to be the same, but sometimes anticipation has more power in it than intention. For example, years ago, rather than intending to receive guidance from my higher self, I anticipated it–I paid attention and I looked out for it and then I followed through when I received the guidance. When describing what worked to get things rolling, anticipation seems to be more accurate than intention–at least in my personal experience. Anyway, would Carly Simon have written a song titled, “Intention”?

The following is an example of a meaningful dream I had in October, 2005. I saw the dream as a message from my higher self, and as guidance that would help me get to the next level of my life path. The following is an excerpt from my memoir, What Everyone Believed: A memoir of intuition and awakening:

With a pounce onto my chest, our kitten awakened me from a dream the day I was revising this chapter. In my dream, I was on my way to Alaska as a passenger in what looked like a new, comfortable, European-style city bus. I was aware that I’ve never been to Alaska, only to Canada, and I was thinking that going to Alaska would be just as easy as going to Canada.

The bus traveled through a picturesque, green valley in between beautiful snow-capped peaks, maybe ten miles from one side to the other. The valley reminded me of Davos, Switzerland, still snowy in the higher elevations though it was almost Summer. The bus meandered, switchbacking up an incline, went here and there, stopping in many places for passengers, taking its time. Impatient, I asked a passenger sitting next to me how long this trip to Alaska would take. “It’ll be around four hours,” she said.

Four hours? That was way too long for me! I wanted to get there sooner! I explained to her that if I drove my own car, it would take me only two hours. So I decided to get off of public transportation and drive my own vehicle. I pulled the signal to stop and got off the bus. That’s when the cat woke me up.–end of excerpt.

This dream referred to a process I was going through in my life at the time, and encouraged me to shed any mainstream cultural conditionings and keep moving forward–which I did.

Reconnecting to your higher self and following the tips above will help you develop your capacity to not only remember your dreams, but to experience dreams that are more meaningful to you, dreams that guide you to solve a particular problem for yourself or your family, or to advance you in some area of your life. Because the truth is, your dreams are one way your higher self (and the Divine) use to guide you on your life path.

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