Sudden lack of dream recall

[Moonshine]

Normally, I have rather vivid (although not lucid) dreams, and vivid dream recall. This is thanks in part to the St. John's Wort I take for therapeutic reasons, and the melatonin I take as a sleep aid. I can tell you about the dreams I had on the three previous nights, despite never having written anything down about them. I can visualize parts of those dreams quite clearly in my mind's eye, as easily as I can recall a waking memory.

I have been attempting OBEs for several days now, using the techniques described in one of William Buhlman's books. I have attempted OBEs before going to sleep, after waking up in the morning, and in the middle of the day. Tonight, for the second night in a row, I attempted to induce a lucid dream through written, spoken, and "mentalized" affirmation. It did not work, and when I woke up this morning, I could remember nothing of my dream(s) that night. Not even a shred. I understand how waking unexpectedly versus naturally can affect recall, but I woke up naturally. For me, this is like blacking out. It's like knowing that I've been *somewhere* for several hours, but not remembering. Furthermore, whenever I try to remember what I dreamed about, my right ear starts ringing.

I searched around on Google and could not find any precedent for this phenomenon. It's the worst dream recall I have ever had. Can anyone shed light on this? Thanks.

[CFTraveler]

I can offer an explanation but it would be rather esoteric.

[Moonshine]

I'd be interested in hearing it. The best explanation I've been able to find so far points to either a traumatic dream that my conscious mind has blocked me from recalling, or being out of REM phase for a substantial amount of time before waking, or not even having any REM phase at all. But all of those would be quite unusual for me. I cannot remember the last time I woke up naturally (as opposed to an alarm clock or other such external disturbance) and had zero recollection of my dream states. There is always at least a glimpse of something.

[kurtykurt42]

Try raising your energy using NEW-ENERGY-WAYS before you go to bed. When i spend 20-30 min raising my energy before bed I can remember up to 10-15 dreams.

[zareste]

I can only explain it as a psychic disturbance. The ringing, however, seems to imply that something was implanted in your brain

[CFTraveler]

OK Moonshine, here's my esoteric eplanation:

Normally, I have rather vivid (although not lucid) dreams, and vivid dream recall. This is thanks in part to the St. John's Wort I take for therapeutic reasons, and the melatonin I take as a sleep aid. I can tell you about the dreams I had on the three previous nights, despite never having written anything down about them. I can visualize parts of those dreams quite clearly in my mind's eye, as easily as I can recall a waking memory.

Since both of these substances increase neuronal activity (or at least facilitate it) it doesn't surprise me.

I have been attempting OBEs for several days now, using the techniques described in one of William Buhlman's books. I have attempted OBEs before going to sleep, after waking up in the morning, and in the middle of the day. Tonight, for the second night in a row, I attempted to induce a lucid dream through written, spoken, and "mentalized" affirmation. It did not work, and when I woke up this morning, I could remember nothing of my dream(s) that night. Not even a shred.

Here's what occurs to me:
Affirmations usually work to rewrite the programming that's in your subconscious, the stuff that you have that tells you what you're capable of doing and what you're not.  When you affirm something you are telling your subconscious 'what it is'.  Because of this, affirmations do not work instantly (although the process that gets started to realign reality to your specifications is instant) but your 'programming' takes a bit longer, depending on what your intent it and how entrenched a prior belief is.  It occurs to me that your problem is not programming, it may be partly in the other things that facilitate OBE:  Increasing recall (which you don't need) and increasing lucidity in your dreamstate, which helps attain trance and use it without falling asleep.
The problem with using an affirmation for something you're already able to do is that it 'may' set up the idea that it is something that 'will happen later', or worse, that 'is not something you're doing' is that it may set the goal for the future, or even set up the belief that it's not what you can do.  Of course in this I'm only guessing, as I don't know how you structure your affirmations.

So with the little info I have I'd ask you to do three things:
First, continue using affirmations for what you want to do:
"I remember my projection" is a good one because it assumes that you are already projecting, and it doesn't push anything towards the future.  But this is only one part of the combo that would increase the speed of your success:

Like Kurt said, learn NEW.  It will help in many ways and will help you stay out longer and have higher quality projections.

Learn to cultivate the trance state.  This means long meditative sessions, with the intention of not going to sleep, staying aware until you've switched conscious awareness.

If you believe there is some traumatic experience you had in dreamstate, use a protective prayer designed to let your Higher Power (whatever you believe in) decide whether you're ready to experience it.  I like "Heal what must be Healed and Reveal what must be revealed." (it's part of a larger prayer, but I used that part in a meditation, and it worked for me.)


Also, and this is important:  When you begin to do a certain type of work (OBE and Trance inducing work) that does mess with your sleep cycles at first, because you are changing your brainstates, in the sense that you're trying to stay in Theta instead of 'falling into' deeper sleep states.  This takes some getting used to at first, and it is understandable for some initial exhaustion, which will go away in a few days of rest.  My recommendation to you is to get a little more sleep time if possible at first, until you adapt to your new 'routine', and it will get better, once you get over the initial hump.

Furthermore, whenever I try to remember what I dreamed about, my right ear starts ringing.

Every time?

[Moonshine]

Ah, thanks. I hadn't considered how affirmations could have those effects. The one I used seemed pretty simple: "When I fall asleep tonight, I will maintain lucidity." That's it. And it apparently had some kind of profound effect, just not the one I would have expected.

I appreciate the advice, and I will take a look at that PDF that Kurt linked.

I'm able to recall a few "scenes" from my dream(s) last night, so it seems as though this was just some kind of fluctuation that was either induced by the affirmation, or was something happening on a subtler level.

My ears were ringing on and off all day yesterday, so it may have been coincidental that they rang when I tried to recall that night's dream states. It's also pretty odd for my ears to do that, but I guess all I can say now is that I'm glad it's gone and I don't appear to have tinnitus or something :p

[CFTraveler]

My ears ring when there's a storm coming (due to the change in pressure) or when I'm coming down with a cold.  (Same reason).  For whatever that's worth.

[Gbob]

Perhaps reading books on lucid dreams will help. I was reading one last night and I had a 2 hour LD. Well at least it felt like it.

[CFTraveler]

Perhaps reading books on lucid dreams will help. I was reading one last night and I had a 2 hour LD. Well at least it felt like it.

If you knew you were dreaming it was.