repeating the phrase “I’m going to remember my dreams” three times before you drift off to sleep. And keep a notebook and pen by your bed. Both preparations establish recall as a priority.

Research shows that dreaming is not just a byproduct of sleep, but serves its own important functions in our well-being.

“It’s not a huge, dramatic effect but it certainly seems like paying attention to your dreams can have positive effects,” says Harvard University psychologist Deirdre Barrett, author of The Committee of Sleep.

We Learn When We Dream: Our Vivid Dreams Shape Our Memories

dream sleep actually provides at least two benefits for the brain.

The first is actually creativity, because it's during REM sleep and dreaming specifically when the brain starts to collide all of the information that you've recently learned together with all of this back catalog of autobiographical information that you've got stored up in the brain.

The second benefit of dream sleep is essentially a form of overnight therapy. It's during dream sleep where we start to actually take the sting out of difficult, even traumatic, emotional experiences that we've been having.

There are thousands of anecdotes of creative greats having eureka moments when they dream.

dream recall is thought to require some amount of wakefulness during the night for the vision to be encoded in longer-term memory.

The sleeping brain cannot store new information into long-term memory

Dream themselves exist first in working memory, or the memory we use to hold and manipulate thought fragments.

REM (rapid eye movement) is the stage of sleep in which dreaming usually occurs.

Dreams are potentially massive indicators of your overall sleep health, and, more specifically, your REM sleep health.

The process of hammering and forging our daily experiences into long-term memory through REM sleep is how we learn to master any sport, art, musical instrument, surgery, etc. through daily practice.

The more regularly you exercise, the better you will sleep, the more you will dream during REM sleep, and the more of a creative powerhouse you will become.

When you’re awake, your thoughts have a certain logic to them. When you sleep, your brain is still active, but your thoughts or dreams often make little or no sense. This may be because the emotional centers of the brain trigger dreams, rather than the logical regions.

The occasional nightmare is considered a dream that’s simply more frightening or upsetting. Nightmares tend to be caused by stress, anxiety, or sometimes as a reaction to certain medications.

if you have nightmares frequently, you could have a sleeping disorder.

Regularly occurring scary dreams can be labeled a sleeping disorder if the nightmares: -cause you to be anxious about going to sleep -lead to frequent disruptions of your sleep -bring about other sleeping or psychological problem

 Sleep hygiene involves ensuring both your habits and sleep environment are ideal for quality rest.

Dark and quiet room. Temperatures in the 60s to low 70s are considered best. Remove or turn off light sources like TVs, VCRs, and alarm clocks, and consider light blocking shades if you live in an urban area or sleep past sunrise. White noise machines or earplugs can be helpful for drowning out bothersome noise.

Some psychologists believe talking about dreams and getting social support to put them in perspective is key to reducing anxiety following nightmares.

Other approaches can focus on routines or working on areas of your life that could be contributing to stress or fear.

The American Psychological Association’s 2013 Stress in America poll found that stress was associated with poorer sleep, and that poorer sleep was also associated with higher stress

When you’ve had a tough day, take a few minutes to de-stress before bed. Try a warm bath, relaxing music, yoga or other techniques to see what helps you most.

Knowing something about a dream or nightmare can significantly help a person identify any “real-life” stressors that they can easily modify to prevent restless night.

The dream-deprived nod off quickly, sleep soundly and emerge from sleep fully awake.

The processes that allow us to create long-term memories largely lie dormant while we sleep, which is why most dreams are forgotten shortly after waking.

The emotional content and logical consistency of a dream also affect how much of our dreams we remember.

before going to bed, drink three full glasses of water — not beer or wine, because they suppress R.E.M. sleep — which will force you to get up and go to the bathroom. “Middle-of-the-night awakenings are frequently accompanied by dream recall,” Stickgold says.

On waking up, don’t open your eyes, don’t move, don’t say a thing — any sensory perception or movement tends to wipe out memories of a dream.

As the brain awakens, it starts to turn on processes needed for long-term storage.

I think it is quite dangerous for an organisation to think they can predict where they are going to need leadership. It needs to be something that people are willing to assume if it feels relevant, given the context of any situation.

At this rate, I'll live forever.

It is changing the face of terrorism. It is basically bringing it to the United States, to our great citizens. We know the terrorists are barbaric and murderers that attack innocent civilians, as they did in this case.

End of the sixties, Keith Blazey interested me to work on GdAlO3, an antiferromagnet on which he had done optic experiments. This started a fruitful cooperation on magnetic phase diagrams, which eventually brought me into the field of critical phenomena.

A contented mind is the greatest blessing a man can enjoy in this world.

If night raids and detentions are an unavoidable part of modern counterinsurgency warfare, then so is the resentment they breed.

The speed of decision making is the essence of good governance.

A master can tell you what he expects of you. A teacher, though awakens your own expectations.

Nobody likes to fail. I want to succeed in everything I do, which isn't much. But the things that I'm really passionate about, if I fail at those, if I'm not successful, what do I have?

You must stay focused on the end result to achieve your goals.

If you find yourself desperate for money, you sometimes do whatever, but on the other hand, if you really want to be known as a certain type of actor, then you have to restrain yourself.

I am American. If you drop me in Seoul, I don't think I'm going to thrive there.

The United States of America will never be intimidated by thugs and assassins. The killers will fail, and the Iraqi people will live in freedom.

I don't care what you think unless it is about me.

I used to get off the bus, and there'd be a crowd around, you know, and I was thinking, 'God, I hope this is not for me.' And it normally was, and it was because someone said something to my sister, and the first she says is, 'Well, I'll get my brother.'

Trying to understand fundamental processes that take place as organisms develop and how their various cells interact with one another - one can see what happens with those cells by asking questions about the fundamentals of biology.

The Smithsonian Institute is one of the most popular agencies of government in the United States.