Dream Deterioration . . . .

This is a question for those of you in the forum who are in the upper age groups--have you noticed as you age that your dreams have become less interesting? When I was in my late teens or early twenties, I started keeping a dream journal. I continued to do so into my middle-age years. Only, in the last 10 or so years, I stopped writing down my dreams because they went stupid! By that I mean they were rarely interesting and all started seeming simple-minded, as opposed to being captivating and complex. That greatly disappointed me since dream work and dream journaling were the only metaphysical exercises I stuck with over the years.

Sometimes I wondered if the dream deterioration was possibly biological, an aging type problem. The thought of that did nothing for me, though, since I have always considered dreaming a spiritual matter, not a biological one, although I do realize dreaming has been scientifically studied and such. Well, this week I read a Wall Street Journal article about sleep problems associated with aging. Two interesting quotes from it:

"As you enter your 30s and 40s, your deep-sleep brain waves become smaller, less powerful and fewer in number."

"Passing into your mid-to-late 40s, age will have stripped you of 60% to 70% of the deep sleep you were enjoying as a teen. By the time you reach age 70, you will have lost 80% to 90% of your youthful, restorative deep sleep."

I was in my late 40s when my dream life started going downhill. Thus, once again, my question to those of you middle-age or older, particularly anyone who keeps or kept dream journals--did you notice your dreams becoming far less interesting, as well as usually no longer worth remembering or recording, when you became middle-aged?

P.S. That WSJ article was adapted from Matthew Walker's book Why We Sleep--https://www.amazon.com/Why-We-Sleep-Unlocking-Dreams/dp/1501144316/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1510107244&sr=8-1&keywords=why+we+sleep

While reading the first part of your Message/Post I thought you were asking me personally because of the number of nights I've slept. Although I never had a serious interest in trying to evaluate my dreams I am aware that they now lack depth, and there have been periods where there were very few dreams and I missed having them. I had always assumed that they served in problem-solving like releasing tensions and my right-brain expressing itself, that sort of thing, so I didn't give it much thought after retiring and not experiencing as much tension. The other thing that I thought deep sleep was for spiritual things including OBEs even though I was not aware of them. I don't like the idea of it having to do with aging or deterioration

Perhaps we need more contact with the spirit-world when we have so many paths ahead of us when we're young and being given less help as we go along.

Yeahhhh, when I was in my twenties I had the most fantastic and interesting dreams. Real dreams.

Nowadays it's not much worth mentioning, except for those dreams with meaningful content.
And the other dreams are usually about roaming around, travelling, walking through buildings and so on.
It's more like astral wandering during the night, no more stories or irreal circumstances.

I used to think that I have done my work of clearing my inner self and now I can spend my nights in peaceful realms.
To me, it's more like graduation when the dreams become realistic, peaceful and serene.

Interesting theory, Ken, but I was hoping for more spiritual dreams as I aged, not less. But it's not just the spiritual ones I miss. I miss not having complex ones that I feel compelled to write down and analyze, because they are complex. I miss the ones that were just fun, too, where I woke up in a good mood and stayed in a good mood all day, due to the dream.

Fireflydancing, so you are saying you prefer your current dream state? I know I had endless nightmares in my teens and early 20s that I don't miss at all. Those just suddenly stopped one night, too, and I rarely, rarely have a dream that frightens me. But I would take a bad nightmare every now and then over the dull, worthless type dreams I have now. Nightmares are usually complex and worth the time analyzing. There's also the happiness you feel when you wake up and realize it was just a bad dream.

I don't know if my dreams are becoming less interesting or that I can't seem to remember them anymore. Unless I wake up in the middle of one.

Well, as the above info goes Cryscat, there should be less dreaming going on from middle-age on up, since there is less deep sleep. The older I get, the less I remember the details of the ones I have, too. But I'm less motivated to try to remember the details when I do repeatedly remember the simple nature of the dreams I am having. From past years of dream journaling, I know the more you write down and analyze your dreams, the more you start remembering the ones you are having every night. This seems almost like a vicious cycle of sorts. L L