Gateway practices · 10 MIN READ · 8 SOURCE QUOTES
Recording and remembering your experiences
Most of what happens in a Gateway session is gone within hours unless you capture it. Impressions from deep relaxation behave much like dreams: vivid while you are in them, fragmented when you come back, and quick to dissolve once ordinary thinking takes over. That is why recording and recall run through the whole Monroe tradition, from Robert Monroe's own notes on his out-of-body experiences to the tape-recorded debriefs of the Explorer sessions and the journals kept by today's home listeners.
In Monroe's laboratory the record was built into the method. Explorers spoke aloud during sessions, a monitor asked questions, and at the end the monitor counted them back and asked them to review and recall what had happened before they returned. Then came a debrief, put on tape while the memory was fresh. Residential Gateway programs kept the same habit with group debriefs after exercises. Home listeners have no monitor, so the notebook does the job: write straight after the return count, before you get up.
Recall also connects to clicking out, the Gateway term for losing a stretch of a session. Listeners and trainers commonly treat a click-out as a gap in memory rather than a gap in experience, and use intention, short follow-up sessions and sleep to try to bring material back. Whatever you make of that idea, the practical lesson is the same across all these sources: decide before a session that you will remember, and write it down as soon as it ends.
Gateway experiences fade like dreams. How Monroe's lab captured them, and how listeners record sessions so the details survive.
Key points
Experiences fade like dreams
Gateway listeners regularly describe returning from a session with a clear sense that something happened and only fragments of what it was. A podcast host summarizing Monroe's early work put it this way: you come back and the recall of the data is a little fragmented. The fix in every source is the same. Capture the material immediately, in any form, before you stand up, talk to anyone or check your phone.
Monroe built his work on notes
Monroe's own path began with careful records. From his first episodes of the vibrational state in 1958 he kept notes on what he experienced, and Journeys Out of the Body grew out of them. One podcast host who reviewed the book chapter by chapter notes that Monroe took rigorous notes because he was trying to work out exactly what was going on, which let him compare episodes and notice patterns he would otherwise have lost.
The lab put everything on tape
In the Explorer sessions, the participant spoke during the experience while a monitor listened, asked questions and guided them. Sessions were recorded, and many were later transcribed, which is why the Explorer archives exist. At the end, monitors routinely held a short debrief and made sure it was captured on the recording. Explorers and monitors sometimes went back to the tapes of earlier sessions to recover details neither of them could remember.
Review before you return
Monitors often gave Explorers a moment at the end of a session to review and recall what they had experienced before counting them back to ordinary waking awareness, with the suggestion that they would bring it back with them. Home listeners can borrow the idea: when the exercise starts its return count, spend a few seconds running back through the session, then write as soon as you reach full waking awareness.
Residential programs debrief after exercises
At Gateway Voyage and other residential programs, participants come out of each exercise and talk it over with the group and trainers. Skip Atwater, describing research done during Gateway programs, recalled participants sitting around for their debrief after an exercise. Saying an experience out loud fixes it in memory and helps you notice details you skipped, which is one reason solo listeners are encouraged to write in full sentences rather than single words.
Work backward from the last thing you remember
A practical recall method that a caller described during a 1980s radio interview with Monroe is to start from the final image or feeling and move backward step by step. Each remembered fragment tends to pull the one before it into view. Jot an outline first, then go back and fill in details. Over weeks, like exercising a muscle, the habit itself tends to improve recall.
Clicking out and the missing minutes
Clicking out, losing a stretch of a session without feeling you slept, is the most frustrating recall problem. Listeners who discuss the 1983 Army assessment often take from it the idea that a click-out is a lapse in remembering rather than in experiencing. Some deal with it by setting a firm intention to remember, then doing a short follow-up session or going to sleep with the request to recall what happened. Treat this as a practice idea, not a proven fact.
The Human Plus series made recall its own exercise
The Monroe Institute's Human Plus series includes a Recall function exercise. Its instruction sheet describes the purpose as learning to remember, and the application as retrieving earlier experiences or information, including material retained at a non-conscious level, and even complete dream sequences. The sheet calls it a good partner for the Imprint exercise, which is used to fix something in memory in the first place.
In their own words
Quotes are checked word for word against the recordings and documents they come from. Bracketed words correct transcription errors; “…” marks an omission.
“Now in focus, [take] a moment to review and recall the experiences you've had. Review and recall the experiences you had, and you will be bringing them back with you.”
“Okay, how [are] you feeling in one? Great, great. Remember everything that happened to you today? … I'm not sure.”
“Joyce, how was the … experience? We can share now. We'll do a little debrief and get it on tape.”
“Take it in … small steps like that, in reverse order. And then after … I just write down it like an outline, I could go back and fill in more details of the … story. And it just, because I can remember this first step or two, then the ones before that will come to my recall.”
“My son had warned me when he came home that day: don't read anything about NDEs and don't talk to anybody who was there, just write it down. So for six weeks I wrote, and I wrote down 20,000-plus words about what I remembered from within coma.”
“Because even if you think you'll remember something weird that happened, I promise you, after a few hours or [a] week, you're not going to remember that.”
“So when you click out, you can come back and say, like, go into, like, another short meditation, or, like, if it's bedtime, go to sleep and subconsciously program yourself. Say, I want to remember what happened.”
“Her journals documented the circumstances and results of each session, noting the date, the CD, her experience while listening, her experiences during the rest of the day, and whether she was sitting or lying down.”
Important things to consider
Keep the notebook within reach
Put a notebook and pen, or a voice recorder, beside you before you start. If you have to get up to find them, much of the session will be gone by the time you sit down. Many listeners prefer speaking into a phone recorder in a low voice because it is faster and keeps them closer to the state.
Write before you move or talk
Let the return count finish, stay lying or reclining, and record first. Standing up, checking messages or chatting with someone reliably erases the faint material. Write even if it seems like nothing happened: a single image, a body sensation or the point where you lost track is worth noting.
Record the circumstances, not just the content
Note the date, time, which exercise you used, how rested you were, whether you sat or lay down, and what you ate. One long-running case report in the TMI Journal describes a listener who logged the date, the recording, her experience, the rest of her day and her position. Over weeks they show which conditions help you stay aware and which make you click out.
Describe, do not interpret yet
Write what you perceived in plain terms: colors, shapes, sounds, feelings, words heard. Leave explanations for later. Interpretation in the moment tends to replace the raw impression with what you expected, and the raw impression is what you will want when you compare sessions.
Set the intention to remember
Before a session, state clearly to yourself that you will remember what is useful to you. Monroe used a version of this idea in his own out-of-body practice, and the Gateway Affirmation and Human Plus exercises use spoken intention in the same way. It costs nothing and many listeners find it helps.
Look for patterns over many sessions
A single session rarely tells you much. Read back through a month of notes and patterns appear: recurring images, the time of day you do best, the stage where you usually drift off. Monroe's own value as an explorer came from comparing many episodes rather than trusting any single one.
Do not force recall
Straining to remember tends to pull you into analysis and away from the material. If nothing comes, write down that nothing came and move on. Fragments often surface later, in the shower or as you fall asleep, so keep the notebook handy for the rest of the day.
What the evidence covers
The idea that clicked-out material is stored and recoverable is a practitioner belief, not an established finding. Studies published in the Institute's own Hemi-Sync Journal report memory effects from binaural-beat audio in specific tasks, but they are small and not independent replications. Journaling is useful whatever the mechanism, because memory for unusual experiences is unreliable.
Common questions
Why can't I remember what happened during the Gateway tapes?
Because the exercises take you into a state close to sleep, and memory in that state behaves much like dream memory: vivid at the time and quick to fade. Many listeners also click out, losing a stretch of the session without feeling they slept, and come back with only fragments. This is common and usually improves with practice. Set a clear intention to remember before you start, stay still and record your impressions as soon as the return count ends, and listen when you are rested. Even monitors in Monroe's lab regularly found Explorers unsure what they remembered right after a session.
Should I keep a Gateway journal?
Yes. Journaling is the most consistent piece of advice across Monroe's work, the Explorer sessions and experienced listeners. Monroe built his first book from notes on his own experiences, and the lab recorded and transcribed sessions and debriefs. Write straight after each session, before you get up. Note the date, the exercise, how rested you were, your position and what you experienced, including where you lost track. One 2010 TMI Journal case report describes a listener whose journals recorded similar details for each session over thirty-three weeks, and that kind of record is what lets you see patterns.
How did Monroe's lab record what Explorers experienced?
Explorers lay in an isolation booth and spoke aloud during the session while a monitor in the control room listened through an intercom, asked questions and guided them. Everything was recorded on tape, and many sessions were later transcribed, which is why the Explorer archives survive. Toward the end, monitors often gave the Explorer time to review and recall what had happened before counting them back. Then they held a short debrief and made sure it was captured on the tape too, while the memory was fresh.
What is the best way to remember a session?
Decide before you start that you will remember. When the exercise begins its return count, run back briefly through what happened. Then, still lying down, write or speak your notes immediately. If only the last moments are clear, start there and work backward, one step at a time; each fragment tends to bring back the one before it. Make a quick outline first and fill in details after. Do this every session, even when little happened. Like exercising a muscle, recall tends to improve with regular practice.
Can I recover what happened when I clicked out?
Some practitioners think so. A common view among listeners, often linked to their reading of the 1983 Army assessment, is that clicking out is a lapse in memory rather than in experience, so the material is still there. Their suggested method is to set a firm intention to remember, then do a short follow-up meditation, or go to sleep asking to recall what happened. The Human Plus series also has a Recall exercise aimed at retrieving material held at a non-conscious level. None of this is established science, but it costs little to try. Most people find click-outs become less frequent with practice.
Should I write down my experience before reading about other people's?
It helps. Other people's reports can shape how you remember and describe your own. The neurosurgeon Eben Alexander told a Monroe Institute seminar that his son advised him not to read anything about near-death experiences and just to write his down first; he wrote more than 20,000 words over six weeks. The same principle applies on a smaller scale to Gateway sessions: record your raw impressions first, then compare them with books, forums and other listeners' accounts.
In Monroe’s books
Summarized in our own words; the books are not reproduced on this site.
Journeys Out of the Body. Monroe based the book on the notes he kept of his experiences from 1958 onward. In its technique chapter he advises silently repeating, before each attempt, an intention to perceive and remember what is met, and to recall in detail only what will benefit one physically and mentally.
Keep exploring
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