The practice of keeping a dream journal is primarily intended to nurture the connection with your dreaming. Can you imagine it as a muscle? As you work with it, it grows. Whether or not you go back through your dreams (useful and full of beneficial surprises, but not necessary), the simple act of recording them strengthens the neural synapses of your dreaming. The friction of pen on  paper becomes a trigger for recall and connection and the stronger and more prolific they become, the more amazing, revealing, guiding, and gift-bestowing your dreaming can become. This is the first step in bringing your heightened awareness from your dreaming to your waking life, blurring the line between the two. The greater your dream awareness becomes, the greater your over-all awareness becomes.

Let's get started!

        Here are some helpful suggestions for how to keep a journal. Any of the following will support your practice.

• Date and time at the top of the page.
  
• The time is more important if you've woken and written a dream in the middle of the night. If you're so inclined, you can include the current  lunar phase and the Mayan date, and anything else you wish.
• Leave room on side of the page to make a few notes about recent & current personal events, including any current Intentioning you've put in.
• On the facing page, write any or all of the details described below. These details help you to link your consciousness to your dreaming space. Often, when you don't recall much, just writing a single detail will bring back another single piece and before long you're be remembering vast amounts of detail. This basic exercise is the foundation of your dream work. I haven't yet worked with someone for whom this was not effective.

        These details can be written in any form you like; narrative/conversational, listed out, drawn or painted...

Environmental:

• Time of day; dusk, morning, afternoon, twilight, night, or none. Don't worry about getting it right.
• Inside, outside, both, neither, a combination.
• If you’re in a building, what kind of building. Is it familiar?
• Colors, scents, flavors, sounds, textures.
• Are you alone or is there someone/people there with you? Do you know them?

• Do they have the same face that you’re familiar with or has their face changed?           

• Is there a presence or a being without form that you're aware of?

• Was there something to read? Were you able to read it? Some people believe you cannot read the written word in a dream, reading being a function of the left  hemisphere, and dreaming being a function of the right hemisphere. Personally, I've been able to read words in dreams and I've spoken with people who have written number sequences and words frmo their dreaming, and found correlations in their physical lives. Your experience will be your own. There are no 'laws'. This is the dreaming and it's just not that far from the waking. Not far at all.

Any other particular details?

• What's the situational dynamic (what's going on?)

Here's the juice: What are you feeling in each scene? The emotional content of your dreams is a fundamental quality. Recognizing and acknowledging a range of emotions; joy, grief, pleasure, fear, despair, amusement, excitement, apathy, confusion, surprise, resolute (warrior), compassion (warrior), anger, and so forth. Learn to notice the emotions associated with the sequence. We'll use this information and all of the above when we get into Dream Reading (Interpretation).        

I tend to recall my dream closest to waking first, and as I write that one down, those that preceded it return to me. As I'm writing about one dream I'll recall a detail from a previous or following dream, so I'll make a note about that near the appropriate dream and then I'll continue on with where I started. This skill develops quickly so try to be patient with yourself. The results may surprise you. A little persistence and trust that what you're doing will work, goes a long way. Please write to me with questions, concerns or feedback. I'll write back as quickly as I'm able.

Now that we've covered the essentials of journaling, let's look at the other aspects of dream recall.
       
Dream Recall