After a few months of keeping a dream journal, I developed quite a number of symbols to annotate the events of my dreams. Anyone else come up with something similar? I figured I'd share mine.
  • ■ (black square): Wake up
  • □ (white square): False awakening
  • ~ (tilde): Forgotten events
  • [] (square brackets): Outside commentary (e.g. [This isn't actually his name.])
  • * (asterisk): "Before that..." (this is particularly useful for recording dreams in reverse order as you remember them.)
  • "Smash product sign": Attaining lucidity. This made it easy to scan through the journal to see which dreams were lucid. I also mounted a large sign containing this symbol above my bed, so it'd be the last thing I saw before going to sleep.