Dream Journals?

[Vegetathewise]

Why is it good to have dream journal? I've been keeping a dream journal ever since I learned about lucid dreaming but I never knew why I needed one.

[stjimmy]

Because by keeping a dream journal, you allow yourself to reflect upon your dreams, analyze and get to know them. Then, when you're familiar enough with your dream world, you'll be able to recognize that you're in it while dreaming and thus become lucid.

[Maria92]

Isn't this like the fifth DJ thread about the same darn thing in three days? Anyway, yes, DJ's boost recall and let you identify recurring elements and dream signs. Once you get used to them, journaling becomes almost habitual, and can actually be quite fun. Plus, if you have an epic dream, it's nice to know that you can come back to it some day.

[Pistols]

@Vegetathewise I would recommend the book 'Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming' by Stephen LaBerge and Howard Rheingold. In the opening chapters it describes the purpose of a dream journal in good detail. Once you have a significant amount of entries in your dream journal you can go through the journal and highlight recurring themes or oddities that occur in your dreams which should trigger the realisation that you are dreaming the next time one of these occurs, or it should at least prompt you to do a reality check. LaBerge goes in to more detail and categorises the dream signs which I found to be of great help and the book is only like $8 (£5) on ebay if you buy the older print (perfect condition) Hope that helps.

[Raspberry]

By keeping a dream journal, you'll begin to remember more dreams per night. They'll also be longer and seem to have increased in vividness. Pretty much it makes dreams awesome. Then (as stjimmy said) you'll start to realise when you're dreaming because you'll be familiar with them

[The Adventurer]

it helps you improve your dream recall. I never thought i would actually be able to recall 5 dreams! but after working on it for a couple weeks thats what i'm doing, almost every night! and whats the point of trying to have/having a lucid dream if you won't be able to remember it? just keep it up. it's worth it.

[Elredion]

Hi, I'm new here. I already have pretty awesome dream recall. I've also had 2 lucid dreams that I can remember before I even really knew what they were about, in which I flew around for a bit before I woke up shortly into the dream. But anyways I found this site and want to be able to have more control over my dreams. I kept a dream journal last night and got 3 dreams down, these were all in the early morning and I know had more dreams that I didn't recall. First dream I couldn't recall too much, mainly because it was a pretty boring dream, but the last 2 I remembered much of. There were no signs as far as I can tell that were present in all 3 dreams. At no point in the dreams did I ever think to do a reality check or question if I was dreaming or not. In fact it seems I had no real control over my dream self at all. It was more like just watching a movie 1st person through a character's eyes. So what's the next step?

[Maria92]

So what's the next step? Keep trying. Lucidity is not something that happens overnight. For a lot of people, it can take weeks or months, even years. Build your awareness in real life. That will help.

[Elredion]

Build your awareness in real life. That will help. What exactly do you mean by this? Any links to a guide?

[grischkaja008]

What exactly do you mean by this? Any links to a guide? You must stop yourself for a few minutes in the day and think about your environment and do some reality checks through the day. You must ask yourself: Is this Reality? Am I dreaming? What would be diffrent in my dream? etc When you get more aware of the real world, you will be it in your dreams; you will become able to recognize that you're dreaming (becoming lucid)

[Marlowe]

Also, in conjunction to what grischkaja said, tell yourself every time you see a [INSERT OBJECT HERE], you will do a reality check. My object was the Moon, and it turns out my dream sign is now two moons being in the sky. Since I would do a RC in real life when I see a moon, I naturally do it in Real Life. Doing this, I had my first two lucids in the same night 5 days after starting it. It may work for you.

[Vegetathewise]

It sounds fun. I honestly can't wait until I have a lucid dream! Thank you for your replies!

[The Adventurer]

Lucidity is not something that happens overnight. yeah it is. sorry for being a smart ass, i just had to do that

[Raspberry]

yeah it is. sorry for being a smart ass, i just had to do that lol