To have "present" dreams where you feel yourself "there" in them moment as it's happening, you need to learn to live all life's experiences via paying attention to the present moment, both waking and dreaming. Trying to be one way while awake (non-aware, non-mindful, autopilot, "zomebie" mode) and a different way while dreaming (aware, paying attention, tuned in) will delay reaching this goal. I talk about this a bit more in my "Unified Theory" of lucid dreaming (link in my sig).