dream

Journaling

(From Chapter 11 in The F-Model of Dreaming)

Context can be external, internal, chemical, etc. The state-dependency of memory is why it is difficult to recall dreams while awake— dreaming exists in a partially-overlapping, yet distinct and separate reality-field from that of day-life. However, the life we live in dreams does contain a reality as real as that of the sun- lit world, and it evolves and changes across the night and across one’s life. Freud observed how "a whole series of dreams, continuing over a period of weeks or months, is based upon common ground and must accordingly be interpreted in connection with one another" (1900, p563). And "in the case of two consecutive dreams it can often be observed that one takes as its central point something that is only on the periphery of the other and vice versa, so that interpretations are mutually complementary." Of course, without capturing a record of the dream- life—taken from that liminal position at the transition from dreaming-to-waking— our waking-self would hardly know what its complemental sphere is going through. And for practical reasons, keeping a dream journal is the most efficacious method to get familiar with that self.

THE MAGIC OF JOURNALING. Chapter 8 of P. Garfield’s Creative Dreaming is titled “How to Keep Your Dream Diary” (p204). Funny, I probably started recording my own dreams thanks to that chapter— in large part, anyway...I just realized that. Goes to show: You never know what kind of impact a book or story will have on your future. I may never have had my first big lucid dream if I was not somewhat familiar with my own dream life, a la experience with journaling. May not have gone back to formal studies or experienced everything that happened after. Like Patricia wrote— “Your dream life can provide you with many marvelous gifts: creative products, delightful adventures, increased skill in coping with waking life, and a personal laboratory to develop any project of your choice.” Heck, it can provide some people with a living.

Dream journaling does not need to be complicated. But it is not easy. This should be said right away: You do not have to do “dream work” for long stretches of time to receive huge results, potentially. The effort to record dreams does not really diminish with practice, because your problem will likely switch from not being able to recall much material, to the opposite— recording dreams begins to take up too much time, and may even affect mental stability, as you ponder over all the strange imagery. Imagine writing pages and pages of dream details, first-

thing, every day. And nobody is paying you or patting your back. So know— this dream journaling thing is hard but not something you have to do forever, or for very long at all; a few weeks of diligence should suffice per cycle.

Garfield wrote that Hermann Rorschach—yep, from ink-blot fame—noticed that “it was necessary to lie still when awakening because any quick motor movement like jumping out of bed disrupts memory of the dream” (p206). Garfield added to Hermann’s advice that we can gain additional memory-access by flipping-over to our opposite sleeping side, thus activating memories from when we were dreaming in that position, too. I offer this: DO NOT MAKE ANY MOVEMENTS AT ALL UPON AWAKENING. Do not get out of bed, do not stretch your legs, do not scratch. Do not open your eyelids. Definitely do not roll- over until you have extracted as much memory as you can from your initial waking position. The waking mind, the non-sleeping volitional mind, is for muscle- moving. Dreaming is possible because all skeletal muscles are inhibited during dream episodes, and upon first awakening we can remain in a liminal state for several minutes, one which is neither asleep nor truly awake. Once you so much as consciously move a fiber, or open your eyes, that liminal state is gone. Two things about this liminal dream-memory optimization state: 1., You cannot combine this approach with an alarm-clock that requires turning off (there are those that chime and then quit on their own, though), and 2., Even if you do use a self-terminating alarm, without activating volitional movement it is likely that your conscious ability to hear will remain “off” until you do budge (it is bizarre to experience hearing “turning on,” when for all intents and purposes you have been “awake” for a minute or longer already).

I am not saying that dream material cannot be recalled once the volitional system has become activated, of course. All sorts of triggers can instigate dream recall, even hours after awakening. Although, the longer after-the-fact a memory is, the less likely we may feel confident of the recall accuracy. The message is: The closer a state you are in, to actually being in REM—like right after waking from REM and before moving a muscle—the more accurate and vivid your dream recall will be. However, the very act of intending to record your dreams—and devoting a journal and pen to doing so—goes a long way toward ample recall success. It is typical to wake up in the morning immediately following your final and longest REM period, so Step 1 in journaling is to simply tap into that story and record the details. Step 2 would be channeling your effort into writing down other dreams, from earlier in the night— immediately after they occur. And how? Easy— you already wake-up after each of these. It’s just that, normally, we fall back to sleep within a few moments and are hardly aware of the brief waking.

FIRST: RECORDING YOUR LAST DREAM OF THE MORNING.

Garfield recommended a method of recording dreams on paper in the dark by using fingers as guide rails along note cards, and...anyway, today we have pens with

illuminated writing tips. That’s the way I have gone for decades. Ideally, the light should be red or green because blue light is said to affect sleep hormones (and you may be writing several dreams per night from early in your sleep cycle and not want to affect your natural rhythm)—but really, any color will work. So, devote a journal to your dreams and also a pen, and make these attractive and denote some special significance to you, if possible. I have been using the same style of book for years, always buying a new black-and-white marbled (college-ruled) notebook when the last is filled with dreams. On the cover I write the start date of the first dream entered, and then when the book is complete, I add the final date.

When I am following my own advice, I use the not-moving-anything protocol to draw up as much imagery as I can, usually not requiring more than a few minutes of motionlessness. Then I open my eyes. Stretch. You can write from your bed— in the dark with your penlight, preferably—or wait until you are on your feet or in a chair, but once you begin writing even more material will likely arise into memory from your last dream, and perhaps from several dreams. With practice— and this is tricky stuff—you may be able to learn how to recall dreams from earlier in the night without immediately recording them, instead running through them with eyes closed and then returning to sleep, but this is not recommended when building up dream recall initially. And what to include in the journal entries, exactly?

I, like many dream journalists, write my dreams in the present tense. This seems to increase memory access while writing, initially, and also may activate a more immersive sensation when revisiting dream entries in the future. I also only write actual dream content on right-side pages of my journals, saving the left-pages for commentary. This single practice can make a huge difference in the usefulness of your journaling efforts. I include the date of the morning I woke up from the dream (or whatever part of day it was), and when I am on my game, I include a time- stamp. You would probably not be surprised to find that we don’t have a large collection of dream journals out there with home-sourced dreams (rather than lab mediated) recorded over a span of decades, which include in many instances multiple dreams over single-sleep cycles, with time-of-waking and commentary comparing waking events from recent life. And why do we lack all this, what would be a rich source of information regarding how dreams operate? Work. This stuff requires a lot of work. Who has the energy or inclination?

Listen: Would you like to look into your own journal and read dreams from many years ago? Are you interested in how your waking life and dream life seem to be related, or even, perhaps, independent of one another, in ways? Other than a few memorable dreams that will forever stick to waking memory, dreams are for the most part irrevocably lost from conscious recallability shortly after acting themselves out. To catch a dream is like catching a phantom. As for how to order a dream in words, on paper, do your best to start at the beginning and work toward the end, but as things become mangled and twisted in memory, just get it onto the

paper. For me, it usually begins: “I am somewhere, doing something, the scene and setting is like this, so and so are here.” What is important to you will strike you. If you remember a color, record that. Sounds, words, feelings. When we are familiar with the typical flora and fauna in dreams it may be easier to recall them. We know what the typical themes are already. When you have verified, established categories for events or perceptions, this facilitates a place for memory to hold the material for further inspection.

Here are some rapid-fire bullet points for you to consider when putting together your own dream journaling protocol. You decide the order of importance:

Tell yourself what you intend to do. What you will do. Before falling asleep, determine that you are going to work at this dream journaling until you are satisfied with the results. Whatever happens, it was because of what you did or did not do. Take responsibility for your Now, from moment to moment. That’s a general one...

Keep your dream journal and pen by your bedside. Right there on your night-table. And don’t keep a cluttered surface around the journal. Matter of fact, clean that room. What kind of a bedroom invites the most powerful dreams to unfold for you, those that want you to remember them and be moved by them? Create an inviting, restful space.

If you share sleeping space, that has to be factored in to your journaling efforts. All humans and animals need to be on the same page...order and cleanliness and quiet when lights are out. If a baby is in the picture or if there are offset sleep cycles because of different work schedules between family members, these are complications that need to be addressed or accepted.

For deeper sleep and possibly the best-tuned sleep rhythm, consider not only noise and movement, but also temperature and ambient light. I know people warn of things like blue-light—saying to avoid this for several hours before bed—but I think the biggest improvement in sleep quality may come from maintaining a pitch-black sleeping environment. A deep black-out may require some preparation. Could be worth it. And cool temperatures are usually beneficial for supporting a deep sleep, likely mirroring natural air fluctuations— something we tend to minimize via air conditioning or simply by living behind insulated walls.

If you rarely recall any dreams, ever, maybe for years on end, this is not normal. I mean, it shouldn’t be. I am not saying we need to remember all of our dreams, or even many of them. That is fine. As we get older, we do tend to remember less of our dreaming, and that may reflect a healthy mind. A very active dream life is not always a sign of a well-adjusted mind— especially if you can’t not experience vivid dreams, every night. With that said, the psychotropic drugs/medicines so many people are on, in many cases, do affect sleep cycles and REM sleep quality, as does alcohol and recreational drugs like cannabis— especially cannabis. There are probably exceptions, but my position is that you

should not expect any success with dream work while on a heavy pot-smoking phase.

This one comes from Garfield: Record your dream in the order you recall it having occurred, except, “make note of unique verbal expressions first (poems, names, unusual phrases), regardless of the order, before they are forgotten” (p221). This material fades rapidly and to bring the highest fidelity back into the light of day these fragments require immediate fetching.

Title your dream...after you write the details out. Don’t spend time worrying about a clever title at the start. The title should be a short descriptor that acts like an instant trigger to pull all of the important aspects of the dream into working memory. It may be a central figure or scene, or maybe it’s a strange statement from the dream. Try to sum the dream up with three to five words that will easily summon it later.

NEXT: BECOMING FAMILIAR WITH YOUR DREAM LIFE. Except for the rare bird, and unless one is concomitantly taking drugs that complicate sleep patterns, dream recall will likely improve when sufficient effort is applied. This may require sleeping in a different space—the couch, another bedroom—a few days per week. It may require going to bed earlier so you can wake up before the rest of the household. Whatever your individual obstacles are, you’ll want to find a way to get a hold of your dreams. The more material you collect, the deeper you can go into your own Dream Work, whatever that ends up meaning to you. Remember, you might just open the floodgate. And, you do not have to do this every day, or even every month. If you begin to pay more attention to your dreams and they start to overwhelm you—either through time spent writing them down or because of their content—then back away. It is fine. Strange dreams do not mean you are crazy. They may have messages for you, maybe not. It is up to you how much attention your waking mind spends with dream memories. It looks like many people lead fine lives without ever being concerned about what they dream, so don’t worry about taking breaks.

After your mind realizes you are serious about recording your dreams, it is not unusual to wake up after each REM period across the night. Once in the habit of writing dreams in your journal—even if tired, even if you want to just fall back for a few minutes—you may notice these pre-dawn, early dreams, and manage to write these down as well. I tend not to keep this number up for long (because it gets too demanding), but I have regularly worked myself into periods of journaling where I can record five dreams per night. One of the obvious, little-examined questions in dreaming is: How do dreams change across the night? Relatedly, how do sequential REM-dream epochs incorporate waking material (if at all)? And this: Do dreams from early in the night evolve, like TV episodes, as they grow longer, like inverted shadows stretching toward the morning sun? We need more detailed, lifelong accounts to know.