Harness the power of self-awareness through dream journaling

Dream journaling is a way to record your dreams and turn them into reality. Dream journals are notebooks that contain information about our dreams and desires. You can record your desires, interpretations and goals to keep track of them.

Not all dreams are positive and when we wake up the next day, we often feel negative about experiencing them. However, even those with negative themes may be an indication of something that is impacting our mental and emotional health.

Many fields of psychology place an emphasis on interpreting dreams, seeing patterns in them and improving your life. While you can always work with a professional for dream interpretation, you can start doing this on your own by dream journaling.

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What is dream journaling, and how do I get started?

Dream journals are private memoirs of your life. (Image via Vecteezy/Icon ade

As children, we engage a lot in imagination and dream of unimaginable things. However, as we grow older, we feel that our dreams are unrealistic and often give up on them.

Often, these unconscious desires pop up in our dreams. Sigmund Freud, founder of psychoanalysis, helped clients notice the impact of their unconscious dreams and desires on their everyday lives.

"Dreams are the royal road to the unconscious" - Sigmund Freud

While we have come a long way from Freud's theories, dreams remain an important gateway to understanding emotions and subconscious patterns.

There isn't a fixed or singular method to engage in dream journaling. However, one of the most common tips is to record your dreams the first thing after you wake up. It's very common for us to add or delete details from our dreams, since we may not remember everything.

Dream journaling can be initially difficult, as we are not used to recalling and writing our dreams. That can be relatively easy for someone who clearly recalls their dreams or has noticed a consistent pattern in their dreams.

You can record two types of details. The first are the details of the dreams as they were happening. For instance, if you recall seeing a tiger in your dream, write exactly that in your journal.

The second is that you can write about your own interpretations of the dream. For instance, what does the tiger represent and mean? You can also use journal prompts to aid writing.

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What are the benefits of keeping a dream journal?

Dreams are not meant to be achieved but chased. (Image via Vecteezy/Kanur Ismail)

Dream journaling can pave the way for self-reflection. They can be important indicators of things that you have been missing out on or paying attention to.

Here are a few key benefits of journaling:

• Dreams are a storehouse of unconscious desires, fears, and memories. By dream journaling, you can become aware of your patterns and see if any of them need attention.
• Provide a way to work on deep-rooted emotional and thought patterns.
• Alleviate negative emotions and stress by allowing you to vent in a safe and private space. This space becomes your own and you are not judged for your internal experiences.
• Encourages you to be more mindful of your internal world.

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Dream journaling is an interesting way to enhance self-awareness. The beauty of its tool lies in its unique and self-exploratory nature.

A lot of things can come up in our dreams and not everything needs to be addressed. However, becoming mindful of your subconscious patterns can influence your conscious life.

You can always seek out a mental health professional trained in dream interpretation to help you out in the process.

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Janvi Kapur is a counselor with a Master's degree in applied psychology with a specialization in clinical psychology.

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