I used to record my dreams in an effort to try and achieve lucid dreaming. I was making progress, but then inevitably, life happened and I dropped the habit. I’d really like to give it another go, and use my dreams as inspiration for artwork.
What I plan on doing this time is record them using an online dream journal. A quick Google search brings up several options, so let’s check some out.
Here you can share dreams and people can rate them. Ehhh. I don’t know about that. How interesting could most of them be? Don’t get me wrong; dreams are mysterious, beautiful and weird. However, sharing your dream with someone else is so hard to do because it’s an unknowable experience. I often feel pretty silly trying to explain something like,”My dog was teaching me how to mow the lawn with a chainsaw, and then the grass turned into romaine lettuce.” It doesn’t really capture the surreal quality of how it was totally normal to you when you experienced it. True dream, by the way.
It also has workshops and tutorials on lucid dreaming, so it might be worth checking out later on.
This looks appealing! The video gives a simple explanation of how you can track your dreams and learn more about yourself. It keeps track of trends in your dreams and gives you suggestions for what they mean for you. Plus, they have an app! Handy for recording your dreams on your phone right when you wake up.
This is as simple as it gets. Sign up for daily emails asking you what you dreamed about. Neat idea, but the website has so little information about it. Where do the entries go? How do you access them?
Dreamboard it is.
This is the first thing you see when you sign up:
(ZebrasHateHail is my twitter handle. Follow me!) Look! It’s a little seed to start my dream tree! I like the sound of that. Time to work up some dreams!
Hmm. It appears they do not yet have the app for Android. Oh well, the site itself is pretty mobile friendly.
When you record your dream, you are prompted to give various details, such as mood, who was in your dream, the weirdness level, and you can assign it a color. Over time your dreams are analyzed to give you a summary of the type of dreams you have, how often you dream, etc. Apparently Fridays are my “dreamiest” days.
I’ve been pretty adamant about recording my dreams, though I’m sure a few slipped past the radar. Here’s what I’ve got so far:
So over two months, I’ve tracked 16 dreams. I can glance at the data and easily see that I have more unpleasant dreams than pleasant ones. This doesn’t really surprise me. I read once that during a dream study, scientists discovered right before many test subjects woke up, their brains showed activity in areas that are associated with negative thoughts.
Pretty cool. This is a really easy way to record your dreams and learn things about yourself. I’m finding that movies influence my dreams a lot. Maybe I should get out more…
Haha Sarah 
Hey HahaSarah … thanks for dropping in at Pairodox Farm … your attentions are appreciated. I looked over this post concerning the dream-thing … perhaps I’ll try and convince my wife that it’s something for her. She dreams quite a bit and I bet she would be interested in tracking patterns. Thanks for the lead. D
You’re welcome! I love reading about your farm. I fantasize about leading a similar life. Maybe someday! Hope your wife does check out Dreamboard. It’s very easy to use, and asks all the right questions when recalling dreams!
HahaSarah – thanks for your sweet comments on my blog. I love this post – I always have weird dreams. Night before last I was a double agent in a war against goblins, fought with broomh-andles, and the cause of the war? Bread eaters versus cake eaters! So, analyse that, as they say! I had no idea there were online dream journals, and thanks to you I’m now off to sign up on Dreamboard.
That sounds like a plot in a Dr. Seuss book! I love how surreal dreams are. Such wonderful inspiration for artwork and stories.