In the day time, we can get away with not addressing feelings or issues because we simply have other distractions to use as excuses. When we sleep, all those excuses go away and we have next to no control over our thoughts and feelings. So if our brain is trying to get something through to us why are we dismissing it as soon as our eyes open?
In my experience with anxiety, the one thing which was always working against me in my fight to recover was confusion.
I was confused about why I was this way, confused about what was setting me off, confused about why I couldn’t get it under control and a thousand and one other things.
I learnt to be strategic, logical and strip away all the noise of the day to get hold of my anxiety and myself. I designed the original mental health diary in accordance with this, breaking down the day bit by bit and being analytical and honest with yourself and the results that were discovered. So now its time to take it one step further with the new Dream Tracker!
What does a dream journal do?
A dream journal is a way to track and log what your brain is trying to tell you while you are asleep.
The subconscious has an extremely powerful insight into your waking life and is in fact much bigger and much more dominant that our conscious mind; if something is invading our sleeping mind the chances are its important.
Have you ever woken up from a dream and felt absolutely shaken? So much so that it temporarily affects your relationships, communications and actions the next day? Well, a dream journal does away with that. By noting down your initial thoughts and what you remember (even if you are a bit sleepy) you can get to work sorting out what the underlying message was before you let it affect your waking hours and simply return to address the rest of the dream later on.
A dream journal will allow you to make a start solving the puzzle instead of spending all day wondering “what could it have meant” or “why do I feel terrible about that person?”
Diet, hydration, activities during the day or caffeine could all be contributing to our quality of sleep, we need to pay attention to every aspect of our health in a waking or sleeping state if we want to fully understand yourselves, our wants and needs.
Why bother it’s just a dream right?
I suffer from horrendous vivid dreams and nightmares. I also have the ability to lucid dream.
(Lucid dreaming is where I am able to identify that I am in a dream, I know that I’m asleep and I can control the contents, characters and environments). This is obviously not an exact science but in theory, I have some clarity while I’m asleep and can often wake myself up if I need to.
The disadvantage of this is that I feel from time to time like I have been awake the whole night and this can greatly affect my mood, temperament and anxiety levels during the day. I remember what has occurred so vividly that I often believe its happened.
Of course, sometimes I will wake up and not remember what happened or halfway through a day have a moment of realisation, but I’m talking about the types of dreams and nightmares which sit there, eating you up emotionally, you can’t put your finger on it but there was something troubling about it, something that makes your brain itch.
It's often not about what happened in the dream at all, it’s nearly always about the overwhelming emotion you felt during.
That’s what we miss about dreams, they are always driven by emotion. We might get bogged down about who was there and the randomness of certain things but ultimately on waking up you don’t know who everyone was or where you were but you know for certain you were scared.
So, what’s so special about this dream journal?
I have designed the Discovery Journal’s – Dream Tracker in exactly the same way as the Original mental health diary
One thing you don’t want to be doing first thing in the morning is trawling over details you’ve just managed to escape from and getting bogged down by the sheer volume of information you can or can’t remember!
So let's track it...there are 2 pages per entry split into sections addressing the two aspects of the dream the conscious and the subconscious. Look into what could have caused a poor night’s sleep and physical symptoms when waking as well as underlying messages, emotional keys and conclusions of meaning and do it all in your own time!
Give yourself a better day time but really putting your night time to rest! Give yourself direction and focus!
You can get a combo of our Original Mental Health diary and our NEW Dream Tracker for £35 with FREE UK shipping, perfect for Christmas!
