Dream Catching
by BlackLion

To further my spiritual practice, I have begun to keep a dream journal. Nearly every night I write down a dream or two, whether it is a snippet or a full story. Many of them include strange encounters or scenarios that would not normally happen in waking life. People and places from my past, along with folks I have never met, are all a part of my dreaming life.

Until recently, I have rarely recalled any of my dreams. In fact, I believed that I didn’t dream much at all. With this belief, I would wake up every morning with barely a skip from waking time to waking time. From my current perspective, I believe I purposefully chose not to recall any dreams. I essentially cut myself off from the other parts of my mind.

So what changed? Well, first, my partner Starcat is an avid dreamer. She has been keeping dreams ever since she could remember. The stories and adventures she has are quite fantastical and I was a bit envious. Secondly, since she was such an active dreamer, we decided to create a dream tower that we could go to when we wanted to meet but were physically apart. Then we could see each other and have fun times together.

As I became a more active dreamer, a choice I do not regret, I have come to realize that through the interpretation of my dreams, on my own and with the aid of Starcat, I am better able to understand and forgive the parts of me that get upset or anxious about waking events not to my liking. I am also able to forgive the parts of me that are no longer serving me in the ways I want, and let them go more easily.

Now, whenever I wake at night, I immediately turn on the light, grab my journal and pen (placed conveniently nearby) and jot down whatever dream I have just awoken from. Sometimes this can be quite hard to do, especially when I am feeling groggy (and my penmanship is not great, especially while half-asleep). At times, I have barely had a thread of a memory about my dream, but once I grab on to it, I am able to write down much more detail than I initially remembered.

If you have an active dream life, and even if you have so far chosen not to, I would highly recommend keeping a dream journal. The insights that you can find about yourself can be quite fascinating. With practice, you can affect your waking life by understanding and working with your dream life. The friends you make there can help you on this side of the veil. Sweet dreams!