If you are interested in keeping a dream journal but just can't keep it up, get a pack of index cards and keep them near your bedside. As soon as you awaken, jot down the images, names or story points and later you can date it and give it a title when you are fully awake.
I made a cassette tape of my dreams for about a month. I'd wake up in the middle of the night and record fragments of the dream I recalled, and then go back to sleep. I stopped after listening to the first one because it was downright eerie and kinda creeped me out. I didn't recall having those dreams and hearing the discarnate voice of my sleepy self was weird, too. It was an amazing bunch of knowledge and dream ideas, though.
I must have over thirty dream journal notebooks from the last few decades. I just can't handwrite them out anymore, but thanks to technology I don't have to! Much IS lost when typing as opposed to hand writing out dreams or letters, but with so many other wonderful things to do besides dream research, I like the speed journaling on the computer the best. It is the easiest way for others to send their dreams to me for interpretive reasons.
I do dream work for free and the computer makes it clearer and more accessible, too.
I have been taught to hear and see names, numbers and colors in a dream from a more past life/reincarnational viewpoint. My Teachers have taught me and still do, and I'm always willing to teach yet another means to dream symbols and interpretation. It's fun, and sometimes quite illuminating.
