My wife uncharacteristically read my dream journal

[NightHawk999]

@candidasart

I’m going to have a different perspective here. I do a lot of dream analysis in my work as a psychologist. One of the main presets of dream work is to realize it’s all metaphorical. And it’s all personal. And yes there are dreams that are big dreams! And they are not personal. But these don’t sound like big dreams. They sound like personal dreams and they need to be respected as inner characterizations of metaphorical parts of yourself.

Yes I agree with all the posts here about it being very personal space, and that you had your privacy violated.

@murphyjd

I sincerely trust that her curiosity was innocent, I just felt helpless in my ability to respond in a meaningful way that respected her feelings and was true to my practice.

My only coherent explanation was that a certain level of difficult honesty is required to do this type of work; that writing down a dream regardless of the content is the most effective means for me to enhance recall and lucidity at night.

I believe what she did was wrong. But I do also see this as being partially your fault, and if you can accept some of this blame, it might help you going forward.

A poor analogy would be, if you don’t want the neighbors attention or video taping you, don’t dance naked in your back yard…

Meaning certain things are bound to draw the gaze and or curiosity of people in your space. Why not put up a better fire wall for next time.,

Have you thought about writing in coded phrases, like:
Dream:
the hot stripper walked into the library
Dream Journal entry:
the elephant walked into the library and captivated everyone’s gaze…

I know its not 100% authentic, but I think it is really important to realize that in this day and age, people are infinitely curious, and privacy is a delusion ( it never really existed).

[Carolel]

I don’t know how one can accidentally read an entire journal without realizing it is highly personal and stop after the first line. Since I am secretive, I always write unusual unnerving details or sexual encounters in a kind of code or implication rather than direct statement. If u have an Android phone, u can get an app called Awoken and speak in yr dream with audit function. Our personal phones r private with password so it might help against these kinds of intrusions.