How to Interpret Dreams

Thursday, June 5th 2008 by Shanel Yang

Dreams are universal. We all dream, even if we don’t remember them.

The themes of some dreams are pretty common, too. For instance, we all dream about flying, freefalling, being chased, taking tests, or being naked. Is this just coincidence?

Dream interpreters don’t think so. They believe that these common recurring themes in dreams represent unresolved conflicts or important new developments in our waking lives. I don’t know whether any of this is true, but it certainly sounds interesting. Read the interpretations below and decide for yourself if they apply to your dreams and your real life.

FIVE COMMON THEMES IN DREAMS

1. FLYING

Flying represents freedom, confidence, and growth. If you have trouble getting off the ground or controlling your flight, you might feel trapped in your current life situation and unsure about ever being able to escape to a better life someday. You desperately want to break away from all of it, but you just don’t know how.

You might occasionally find yourself flying high and enjoying the experience, when, all of a sudden, there appear dangerous obstacles in your flight path, such as trees or telephone poles. These obstacles represent barriers to your freedom, possibly your current boss, coworkers, friends, or, even, your family. Or, the obstacles might be your own fears and self-doubts keeping you imprisoned in your current life.

More rarely, if you can fly easily with wonder and joy, then you might have had recent changes in your life that make you feel stronger, wiser, and free as a bird!

When I was a child, I often dreamt about trying to escape boys or men trying to capture me and enslave me. I would begin to run and furiously flap my arms at the same time. This would cause me to lift off the ground, sometimes only by a few inches, while I desperately flapped and fluttered. But, sometimes, I would gather enough momentum to make a clean leap into the sky! Suddenly, I was high above all the houses and trees and flying too fast, too far—out of control and unable to land at will. As soon as it looked like I had gained some control over my flight, telephone poles and wires suddenly appeared out of nowhere. I dodged as many of them as I could before I was finally forced to land—and ended up exactly where I had started with my would-be captors close behind me! Then, I’d wake up.

2. FREEFALLING

Freefalling dreams are most common when you are really tired and as you begin to doze off. Sometimes, your body will twitch or jerk involuntarily. Falling represents a complete loss of control. You may feel insecure about a new school, job, or relationship. Or, maybe your old cornerstones of faith have been shaken recently—perhaps your lifelong devotion to your work, family, friends, or, even, religion.

Contrary to popular belief, you will not die if you hit the ground in your dream. I’ve done it several times and the dream just jumped to another scene as if the fall never happened. Though, one time, I woke up immediately afterward with the sensation of having the wind knocked out of me. That was scary! Look at your life and address any areas that might need your attention in terms of recent changes.

3. BEING CHASED

Being chased in a dream represents fear of harm from some malevolent force that you cannot avoid. In real life, this might be something you dread catching up to you if you don’t deal with it more directly. In addition, females sometimes dream about being chased by obsessive, stalker-type boys or men from an early age.

When I was in the second grade, there was a boy who sat behind me (I’ll call him Jose). While most of the other boys our age were still grossed out by girls in general, this particular boy was totally obsessed with the most popular girl in class (I’ll call her Sylvia). Jose tormented me all day long with his constant desire to plant a big wet kiss on her mouth. I recall him constantly telling his best friend who sat next to him, “I think I’m going to die if I can’t kiss her!” The intensity and urgency of his obsession coupled with his complete disregard of the fact that she obviously wanted nothing to do with him terrified me. For years afterwards, I had a recurring nightmare of him being obsessed with me and chasing me to keep me forever!

4. TAKING TESTS

Another common dream is you wake up late for a big test or have to take it under the worst possible circumstances. Your heart sinks as you realize you’ve blown it. These types of dreams represent your fear of failure in school, at work, or with some other performance related activity that is very important to you. You might lack confidence in your abilities or worry that others will reject you as not good enough. The only way to combat this fear is with plenty of preparation.

5. BEING NAKED

You are going about your day as usual in your dream and suddenly you realize you are partially or completely naked. How do you react? If you are mortified and immobilized on the spot, then you are afraid of being exposed—that all of your true history, feelings, or thoughts that you’ve carefully tried to hide has come out for all to see. You might also have body image issues. However, if you are comfortable with your sudden nudity in public—and, even, find yourself enjoying it—you are confident and proud of the person you are, of your thoughts, and of your body.

CONCLUSION

Dreams can act as wake up calls, reminding us to give serious attention to something that needs it immediately in our real lives. We tend to rush about our busy days without taking the time to question whether what we’re doing is really good for us. I think nightmares, or bad dreams, are one way that our subconscious mind tries to tell us that something’s not right and urge us to check it out.

I used to view these (and much worse) nightmares with nothing but a strong desire to do anything I could to avoid having another one. I even stayed up late to try not to sleep at all. But, they didn’t go away until I focused on what my dreams might be trying to tell me about my waking life—and then set out to change all the things that were obviously making me miserable. Over the years, my nightmares slowly lessened from about 3 or 4 per month to only 1 or 2 per year. Meanwhile, my flying dreams have become gradually more controlled, daring, and amazing, as I learned to soar, free as a bird, fleeing far away from the troubles down below me!

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