The Dream Dictionary from A to Z [Revised edition]: The Ultimate A–Z to Interpret the Secrets of Your Dreams

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Although dreams can occur during NREM, researchers have discovered that it is REM sleep which is most associated with dreaming. When sleepers are awakened during REM sleep, they typically recall their dreams. Sometimes people feel temporarily paralyzed if woken during REM, as if something heavy and/or malevolent is pressing down on them. This phenomenon may explain supposed succubus, incubus, and alien abduction experiences.

The first stage of REM sleep lasts around 10 minutes and then you fall back into stages two, three and NREM sleep again, and keep moving backwards and forwards between the stages through the sleep cycle. As the cycle continues, however, the REM phase gets longer and longer, with the longest phase lasting up to 45 minutes. Of all the phases of REM and NREM sleep, the final REM phases are the ones from which you are most likely to recall your dreams.

The emotional center of the brain is more active than the logical center when we are dreaming. But, intriguingly, scientists have found that dreaming about faces is linked to the areas of the brain involved in facial recognition when we are awake, suggesting that the dreaming and waking brain may not be as different as is often thought.

We Sleep to Dream

And one day there will come a great awakening when we shall realize that life itself was a great dream.

– Chuang-Tzu

Experiments have proved that sleep is essential for life. Rats typically live for two to three years; rats deprived of all stages of sleep live for about three weeks, and rats deprived of only REM sleep survive for about five. Other research has shown that both NREM and REM sleep are essential for preserving memory, but if people are repeatedly woken during periods of REM sleep – which means they are deprived of their dreamtime – they become anxious, irritable and stressed. This suggests that all stages of sleep are vital for physical and mental health, and REM sleep – when you are most likely to dream – is essential for your emotional and psychological well-being.

Therefore, although we still don’t know why we sleep, it is entirely possible that one of the major reasons we sleep is to dream.

How Much Sleep Do We Need?

We spend up to a third of our lives sleeping, which means that if you reach the age of 100 you will have been asleep for around 33 years. The amount of sleep each person needs to feel healthy and think clearly depends on many factors, including age and activity levels. For example, babies need around 14–15 hours a day, while teenagers need around 9–10 hours. For most moderately active adults around 7–8 hours of sleep a night appears to be the average amount needed, although some people need as few as 5 hours and others need up to 10. Elderly people tend to need a little less sleep, around 6–7 hours a night, and women tend to need more sleep than men. Women also tend to be lighter sleepers and more likely to wake during the night than men.

So, What Are Dreams?

Life is a dream, realize it.

– Sathya Sai Baba

Dreams captivate us. But what are they? Where do they come from? Why do we have them? Do they mean anything? Are they simply a collection of memories and random associations, or insightful gifts from our intuition? Can they help us make decisions in our waking lives?

We have learned a great deal about dreaming – and, as mentioned previously, all the indications are that dreams are crucial for your mental and emotional health – but there is still so much we don’t know: dreams remain as mysterious as ever. This elusiveness hasn’t stopped people theorizing about why we have them.

There is a school of thought which believes that dreams are meaningless, or just random neuron activity responding to biochemical changes. Others believe dreams are simply your brain’s way of decluttering or sorting out and consolidating memories and associations. However, most modern psychologists, scientists, and sleep researchers believe dreams are far more than that.

One prominent theory is that dreams reveal hidden insights, wishes, and truths about the dreamer. The world of the dream is a dramatization of the dreamer’s personal or inner world. Another popular theory suggests dreams can help you process or come to terms with difficult emotions to achieve psychological or emotional balance. Dreams may also help you rehearse, practice, and prepare different responses to situations or scenarios, in other words, they allow you to role play in a safe way.

There is also the popular ‘sleep on it’ view that dreams are a source of creative inspiration and can help with problem solving. One less prominent theory, but which has its supporters, is that dreams are a form of consciousness that can unite past, present and future and offer us glimpses of potential futures.

One thing that unites all these different theories is the belief that, whatever dreams are, they are good for you. They help you live a better, happier, life.

A Brief History of Dream Interpretation

Now Allah has created the dream not only as a means of guidance and instruction, I refer to the dream, but he has made it a window on the world of the unseen.

– The Prophet Mohammed

The notion that dreaming is positive, and dream interpretation a powerful tool, dates back millennia. Ancient art and literature are rich in dream references. Back in the mists of time dreams were not so much regarded as tools for personal growth (as they are today) but believed to have supernatural or prophetic significance. For example, the ancient Greeks, Romans, and Egyptians all believed dreams had miraculous healing powers, and the Bible promotes the idea that dreams are divine messages.

Other cultures, such as the Australian Aborigines and many African and Native American tribes, have always believed that dreams are a way to enter an unseen spirit realm. To this day, dream interpretation plays a major part in these tribal societies. The Inuit of Canada believe that when a person dreams, their soul leaves their body and enters the spirit realm.

As far as dream interpretation is concerned the Egyptians are thought to be the pioneers, producing the earliest known dream dictionary, written over 4,000 years ago. Called the Chester Beatty Papyrus today, it came from Thebes in Egypt and is kept in the British Museum. It is the ancient Greeks, however, who first proposed the theory that dreams are not from some external or divine source but are internal communications, or the divine spark within. Plato (427–347 BC) suggested that dreams were representations of hidden wishes and desires, while his pupil Aristotle (384–322 BC) suggested that dreams shared collective or similar themes. It was the ‘father of medicine’ Hippocrates (460–377 BC) who presented the idea that dream symbols had a physiological interpretation – for example, fire denoted indigestion – and should be used as diagnostic tools.

Artemidorus (AD 138–180), a Roman living in Greek Asia Minor, is believed to be the first dream researcher to focus fully on dream symbols and themes. He wrote a book entitled Oneirocritica (The Interpretation of Dreams) that is still in print today. He postulated that dream symbols had certain meanings but that the most important aspect of dream interpretation was the personal significance of the dream symbol to the dreamer. (This author is in total agreement with Artemidorus about the personal significance of dreams and their meaning, and can only dream that this dictionary stays in print as long as his remarkable manuscript!)

Throughout medieval Europe, even though the early Christians respected dreams for their spiritual significance, the repressive control of the Roman Catholic Church put a stop to any attempts at dream interpretation. By the end of the 15th century dreams were regarded as no longer significant, and a century or so later even Shakespeare called them ‘children of the idle brain’. The ‘dreams are meaningless’ school of thought persisted well into the 18th century.

During the early 19th century, when the restrictive influence of the Church began to wane and the members of the Romantic movement – in their quest for spontaneous expression – rediscovered the potential of dreams, a revival of interest in dream interpretation began. Popular dream dictionaries, such as Raphael’s Royal Book of Dreams (1830) trickled into the mainstream and set the stage for Freud and Jung, the two giants of dream interpretation whose theories continue to influence the way dreams are interpreted today.

The Revolution of Freud and Jung

Dreams are often most profound when they seem the most crazy.

– Sigmund Freud

Austrian psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud (1858–1939) opened the door to the scientific study of dreams with his book The Interpretation of Dreams (1900). At the time, when prudish attitudes were prevalent, he caused general outrage with his controversial theory that dreams are wish-fulfillment fantasies that have their origins in our infantile urges, and in particular our sexual desires.

Freud believed that the human mind is made up of the id (the primitive or unconscious mind), the ego (the conscious mind which regulates the id’s antisocial instincts with a self-defense mechanism), and the superego (which is the consciousness that in turn supervises and modifies the ego). According to Freud, the id is controlled by the pleasure principle (the urge to gratify its needs), and the instinct that the ego finds hardest to manage is the sexual drive first awakened in childhood. The id comes to prominence in dreams, when it expresses in symbolic language the urges repressed when we are awake. Symbols are used because if these drives were expressed literally, the ego would be shocked into waking up.

To interpret a dream successfully, the symbols need to be uncovered and their true meaning discovered. The way that Freud suggested doing this was a technique called ‘free association’, or spontaneously expressing the responses that immediately spring to mind when certain words relating to the dream are put forward. The aim is to limit interference from the ego to discover the dreamer’s unconscious instincts.

Swiss analytical psychologist Carl Gustav Jung (1875–1965), although an initial supporter of Freud’s ideas, could never fully agree with them. He felt there was far more to dreams than hidden sexual frustration, and put forward the theory of the ‘collective unconscious’: a storehouse of inherited patterns of experiences and instincts common to humans and expressed in dreams in universal symbols, which he called ‘archetypes’.

According to Jungian theory, the psyche is made up of the personal unconscious and the collective unconscious, and when a symbol appears in a dream it is important to decide whether it relates to us personally or is an archetype. The way Jung suggested we do this is by a technique called ‘direct association’, i.e. concentrating only on the dream symbol when you think about the qualities associated with it.

Jung speculated that the unconscious mind projected dream symbols in an attempt to bring the conscious and unconscious mind into a state of balance he called ‘individuation’. According to his theory, the only way the unconscious mind can express itself fully is in dreams, so it will flood our dreams with symbolic messages that reflect our current progress in waking life. These messages can bring comfort and guidance, or bring repressed urges to the fore, but their aim is the same – to encourage personal growth and self-development. However, before we can benefit from such intuitive wisdom, we first of all need to understand the language of symbols.

Other Important Dream Theorists

If you can dream and not make dreams your master …

– Rudyard Kipling

Austrian psychologist Alfred Adler (1870–1937) suggested that dreams are all about wish-fulfillment because they allow the dreamers to have skills and powers denied to them in waking life. According to Adler, ‘The purpose of dreams must be in the feelings they arouse.’

Gestalt psychologist Fritz Perls (1893–1970) believed that dreams project hidden aspects of our personalities and the best way to interpret them is to use a non-interpretative interviewing technique. In other words, you ask your dream character or object what they are trying to say. Then you try to adopt the dream’s mindset and answer the questions.

Noted Australian dream expert Gayle Delaney suggests using an interviewing technique that addresses questions such as ‘How did the dream make you feel?’ or ‘How can you connect your dream with your waking life?’ Some dream theorists believe dreams deal with problems we can’t solve in waking life and offer solutions. Looking at them in the light of waking day, and believing them to be full of insight, we may sometimes come up with new ideas or insights while studying and interpreting them.

Thanks to the work of Jung and Freud and other influential dream theorists, dream interpretation is now accessible to everyone. It’s more popular today than it has ever been, with people from all walks of life using their dreams as unique and personal sources of guidance and inspiration, or as tools for change, growth, and personal development.

Dreams can offer us profound insights into what is preoccupying us and, although they are likely to forever remain mysterious, interpreting them can be healing and empowering, help us understand ourselves better and shape the decisions we make in our waking lives. As we’ve seen, there are different approaches to the interpretation of dreams and you’ll find a fusion of all of these in this book.

Famous Dreamers

Through the centuries, the dreaming mind has been said to be the source of countless insights, revelations, and even history-changing guidance. Here are just a few well-known examples:

Julius Caesar attributed his decision to cross the Rubicon and march on Rome with his army to a dream, in which he saw himself lying in bed with his mother (his seers told him she represented Mother Rome). And his wife Calpurnia saw his assassination foretold in a dream.

St Francis of Assisi had a dream in which Jesus Christ spoke to him from the Cross, telling him to ‘set my house in order’, and so went on to found the Franciscan Order of friars.

Dante reported that the entire story of the Divine Comedy was revealed to him in a dream he had on Good Friday in 1300. When he died in 1321, some of the original manuscript was lost. His son Jacopo recovered the manuscript thanks to a dream in which his father showed him exactly where to look.

Genghis Khan is reported to have received his battle plans in dreams. It is also said that a dream told him he was ‘a chosen one’.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge wrote his famous poem ‘Kubla Khan’ after waking from an opium-fueled dream.

Robert Louis Stevenson was convinced his best stories, including the main device in Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, came to him in dreams. Suffering as a child from nightmares, he reportedly learned to control his dreams so he would no longer have nightmares. He said his dreams inspired all his writings.

Days before he was assassinated, Abraham Lincoln dreamed of loud wails coming from the East Wing of the White House. When he investigated, he was told by soldiers on guard that they were weeping for the President, who had been assassinated. Days later Lincoln’s body was laid in state in the East Wing so people could pay their last respects.

Friedrich August Kekulé von Stradonitz was a chemist working on the chemical structure of benzene. His data made no sense to him because benzene (we now know) does not behave like a ‘long string’ molecule. While dozing in a comfortable seat, Kekulé saw in a dream the image of a snake biting its own tail. He woke up and immediately understood the mathematics of the benzene molecule – which has a ring rather than a long-string structure.

Italian violinist and composer Giuseppe Tartini composed one of his greatest works, ‘The Devil’s Trill’, after a dream he had in 1713. In the dream he handed his violin to the devil himself, who began

to play with consummate skill a sonata of such exquisite beauty as surpassed the boldest flights of my imagination. I felt enraptured, transported, enchanted; my breath was taken away, and I awoke. Seizing my violin I tried to retain the sounds I had heard. But it was in vain. The piece I then composed…was the best I ever wrote, but how far below the one I heard in my dream!

Elias Howe wrote that he understood the central notion of his invention of the sewing machine in a nightmare in which he was captured by cannibals. While dancing around a fire and preparing to cook him, the cannibals waved their spears. Howe’s dreaming mind noticed that the head of each spear bore a small hole through the shaft. The up-and-down movement of the spears and the hole in each spear remained with him when he woke. The idea of passing thread through a needle close to its tip, and not at its widest point, was a major innovation in making sewing by machine possible.

One night in 1816, Mary Shelley, her husband, and a group of friends were challenged to each write a ghost story. That night Mary dreamed of a creature that would later become the monster created by Victor Frankenstein in her yet-to-be-written novel.

Niels Bohr said that he developed the model of the atom after he had a dream that he was sitting on the sun with all the planets whizzing around him and hanging by the thinnest cords.

Paul McCartney heard a haunting melody in one of his dreams, confirmed that none of the Beatles had heard it before, and wrote it down. It became the tune for the song ‘Yesterday’.

In 1964 golfer Jack Nicklaus told a reporter how his dreams helped him practice and significantly improve his golf swing.

Dream Types

To all, to each, a fair good night. And pleasing dreams and slumbers light.

– Sir Walter Scott

Understanding what type of dream you had can help you to interpret it. Just as there are different types of music – classical, rock, jazz – there are different kinds of dreams. Although dream types can blend and merge, modern dream researchers tend to break dreams down into one of the following categories:

Afterlife Dreams

Dreams about departed loved ones can feel incredibly real and bring tremendous comfort, healing, and reassurance to the dreamer, encouraging them to believe that perhaps in some unseen realm the departed loved one lives on. Psychologists believe such dreams are products of grief, but whether they are or not research has shown that people who dream of departed loved ones tend to deal better with their grief than people who do not.

Amplifying Dreams

These can exaggerate certain situations or life attitudes in order to point them out sharply for the dreamer. For example, someone who is very shy may dream that they have become invisible.

Anticipating Dreams

These are dreams that may alert us to possible outcomes in situations in our waking lives – for example, passing or failing an exam. We dream the most likely scenarios, or what our fears about these situations are.

Auditory Dreams

These are dreams where you recall sounds or hearing something, rather than visual symbols. Many artists and musicians have experienced these kinds of dreams and used what they heard as inspiration for their work. Sometimes the sound you hear may be the sound of a narrator telling you what is happening in the dream. When this occurs your dreaming mind wants you to concentrate on the narrative or story being told. (Be aware that sometimes external noises from your sleeping environment, like a phone ringing, can creep into your dream.)

Cathartic Dreams

Such dreams evoke extremely emotional reactions, when the unconscious is urging us to release pent-up emotions we may feel unable to express in waking life. For example, you may find yourself bursting into tears on a packed commuter train in your dreams, or you might punch your irritating neighbor or tell your boss exactly what you think of them.

Childhood Dreams

Dreaming about your childhood may reflect a childhood dynamic that hasn’t been worked out yet and requires a resolution. It may also suggest a need for greater spontaneity in your waking life.

Contrary or Compensatory Dreams

In these types of dreams, the unconscious places the dreaming self in a totally different situation to the one we find ourselves in waking life. For example, if your day has been filled with unhappiness and stress due to the death of a loved one or the end of a relationship, you may dream of yourself spending a carefree, happy day by the seaside. Your unconscious may also give you personality traits that you haven’t expressed in waking life. For example, if you hate being the center of attention, you may dream about being a celebrity. Such dreams are thought to provide necessary balance, and may also be suggesting to you to incorporate in your waking life some of the characteristics that your dream highlighted.

Daily-processing Dreams

Also known as factual dreams, daily-processing dreams are dreams in which you go over and over things that happened during the day, especially those that were repetitive or forced you to concentrate for long periods – dreaming about a long trip or a tough work assignment, for example. These kinds of dreams don’t tend to be laden with meaning, and most dream theorists think of them as bits and pieces of information your brain is processing.

Daydreaming

There is a big difference between daydreaming and dreams when you are sleeping, even though the physical state we enter when we daydream has much in common with the relaxed state we assume during sleep. However, when you are daydreaming, you are not actually asleep. When you are asleep, your defense mechanisms are down and you are psychologically more vulnerable. In other words, we shed the masks we wear in public. Therefore, what is expressed in dreams (as opposed to daydreams) is probably a better representation of who we are, not just our waking hopes and fears. Those feelings and thoughts we might be unwilling to acknowledge in waking life often surface boldly in dreams. Dreams we have when we are fully asleep also speak to us in the powerful language of symbols, whereas the language of daydreams tends to be more tangible, reflecting events that have a clearer reality to them.

Epic, Cosmic, or Life-changing Dreams

These kinds of dreams are extremely vivid and rich in archetypal symbolism. They are likely to be the dreams that you can’t forget for many years after you have had them. When you wake up you feel that you have learned something profoundly important about yourself. See also 10 COMMON DREAMS YOU SHOULD NEVER IGNORE, here (#litres_trial_promo).

False Awakening

It is thought that many reported sightings of ghosts are caused by false awakenings, which occur when you are actually asleep but are convinced in your dream state that you are awake. This is the kind of vivid dream in which you wake up convinced that what happened in your dream really occurred.

Incubated Dreams

This is when you set your conscious mind on experiencing a particular kind of dream. For example, you may ‘incubate’ a dream of a loved one by concentrating on visualizing your loved one’s face before you sleep, or you may ask for a dream to answer your problems immediately before going to sleep. The theory is that your unconscious responds to the suggestion or request. See also Dream-maker, here (#ulink_4bb74840-6c9c-5c17-84f7-edbc7f7c404f).

Inspirational Dreams

Many great works of art, music, and literature have allegedly been inspired by dreams, when the unconscious brings a creative idea to the fore. For example, English poet and artist William Blake said that his work was inspired by the visions in his dreams.

Lucid Dreams

These occur when you become aware that you are dreaming while you are dreaming. It takes time and practice to stop yourself from waking up, but it is possible to learn how to become a lucid dreamer and control the course of your dreams. See also Dream Catcher, here (#ulink_10b90489-f597-5bc8-87ac-18d89db279de).

Mutual Dreams

This is when two people dream the same dream. Such dreams can be spontaneous or incubated, for example when two people who are close decide on a dream location together and imagine themselves meeting up before going to sleep.

Nightmares

These are dreams that terrify us or cause us distress in some way by waking us up before the situation has resolved. Nightmares occur during REM sleep and typically arise when a person is feeling anxious or helpless in waking life. Once the dreamer has recognized what is triggering this kind of dream, and worked through any unresolved fears and anxieties, nightmares tend to cease.

Night Terrors

These are similar to nightmares, but because they occur in deep sleep (stage four of the sleep cycle) we rarely remember what terrified us, although we may be left with a lingering feeling of unexplained dread.