I am not an advocate of dream theory. Most dreams are random and fairly meaningless, but some are significant. The interpretation of these significant dreams can lead to enlightening insights, but I think that the only person qualified to interpret a dream is the one who dreamed it. This is because the dream itself may be nonsense, but our minds can pull meaning and inspiration from the shape of the nonsense.
In March I had two significant dreams. One featured an amazing house full of amazing stuff and I was going to get to live there, except everything in the house needed cleaning or repair. It was a reflection of my emotional state at that time when it felt like everything could be amazing, if only I did a lot of work first. The second dream I’m not going to share, except to say that it showed me exactly what I feared for Gleek when we were in the midst of wrestling with anxiety. Neither dream was pleasant, but contemplating them helped me understand myself and that new understanding changed the shape of things going forward in good ways.
Sometimes the entire dream is not important, just an element of it. I can tell which pieces matter, because they stay with me even after I wake up, they feel important even if I do not know why. Most of the time what matters most is the emotion of a dream rather than the events or objects in it. In my dreams I feel the things I’ve suppressed when awake.
I’m thinking about all of this because Howard had an interesting dream last night with elements that have been re-occurring over the past 20+ years. I kind of want to assign meanings for his dream, to declare that this dream object represents that life challenge, but I don’t get to. Meaning or dismissal are his to assign. I try to do the same for my kids, teaching them that while dreams can be indicators, it is what we do when awake that changes our lives for better or worse. Dreams show up, what we do with them after that is what matters.
Sometimes dreams are just dreams, but sometimes they’re not. Some people have more of one kind than another, and sometimes you realize more meaning in your dreams as you look deeper into them and into what is going on in your conscious life. I’m an avid dreamer, and love deciphering my own, which has taught me that all of those dream interpretation websites and books are bogus because dream interpretation has to be individualized. An image in my dream might mean one thing while it could mean something completely different in someone else’s, or even at a different point in my life.
You’re absolutely right: The dreams we remember are there for a reason. What reason is where each of us does the interpretation. Have you thought of keeping a dream journal?
I have… but only when I remember my dreams. Most of the time, I don’t remember them at all. But that’s okay with me. It just means that it’s something I don’t need to pay attention to… although sometimes I wake up with the sense of “going somewhere”. Then I spend a few extra minutes in bed just wondering where I went…. :\