Tuesday, February 23, 2010

Dreams

Dreams are fascinating things. I've been thinking about them over the past several days, due to the fact that I'm having lots of those weird dreams brought on by pregnancy hormones. (Does everyone else get those, too?) Normally, I have average dreams -- nothing exciting or particularly remarkable about them. When I'm pregnant, however, I have very vivid, very bizarre dreams that make absolutely no sense to me. (like, for example, rotting corpses that chased me, and then turned and went into a bombed-out church that had a Latin Mass going on inside... I woke up and thought, "what the heck was THAT all about???")

I'm wondering in particular about several themes that seem to pop up over and over again. When I was younger, I used to dream quite often that I was being chased. I would run and run until I was exhausted, and just when my enemy was about to catch me, I would always have the same thought: "oh wait! I forgot that I can fly!" and off I'd sail away, turning around and laughing at those who just seconds earlier had been on my heels. I assumed even then that it was supposed to have some sort of spiritual meaning -- that is, that trying to accomplish something, or defeat something, in my own strength was never going to work. When I realized the graces that God had in store for me, however, I was able to soar above my enemies.

That was my guess, at least.

Another theme that seems to be common... at least among the few friends that I've polled... is either (a) buying a house, and then realizing it's a lot bigger than originally thought, or (b) discovering an entirely unknown wing of the house you currently live in. This kind of dream happens over and over again, and I'm stumped as to what my brain is trying to figure out. I usually greet this discovery with "praise God! Now we've got more space!", but other friends feel anxiety whenever they have this dream, because they have no idea what furniture they are going to use to fill it. Anyone else get this type of dream? I get it all the time...

Other themes that I can think of are feeling unprepared (forgot to study for a test... hosting a party and not having anything planned... giving a presentation with no notes to go by... etc), or inadequate/not up to snuff (everyone at a party is better dressed... finding yourself horribly undressed -- or worse! -- in public...), or losing something important... etc.

I'm not going into some "dreams and their meanings" sort of garbage. I stay clear of stuff like that... I'm simply wondering if certain themes pop up for a reason, and what we're trying to figure out when we dream them.

Any thoughts?

5 comments:

Jessica Snell said...

My parents told me when I was younger that usually in dreams, a house represents yourself, and I've generally found that to hold true. It makes sense, and it usually helps me to figure out why I was dreaming what I was dreaming.

Ouiz said...

You know, I think I've heard that before... but I'm not sure what that would mean in this case...

*grin* of course, it would be REALLY funny if my brain was simply trying to tell me, "you're bigger than you thought you are!" *LOL*

Unknown said...

I have the "under-dressed in public" dream; usually I'm just barefoot, though! My most common dream is that I remember a class I've forgotten to attend all semester. I can see where my fear of embarrassment or being unprepared would cause either of those.

I also often dream of a house that's 'mine' but isn't my actual house. No ideas about that one, although I had it camping the other week... my dream thought was, why am I camped out when there are beds in the house!?!

weresalmon said...

Zombies/rotting corpses are generally indicative of problems, those outside your control, encroaching in on you, same as tidal waves or anything chasing you. The fact that yours went into a church shows that you feel religion absorbs, or is a protection for, problems that come at you. You apparently don't fully get how that's the case, so the church had an extra layer of indecipherability; the Latin.

Flying is self-confidence or belief in yourself, whatever the source. I fly all the time.

Yes, a house is not your actual house. Your house is you, and the condition of the house shows your opinion of your self worth. If you find extra rooms, those are extra facets to your personality/psyche. It might just mean you're learning new stuff, it might mean you're interested in things you weren't previously, or it could be that you figure there's something else in you that you didn't see or know about before.

Discovering a new wing of your house means you have whole untapped areas in your head, whole categories of unused or unexamined space.

If you're anxious about the new space it means you're not all that comfortable with expanding yourself. "Filling the new rooms with furniture" is making the new space fit in with the rest of your "house".

Nearly all of my dreams are of huge, vaulted-ceilinged interior space, full of hallways and new rooms and such. Usually it's dimly lit, so I can't readily see what's there, but I know every corner's got stuff in it, and there are a thousand rooms upstairs.

Barefoot can be good or bad; depends on the context.

Dream interpretation isn't hard; it's just a matter of learning the vocabulary. You have to see what regular dream objects represent, rather than what they literally are.

Ouiz said...

I think it's interesting that so many people talk about houses representing yourself (not just here in the comment box... I've heard that for years). I really can't understand how that fits with what's going on in my life... but, then again, I don't normally see a correlation between what's going on and what I'm dreaming about (with some notable exceptions, of course)

This pregnancy seems to be the zombie pregnancy. Had ANOTHER dream about them last night. Every time, they're dead... REALLY dead... and then I'm the one who sees that they are starting to move, or notices that they are turning evil, or whatever.

Bizarre.

Anyway, THANK YOU Bill for the great comment! (although I think you would appreciate the whole zombie dream thing I've got going WAY more than I am! Remember, I could never watch the scary movies, and you could!)