Dreams and Their Meanings; A Short Primer on Interpreting Your Dreams

An ancient Greek concept: we hurtle through life with our backs to the future, able to see only what is past, never what is to come.

I have always been fascinated by dreams and the way they fragment into ‘weird’ imagery and what the imagery means. Are dreams intended to get a message across or are they simply your brain filing and storing events of the day. I believe in both types of dreams. I am not a psychologist and have no formal education directly related to dream interpretation, if such a thing exists. And although I have researched dreams and their possible meanings on my own, I claim no special expertise.

There are many books available by people more knowledgeable than I am and Carl Jung’s work is perhaps the best known. Much of what I what I learned and use to interpret dreams is based on archetypes Carl Jung found to be universal throughout cultures and times and thus, apply to everyone. But those archetypes have a plethora of meanings and recognizing which meaning applies to an individual’s dreams varies by the person who had the dream.

This is how I interpret the meaning of dreams using Jung’s archetypes because it works for me. It may not be the same for another person. I’ll list some of the archetypes I have encountered in my dreams and those encountered in dreams that a few others have related to me and the meaning that I gleaned from them based largely on Jung’s writings. The list below is far from comprehensive in the multiple and varied meanings each archetype might have, but it is a list of what they mean to me and have been a great help in understanding my dreams and their meanings and those of a few others.

1. House- Your physical body. It usually is not your real ‘house’, your house in waking life, but if in the dream you know it to be your house, then it is your body.

2. Car- the way you navigate life. If you dream of being in your car, the dream is trying to convey a message about how you’re living your life.

3. Kitchen- the place where knowledge is prepared for to be consumed, to take in.

4. Eating- the consumption of or taking in new knowledge.

5. Tree- Mortality, your life in this world. Usually, negative connotations.

6. Flying- a desire to rise above the struggles of the life, to escape it all.

7. Blanket- your covering, that which protects you from the dangers of the physical world.

8. Buffalo/Bull- strength, virile, usually masculine. The ability within you to overcome a hurdle, to conquer a crisis

9. Earth/soil- the ground beneath your feet; it can both support you and bury you.

10. Water- life, but it can also represent love.

11. Snake- knowledge of this world and of good and evil.

12. A Woman walking with you at night on a road or path- a daena, imago anima, the mirror of our earthly likeness, your own faith, created out of our good deeds and good thoughts in life. Your Guardian Angel. In life she guides you, comforts you, and inspires you. In death, she judges you and leads you across the bridge.

13. A Library- a place where knowledge is stored and readily available for any seeker

14. New Growth or Greening Grass- Renewal, the beginning of a new season; positive

As I said, I am not a psychologist and others might assign different meanings to the archetypes listed above. I am just offering my method of interpreting meanings found in dream imagery. It will not be the same for everyone.

These are a few dreams’ friends (names changed, of course) have shared with me and how I interpreted them for each. One concerning the archetypes Car and Earth, the other Water.

‘Billy’, a friend from college:

“I was driving my car, not my real car but in the dream, it was my car. As I rounded a curve in the road the steering didn’t work, and I ran off the road. Then dirt came up from the ground and over the hood of the car. It didn’t make sense. It was like an ocean wave of dirt that kept coming and I knew it would keep coming until it covered the entire car. I thought I was going to be drowned so I got out of that car and ran as fast as I could. I thought the wave of dirt was going to catch me but when I looked back the dirt covered the front end of the car but wasn’t following me.”

I knew that ‘Billy’ led a fast life, loved to drink, smoke, and party at the bars all night, hoping to find someone to spend the night with him. He lived a hard and lonesome life. I told him that the ‘car’ he didn’t recognize but knew in the dream was his stood as a symbol for the way he was living his life, how he ‘navigated’ the road that was his life. And that the dirt rising up in a wave meant that that if he didn’t change his ways, he’d be devoured by that life. I told him that the dirt had only taken his car in his dream and was a warning, but it that wave might him next time, too. He thought for a few moments then nodded.

“I know I’ve been taking a lot of chances. Guess I’m lucky I haven’t gotten another DWI.”

“So, you’re going to at spend a couple nights a week at home now? It will save you a lot of money and will be better for you, too.”

He looked at me and laughed then turned away with a shrug. “I’ll think about it.”

“Well, you’ve already been warned in a dream, Billy. A nightmare, even, that your lifestyle isn’t sustainable. And if it takes the universe a nightmare to get your attention, don’t you think you should listen to it? And hope the next warning is just another nightmare rather than a trip downtown in a police cruiser or ambulance.”

‘Jack’, a pastor

Jack told me he’d had recurring dream for several months: “In my dream, I see a brick wall built around my heart and I know it has been there for years, solid and impenetrable. But now, water seeps through cracks in the wall, leaks out between the bricks, pushing out against the wall like it wants to destroy it and let the water gush out. And I can’t stop it, the water keeps coming out no matter what I do.”

Jack had told me that he’d begun to question some of what he’d been taught in church as a child and then in the Seminary training. and wondered if everything he’d been preaching to his congregation was true. It was extremely important to him because, more than anything else, he feared he might lead someone astray, steer them away from their path to God. I knew Jack was a good man, a kind man whose heart was truly filled with love for anyone and everyone he met. I told him the water represented his love and care for others and that it overflowed his heart and filled the space behind that old, brick wall. And the water seeping between the bricks was his love trying to force its way past the confines of the wall that held it back. Trying to break free of the he had built that wall around his heart, maybe in Seminary to keep his focus clear, but now that wall prevented him from truly sharing the love he had been holding back.

I suggested that when he had that dream again, to look away from that wall and without his attention it would fall fast, crumble to pieces so that he could share more of his love with others. His eyes lit up as he saw some truth in that view and he explained that he had long wanted to open a food pantry for the poor in an area of the city that was considered a ‘food desert’, but in the press of daily life he had put off the project repeatedly. He decided he would pull out the plans and begin that work on it the next day. He told me he’d let me know if he had that dream again, but he did set up that food pantry and never again mentioned that ‘recurring’ dream, so I assume it never came back.

I plan this to be the first of several stories on dreams and their interpretations, from my point of view. In the next installment I will look at a few of my own dreams and what I learned from them.

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This was originally posted on Medium.

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