How to Interpret Your Dreams

Night dreams are wonderful symbolic messages from your “real self”—offering insights into what’s going on below the surface, just beyond your conscious awareness. I’ve been keeping a dream journal for almost 20 years, I think of it as free therapy! Here are some ways to get the most out of what those night visions are trying to tell you.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderate

Things You’ll Need:

• A journal
• A pen (with a light would be fantastic!)

1. To interpret your dreams, you have to remember them: before going to bed at night, set your intention. Say it out loud, “I will remember my dreams.”
2. Keep a journal and pen nearby (with a light on it is even better).
3. Write down the dream the moment you wake up—they evaporate like steam if you don’t.
4. How you tell the story in your journal will provide major keys to unlocking it, so let the words flow on the page.
5. Figure out what type of dream message it is—physical, mental, spiritual. Physical dreams are responses to an external stimuli. You dream of a snowstorm and wake up to find the bed covers are on the ground and you’re cold. Mental dreams take you into many areas—anxiety issues, wish fulfillment, hashing out what just happened the day before. Spiritual ones have larger, overall messages regarding your path in life. And there is overlap—dreams operate on several levels at once. You could be cold in that snowstorm—but on a deeper level, your emotions have frozen, too.
6. What’s the dream about? What current problems and interests could it be reflecting?
7. What emotions did you feel in the dream? How do they relate to your current situation?
8. What is the setting? A familiar place (there’s no place like home)? A strange place (venturing into new areas of your life)? A scary place (afraid of a new job)? Springtime (a time of renewal)?
9. What’s the basic theme? Try and say it in one sentence.
10. Dreams operate on a symbolic level so analyze the symbols. Symbols can be conventional (flags), universal (the circle) or personal. Look at each object and person in the dream and ask yourself, what does this represent to me? We use verbal language in the conscious, reasoning mind and then manipulate (and deceive) to our own benefit. The dream source is honest, though. The symbolic and seemingly obscure language of dreams helps prevent deceit between the conscious and subconscious mind.
11. Ask what part of you each person in the dream represents.
12. Apply what you’ve learned from your dream—what have you realized about yourself?

Tips & Warnings

• Dreams are self-correcting. If you misinterpret, you’ll get a simple dream to correct the previous one.
• Books are available with long lists of dream symbols, but you’ll develop your own list of symbols over time, in effect, your own lexicon. Some widely accepted symbols include water (emotions), a house (yourself, downstairs = subconscious, upstairs = higher consciousness), a car (your life). The more you write down your dreams, the bigger your personal storehouse of symbols.
• Pay attention to word choice in what you wrote down—sometimes dreams have a literal meaning. Your car’s battery is dead in the dream, check it out in real life. But it could also mean you’re running yourself down as well.
• Look for wordplay and clichés, they’re telling. You could be “on track” in your dream and life. If someone “scared the crap” out of you in your dream and then you have diarrhea at work, look at who or what is scaring you.
• If you have a nightmare, ask for a dream to resolve it, or use a daydream to face scary elements so you can bring the problem to a conclusion.
• The subconscious can detect where you’re out of balance even if you’re not aware of it yet or are in denial about it—pay attention to messages about your health.
• Ask a specific question before you go to bed—spend 15 minutes writing about a problem, then form the question you want a dream to help you with.
• Consider joining a dream group—the more energy you invest in interpreting your dreams, the more you’ll receive!