OT: Do you take your reoccurring dreams seriously?
 

I know this is OT, but I am wondering how many of you have dreams that repeat and, if so, do you take meaning from them?

I grew up in the land of 10000 lakes. I lived on the CA coast for 13 years. Five plus years ago I moved to the desert. Anyway, for the longest time now I have these dreams with bodies of water. Beautiful bodies of water. Recently I had a dream of this beautiful lake surrounded by all these green trees, supposedly in a part of Phoenix metro area which of course doesn't exist. My friend called me today and held his phone up to the Pacific Ocean - not at my request, but wow.

Anyway, what is your experience in this area and have you actually made any changes in your life based on reoccurring dreams?

Mine is flying....I begin flapping
my arms up and down to get
off the ground.....its kinda hard
tho, but the more i flap the more
momentum i have and i can
go up real high.......then as
my arms begin to tire i begin
a slow descent.....if i dont want
to land yet, i have to begin
plapping my arms faster and
harder......whew....im worn
out already.....

I fly above the trees in and out.
Scoop down and up.....

Havent a clue as to why i dream
of flying.....

Maybe i was meant to be free....
and now i am FREE in recovery. :)

I absolutely do take my dreams seriously! Over the years I've learned my subconscious mind is trying to tell me something I'm missing or not understanding when I'm awake.

There's a really good book "Dream Power" by Ann Faraday ( I think that's the author) you can find on Amazon or eBay. It's been out since the early 70's. She talks about how the mind dreams in puns and metaphors. Everyone will have some different iconography due to personal experiences and cultures.

I still laugh over a dream I had about my cat being covered in ice. I couldn't think what that possibly meant! Drove me crazy all day. Finally, I was telling my best friend about it and it hit me: I had a GYN appointment scheduled! LOL I am not a crude person by any stretch but the dream was to the point!

Could the bodies of water mean something special to you? A rebirth? Drowning?

Love,

Lenina

Thanks, I should check that book out. What I take from mine is this - my mind is giving me relief. This is how I deal with living in the desert. Or, my mind is trying to tell me to move to a place with water.

I am not quite making the connection with your cat and an OB-GYN appointment, but works for me :)

Could it be that your mind is feeling an undertow? A current?

The cat is a crude reference, one I would not make consciously. But you know what gets chilly at the GYN's office? :eek2:

Love,

Lenina

LOL, now I get it.

I have reoccurring dreams about the past, not nightmares but uncomfortable dreams.

Maybe it is your mind's way of coming to terms with things...

I do believe that we work through a bunch of our "stuff" when we dream. Otherwise, I think we'd all go crazy.

I actually had a really disturbing nightmare repeatedly, about 3 or 4 times per year from ages 6 to maybe 13 or 14. I'd be walking with my mom in a building and she'd fall through the floor into some giant turning cog wheels. Yeah, disturbing. But I've never had any other recurring dreams and those finally, thankfully, went away. I never mentioned them to anyone until several years after they stopped, either.

I'm no professional dream interpreter but I've heard water in dreams, and your reaction to it, often refer to sexuality. There are a few dream websites around. www.dreammoods.com is one of my favorites. I really don't know how much stock to put in that sort of thing, kinda seems like asking a Magic 8-Ball for advice, but it still might be interesting for you to check it out. I almost never remember my dreams, and when I do they're usually kind of disturbing. I rarely have pleasant dreams that I remember.

Like Sharon I dream about the flying thing quite often. I always wake up with sore arms so I am pretty sure it is my mind making me forget the pain in my arms by incorporating it in my dreams.
I have another one that is about my teeth falling out and me choking them up. I always wake up with a dry and swollen throat when I have this one so once again I am sure it is my mind tricking me so I won't wake up.
A third is dreaming of being bitten by some animal, often a cat I used to have, and I always wake up with that part of my body being "asleep" or numb. Same explanation.
the only other one I have is getting mugged in a specific part of Toronto after I get lost.
Don't know what this one means but I don't go nowhere near that part of town.

I've always had vivid dreams, especially when I'm stressed or worrying about something. Over the years I've been able to sort them out. I do believe sometimes we notice things subconsciously that might be missed by the conscious mind.

Back to the metaphor thing, there's lots of expressions we use like "being in over my head" or "drowning in debt", that sort of thing that water could represent. It's a pretty individual symbolism. When I dream of being in stores, it's usually when I have to make decisions. Lots of choices and concerns.

I don't think dreams predict the future but sometimes I get warnings from stuff I've noticed but addressed. Wish I could get some power ball numbers!

Love,

Lenina

I had a dream one night that I ate a giant marshmallow. And when I woke up in the morning, my pillow was missing. :lmao

I kinda forgot about these until I read that, but I have dreams about my teeth falling out all the time! For a couple weeks before finals or a major paper or exam I'll have them every night. I finally looked up dreams about teeth falling out, and it turns out they're very common in 1)young women who tend to worry about how they look and 2)people who are under stress. That seems to jibe with my experience.

Sorry to be brief but no I don't take my dreams seriously.

I've tried lucid dreaming there for a wile. My best dream from that was I could fly like superman. I remember I could fly right through skyscrapers. Other dreams, the ones with water has me in a small boat as I pilot my way through narrow canals into open water. Sometimes I'm piloting my craft in rain filled street gutters and notice the funny looks of motorist as I navigate my way through busy intersections. When I reach the delta and enter the open ocean my dream ends with dolphins leading me across the sea.

I'm a prolific dreamer.

Row, row rowing your boat, merrily? LOL

I find dreams very interesting. I can do lucid dreaming and it's way more fun than TV or a movie. My sleep disorder keeps my brain in the dream mode for long periods. I've learned to use and enjoy it. I do have a bad dream sometimes though. Usually it's stress-related.

Love,

Lenina

Thanks, that is an interesting site. According to it water denotes the following:

What I get out of this is that I better move to a place with water!

LOL...merrily most of the time...then there was the time my boat became tiny and I wend down the street drain. There with the help of a powerful spot light I could see all the turns coming up ahead in the underground drain pipe. many turns with a choice of two or more directions. There I discovered the current wanting to take me though one turn but my instinct said go another way. As it would happen I had powerful motors that resisted the current and propelled me into the direction I felt was best.

I dream very vividly....often it keeps me from being rested and refreshed from sleep.
Sometimes my mind is just processing the garbage of the too much input...other times it
reflects subconscious needs, fears, observations etc.

Twenty years ago I experimented with my dreaming and by focusing and fantasizing on what I wished to dream about...I would then pick that up and dream about it.

These days I am better off if I calm and clear my mind prior to sleep.

Wow, that is very creative and interesting...