Do Dreams Have a Meaning?

[chris112]

Well, the title mentions it all. Do dreams have a meaning when you, how do I put this...see them? No. Feel them? Kind of, but not really. Oh, I got it. Experience them. So do dreams have a meaning when you EXPERIENCE them? Because sometimes I have really weird dreams (and when I say really, I MEAN really!) and sometimes they can affect your day. So do dreams have a meaning, or are they just...there for no apparent reason?

 

[A Link In Time]

Yes, dreams do have a meaning. I've found that dreams often foreshadow the future.

 

[Conor]

If I've learned anything while studying the psychodynamic approach it's that yes, dreams do have a meaning. Freud believed that most of the things we see in dreams symmbolise something else or have a different meaning (although from what I can tell these deeper meanings ALWAYS relate to sex) but sometimes "A cigar is just a cigar" meaning not everything in a dream means something significant.

 

[green goron]

I think so. But I found that what you're thinking of before you sleep often plays a role in the dream

 

[onidarklink2]

I think they often do mean something. Dreams are basically just collections of you inner thoughts, so your dreams can help you understand what's going on in your mind and can help you understand yourself better.

 

[Ventus]

I don't think so. I've experienced a myriad of dreams, but nothing came out of them. Oftentimes, what I dream of is just a purple color moving about a black space, what in the world is THAT supposed to mean?

 

[Fraxinus]

Sorry to go all scientific on you, but dreams are referred to as an epiphenomenon--meaning it is a result of something else, going on in the background. Your brain replays the same activity of brain waves that went on the previous day during your sleep, and this results in dreams.

You will only remember a small portion of the dream after you wake up, but there sometimes may have things appear in it that you were involved in during the day before.

I suppose they can have a meaning, but it would never forsee the future, as much as it would the past. There are also people, like my sister, who are capable of controlling the actions and going-ons in their dreams. So, I guess it really depends.

 

[RegalBryant]

(although from what I can tell these deeper meanings ALWAYS relate to sex)

Of course they do. That's most of what the human brain thinks about.

 

[CelticMagician]

Do dreams mean anything? Most definitely in my opinion.

For the most part, dreams are our brain's way of processing information that happened throughout to day. The subconscious provides a us healthy outlet of mental stresses and other factors which affect us significantly in daily life.

That being said, every person experiences dreams differently. Some people can be greatly affected by their dreams while others don't even remember them. Likewise, there have been reported cases of "prophectic" dreams, but those have the tendency to be rare and can range from predicting unforeseen events to speaking with deceased loved ones (I've had a few myself which involved my dog a little over a month after his death).

But yes, we do dream for a reason. It would be disastrous for us mentally if we couldn't dream, since it is an important function to weed out the "gunk" that we accumulate subconsciously throughout the day.

 

[arkvoodle]

The "meaning" of dreams really depends on two factors;

1- Your personal beliefs about dreams
2- Your interpretation/knowledge of certain factors that may appear in the dream

I believe that dreams only hold a slight meaning. My dreams are often very random, and there are no consistant patterns or specific things that jump out at me as having any sort of subconcious or concious meanings/warnings. Though sometimes, i've received...warnings...in my dreams. Things that sort of direct me away from making certain decisions, and normally, I tend to follow these instincts, and they normally help me avoid trouble/potential disaster. So in a way, my dreams do have subconcious meanings...sometimes.

Now, my interpretation of certain things within dreams will differ from other people's. For instance, if I were to have a particular affixation or "vision" of, for example, a friend, I would interpret that as a warning of sorts. Possibly that my friendship with this person is dwindling, or that the person in question has grown away from me or changed. If I were to see a pile of money, I would interpret that as a desire or something that would make me happy, and to be honest, i'd love a big pile of money right now, so why not save up and make that pile?

I've only ever had a few sinister meanings, but they are quite sinister indeed. Stay away/be wary of this person, don't do this on this day or something like that. Though, those meanings tend to be just fantasy and are rarely ever correct.

To sum it all up, yes, sometimes dreams do hold meanings, but it really depends on who you are and how you interpret things within the dream.

 

[Crash]

dreams are a way to let your mind just kind of do whatever, but for the most part... They're just mind farts in that they're necessary but really don't have significance.

 

[Mozzy]

I believe they help give you insight to problems. I have often gone to bed trying to remember something I have forgotten or trying to seek the answer to something and I will have a dream or series of them only to discover an answer the next morning. I also think they have other practical purposes as others have pointed out where information is being reorganized and a sequence of events or images will flash as this occurs causing you to remember them when you wake up. I feel most nights, if not all, we have dreams, some we retain memories of and others not.

One horrific thing that would happen periodically when I was in my twenties is I would have night terrors which I read was uncommon in adults. However, I would still be dreaming when I woke up and see deformed creatures, shadowy figures and other monstrosities staring into my eyes but I could not move or yell. I could only see until I fully came to from the anxiety and everything would disappear like smoke.

 

[Crash]

I believe they help give you insight to problems. I have often gone to bed trying to remember something I have forgotten or trying to seek the answer to something and I will have a dream or series of them only to discover an answer the next morning. I also think they have other practical purposes as others have pointed out where information is being reorganized and a sequence of events or images will flash as this occurs causing you to remember them when you wake up. I feel most nights, if not all, we have dreams, some we retain memories of and others not.

One horrific thing that would happen periodically when I was in my twenties is I would have night terrors which I read was uncommon in adults. However, I would still be dreaming when I woke up and see deformed creatures, shadowy figures and other monstrosities staring into my eyes but I could not move or yell. I could only see until I fully came to from the anxiety and everything would disappear like smoke.

The reason you can't move is because during the 5 stages of sleep, one of them literally paralyzes you and if you wake up during that phase without your mind and body being prepared, you stay paralyzed until your brain catches up.

 

[Ronin]

There are very few times I wake up and recall just what I had dreamt. Only bits of them might catch up later in the day, but those..."memories" are so convoluted sometimes that I can hardly differentiate between them being dreams or reality. I'll stay situated someplace, going over those recollections for about a minute. Finally I'll give up and move on with what I was doing. It oftentimes seems like deja vu; I was in one place at a certain time but don't recall ever being there. Such situations are bizarre and, believe it or not, surreal.

But do they have meaning? Is there a purpose behind each one? How could something that you can't even bear to mind be relevant to anything? The complexities and perplexities devolving from these questions are too much for my simple mind to consider credibly. It depends mostly on what was dreamed, I suppose. Some things might bear significance to the past or present; including the future at times, but that's an entirely different matter. Intriguing how this befuddles even the deepest philosophers, though.

 

[m4rV]

in my opinion dreams always have a meaning. there are several books about it, where u can search for keywords.

maybe you dream about a girl with a knife in her hand... then you can look after "girl" or "knife" and combine it...