Thursday 18 February 2021

In your dreams

Dreams are very mysterious. In general they have no obvious meaning or advice for us, yet we get dozens of them every night. What for? Why don't we just sleep soundly with no dreams whatever?

My dreams are mostly anxiety dreams. I'm lost somewhere and trying to find my way home. Or someone sinister is chasing me through an empty building. Or I'm at a dinner party and have no idea who the other people are or what to say to them.

All my dreams tell me is that I'm an anxious person, which I know only too well. Why remind me of the self-evident? Why don't I have dreams telling me how to banish anxiety? Or even dreams that say my brain is right now deleting all my anxieties?

Psychologists have puzzled over the meaning of dreams for centuries and no doubt will keep doing so, and will keep drawing a blank. Many therapists are convinced dreams have plenty of meaning if you just interpret them in the right way, but I haven't found that myself. However I interpret my dreams, whatever I imagine they're telling me in some coded form, I usually end up none the wiser.

I hardly ever dream of people I know. If I did they might suggest something interesting about that person - that they're creepy or crazy or cranky. Even people I worked with for many years, even family members, even famous public figures, never appear. One supposedly common dream is to be meeting the Queen, but I must disappoint Her Majesty on that score.

Another apparently common dream is to find yourself naked in a public place, but I have to say that wherever I happen to be, I'm always fully clothed. Clearly whatever mechanism controls my dreams, it believes in public decency.

But I'm still waiting for a dream where I'm bursting with self-confidence and optimism, and anxiety is a thing of the past.

28 comments:

  1. I often dream of needing to use the bathroom but not having privacy (doors missing or someone watching). I assume it’s from being a mom. I used to dream about being late all the time but haven’t in a while.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Bijoux: I have similar dreams about being in a dysfunctional and not-private toilet. So it's more than being a mum!

      Delete
  2. I don't often dream...or don't remember having sone so since those I am aware of are those interrupted by being woken up. None seem threatening, nonw figure nudity...so quite dull I suppose.
    My husband has bouts of dreaming...his father usually figures and always in the context of having to perform some impossible task in a given time. Not surprising given their relationship!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Fly: I'm surprised I don't have similar dreams about my father, considering what a martinet he was.

      Delete
  3. My dreams are vivid and technicolored and varied, Often people from long ago pop into them. Often they involve toilets and looking for one and finding a completely inadequate one.

    I analyze the dreams of others but can't do my own, I doubt if anyone can self-analyze as they are quite complex. Subconscious run amok.

    XO
    WWW

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. www: Ah, those toilet dreams again! Clever of you to interpret other people's dreams. I sometimes try to interpret Jenny's dreams but she usually says I've got it all wrong.

      Delete
  4. I have lots of dreams. Some of them are so entertaining I blog about them. I don't blog about the toilet ones, though.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Linda: I didn't know you were still blogging. The only blog I know about is The Sand Castle, which stopped in January 2018. I'd love to hear about your entertaining dreams!

      Delete
  5. I've had nightmares almost every night since I was 9 years old. I used to have Night Terrors and nothing the doctors gave me did anything. They just stopped when I got older. I still scream in my sleep a lot though. One psychologist told me that I have unresolved anger issues and that's why I have nightmares. lol Maybe.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Mary: I don't scream in my sleep but Jenny says I jerk a lot. I don't remember my childhood dreams, so presumably they weren't troubling in any way.

      Delete
  6. I know I dream, but don't remember them long enough to know what they were about.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Joanne: I don't remember many of mine either, even when I was dreaming just a few seconds ago.

      Delete
  7. I am one of the blessed ones who cannot remember their dreams though they know that they dreamt.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Ramana: Yes, that makes life a lot simpler - nothing to spend all day puzzling over!

      Delete
  8. I often wonder why it is that if I wake up right after a dream, I can recall most of it, but if I fall asleep and then rewake those memories are gone. Sometimes, if it's been a good dream, I try to take up where I "left off" before awakening but am unsuccessful.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Beatrice: Sometimes when I wake up I'm aware of the tail-end of a dream, but as soon as I try to retrieve the rest of it, the whole dream just evaporates.

      Delete
  9. I very seldom dream now. or if I do I never remember.
    as a child I went through a dream every night. I remember awakening terrified. it was always the same dream. the walls were gradually closing in on me and getting nearer and nearer. I was 7 or maybe 8.
    suddenly they just stopped! the dreams I mean.
    but I have been rather claustrophobic all my life. I wonder if those childhood dreams caused it. who knows?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tammy: I guess the dreams and your claustrophobia both came from some common cause. Something that gave you a sense of confinement earlier in your childhood? (That's enough amateur psychotherapy - Ed)

      Delete
  10. I almost never remember my dreams, so they definitely can't be interpreted.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Danielle: My dreams defy interpretation, they're so weird and so unreal.

      Delete
  11. I hate those 'have to be somewhere/do something but can't' dreams.
    I often wonder what on earth an analyst would make of mine.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Liz: I have similar dreams. An analyst would probably say we're trying to achieve something in life but can't quite manage it. I can't imagine what that "something" would be though!

      Delete
  12. Mostly my dreams seem to be recycled bits of my thoughts during the day. I'm told that it is the brain debriefing itself. Once I start to think of it, there are certainly endless thoughts shooting through my brain which leave barely a trace unless I make a special effort to notice them!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Jenny: The brain debriefing itself? I guess that's as good an explanation as any other! My dreams never reflect anything I did during the day, they're always complete fantasy.

      Delete
  13. I think of my dreams reflecting my emotions at the time. My actual dreaming now is erratic as is my sleep which is disappointing. I’m sure I’ll recall them when I awake in the morning but usually parts are missing and soon gone. Don't want to wake up enough to write them down at night.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Joared: The only emotion my dreams usually reflect is anxiety! It would be great to experience a few other emotions.

      Delete
  14. I have seriously strange dreams, I used to document them and can remember some of them from years ago. One that occurs regularly is exactly the same as Bijoux’s, needing to use the bathroom, but also in mine the toilets are often blocked or filthy. Usually I wake up needing to go. Another one is climbing stairs but they disappear as I reach the top.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Polly: Climbing stairs that disappear at the top? That's a new one on me. Rather scary!

      Delete