10. How To Interpret Your Dreams

TL;DR: Dreams are a gateway to the subconscious aspect of ourselves. Write your dreams down each morning and reflect on what your subconscious may be telling you.

“Knowing your own darkness is the best method for dealing with the darkness of other people. One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious. The most terrifying thing is to accept oneself completely. Your visions will become clear only when you can look into your own heart. Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes.” -Carl Jung [1]

Introduction

Dream interpretation has been an integral part of many cultures ranging from Mesopotamia all the way to modern psychology. They are traditionally used for the purpose of predicting future events, and for healing and self-understanding. In order to utilize dream interpretation, keep a dream journal and note why you think each dream has meaning to you personally.

Before you take out the dream journal, consider improving your sleep quality to help increase the lucidity and intensity of your dreams. Some articles on UpRiver that we recommend include nighttime routines, optimizing your bedroom, and optimizing your circadian rhythm.

What Is Dream Interpretation?

History

Dream interpretation is an ancient practice. The first documented dreams we know of appear on clay tablets from Mesopotamia, which is commonly referred to as the cradle of Western civilization. The tablets come from The Assyrian Dream Book created during the reign of Ramesses II (1279-1213 B.C.), which was handed down between generations. This book contained about 108 dreams, and those dreams contained 78 emotions and actions that an average person may experience in dreams along with an interpretation for each [2]. Sumerians viewed their dreams as signs sent from gods and people had their dreams translated by “dream priests” who foretold the dreamer’s future [3].

A tablet from the ancient Assyrian dream book [4]

Dream interpretation dates even further back in Mesopotamian culture because in two of their famous epics, The Epic of Gilgamesh (1800 B.C.) [5], and the Atrahasis (1800 B.C.) [6], dreams play an important role [7]. Gilgamesh’s friend Enkidu has a dream that he should die for killing the Bull of Heaven, and Huwawa – a giant who guarded a forest where the gods lived. Immediately after the dream, he falls ill and shortly dies thereafter. In the Atrahasis, the dreamer predicts a great flood that will destroy their civilization, similar to in the Bible.

[8]

In the Book of Genesis, the Bible notes that Joseph had the ability to interpret dreams in order to predict the future. According to the Bible, he interpreted the Pharaoh’s dream, which he said predicted a 7 year famine. This allowed Egypt to avoid the disaster, and caused Joseph to rise quickly in the Egyptian hierarchy [9]. This isn’t the only mention of dreams in the Bible, in fact dreams are mentioned over 700 times [10].

Joseph Interpreting the Pharaoh’s Dream [2]

At around the same time in Egypt, close to Mesopotamia, the Egyptians were recording their dreams in hieroglyphics. They too had a close tie between religion and dreams evidenced by the fact that priests also acted as dream interpreters. Those with vivid dreams and important dreams were considered gifted by God. [10][11]

The Greeks (12th to 9th Century B.C. to 600 A.D.) believed strongly in the meaning of dreams as well. Aristotle thought that dreams resulted due to physiological functions, and that they could be used to diagnose, predict, and prevent disease. [12]. Hyprocrates, often considered the father of Western medicine, thought that dreams were important signs of physical and mental health. The Oracle of Delphi, one of the Greek’s greatest sources of wisdom, based prophesies on dreams – informing all aspects of Greek life, including military strategy [3]. As with the Egyptians, the ancient Greeks created a book of dreams, one of the most important of all time: Oneircritica – “Interpretation of Dreams”, which was written by Artemidorus [3]. When the Romans conquered Greece, they adopted much of their culture, including that of dreams – however with an important difference. The Romans didn’t think dreams came from God or divinity, but from our own personal desires and experience in everyday life [3].

During the Hellenistic period – after Alexander the great, and before the Roman empire – the main focus of dreams was on healing. Temples, called Asclepions, were built around the healing power of dreams [12].

An Askleipion on Kos, a Greek Island [13]

Native Americans believed heavily in the meaning of dreams. In some tribes, individuals sought to have visionary dreams that would help them define their destiny and connection to God. Individuals are even named after symbols and images in their dreams [14]. Some Native American tribes and Mexican civilizations share the notion of a distinct dream dimension, a sort of spiritual world where they could talk to ancestors and other entities [12]

The Ancient Chinese also placed importance on the interpretation of dreams, and used them for identifying signs of health, as well as to predict future events. They too had a systematic way of interpreting dreams and believed that certain symbols meant certain things depending on the circumstance of the symbol. They too created a book on dream interpretation – Zhou Gong’s Book of Auspicious and Inauspicious Dreams, a section of the Chinese almanac [15]. They believed that the waking self and dreaming self were two halves of an interconnected whole, and they believed that the soul actually leaves the body when dreaming to travel into another world [12].

It seems ancient cultures all placed a strong importance on the meaning of dreams, and tried to systematically incorporate their meanings into everyday life. However, many in the Western world do not respect dreams as having any significant meaning, and weren’t taken seriously until psychologist Sigmund Freud revived their importance in the mid 19th century. Soon after Freud, and in close association, another psychologist giant named Carl Jung developed his own theory of dreams and dream analysis based on decades of research into ancient cultures and his own clinical practice with patients.

What Is Dream Analysis?

First of all, what are dreams? The quick answer is that we don’t really know, and the long answer is that there are different theories.

Freud thought:

“The dream is the liberation of the spirit from the pressure of external nature, a detachment of the soul from the fetters of matter.”

Sigmund Freud, The Interpretation of Dreams [16]

Freud [17]

Jung thought:

“Dreams are impartial, spontaneous products of the unconscious psyche, outside the control of the will. They are pure nature; they show us the unvarnished, natural truth, and are therefore fitted, as nothing else is, to give us back an attitude that accords with our basic human nature when our consciousness has strayed too far from its foundations and run into an impasse.”

Carl Jung [1]

Jung [18]

Aristotle thought:

Dreams are connected with imagination. He viewed imagination as perception of events after they have occured and noted that we can process information long after we have been exposed to it. He further applied this idea to dreams essentially implying that during sleep, we further process what happens in the day [19].

What is Dream Analysis?

It seems as though based on a large swath of cultural and psychological evidence that dreams help us to take a step back and look at life without all of the noise – and that doing this with intention is what dream analysis is all about.

As Freud says, “dreams are never concerned with trivia”.

Why Would I Do Dream Interpretation?

Most psychologists and neuroscientists will agree that the vast majority of our consciousness or brain activity is related to our unconscious minds – as opposed to our conscious minds. This must mean that unconscious has a larger resource of activity to draw from, and may be why dreams can tell us what we can’t figure out while we are awake. It seems that it would benefit our self-understanding greatly to delve deeper into this unknown depth of ourselves and to apply the knowledge gleaned back into our everyday lives.

“But since the downfall of the mythological hypothesis an interpretation of the dream has been wanting.” – Sigmund Freud, The Interpretation of Dreams [16]

How Do I Do Dream Interpretation

Up until now, the actual method of dream interpretation hasn’t truly been covered in this article, only a base of knowledge with which to understand it has – which is the important part. How dream interpretation actually works depends on which lens you want to use. There are several methods ranging from those of Ancient Mesopotamia to modern psychologists. For this reason, UpRiver leaves it up to the reader to use the resources in this article to analyse their own dreams. In essence, however, all methods revolve around:

Recording Dreams

First of all, you have to have dreams and remember them in order to interpret them. If you try to write your dreams down in the mornings, but don’t recall anything for many days in a row, it could be that your sleep quality is lower than it should be. If this sounds like it pertains to you, consider reading our articles on optimizing sleep.

Even if you don’t think you remember your dreams, you should keep a dream journal. Often, we forget dreams very quickly, and so writing them first thing in the morning will get you into the habit, and give you the best chance of accurately capturing the information in your dream.

Dream journaling is also a key step to lucid dreaming, for those interested.

Personal Notes

By their nature, dreams are subjective. No one can understand a dream without the subjective dreamer adding their experience to the mix. The key of this stage is to note that everything that happens in your dream is related to you, not to anyone or anything that may appear in the dream – after all, it is you doing the dreaming by yourself in your own mind without any external stimuli. Look at your dreams as a big picture reflection on yourself and your life. What do you think your dreams are trying to tell you?

To get a deeper look at the meaning of your dreams, you can look into the several books mentioned above and see the framework through which they interpreted their dreams.

Author’s Motivation

I think that the meaning of dreams is underestimated in Westerm culture, and often dismissed as no more than meaningless stories we play through at night. After reading through what dozens of cultures and brilliant psychologists thought of dreams, and after almost a decade of experimenting with dream journaling, and dream analysis, I have come to believe that dreams hold a key to understanding ourselves, and the truth of what we want without all of the noise of everyday life distracting us.

Summary

Dream interpretation is an ancient practice dating back further than recorded history. It appears that through cultural and psychological reasoning that dreams offer us an important reflection that we seldom have access to in waking life. Keeping a consistent dream journal and noting personal meanings of your dreams may help you to reduce resistance to growth by improving your self-understanding.