The Dream Dictionary from A to Z [Revised edition]. Theresa Cheung

of yourself.

      Use the explanations offered in the pages that follow for the interpretation of your dream symbols and combine them with your own circumstances to work out an understanding of the likely significance of your dreams. In this way, your innermost feelings, hopes, and fears can be highlighted, hopefully resolving issues in your waking life and enriching it by revealing your hidden strengths and creativity.

      Dreams offer you an incredible opportunity to connect to your inner world to illuminate your waking life. They help reveal who you really are, and understanding their true meaning is the beginning of understanding yourself. In the words of Aristotle, ‘knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom’. So, take the time to enjoy the excitement, mystery, wonder, creativity, and pure magic each and every dream brings. Keep your eyes wide open by day and wide shut by night. Dare yourself to discover and believe in yourself and the beauty of your dreams – wherever they may lead you…

       A–Z BEDSIDE READER

      

      ABANDONED PLACES According to Jung, places in dreams where people work or live together, such as villages, towns, and cities, symbolize how you perceive yourself within your community, how well you are fitting in. So if places are abandoned in your dream, like a ghost town or a deserted village, this could mirror feelings of isolation or rejection in your waking life.

      See also PLACES.

ABANDONMENT Dream images connected to feelings of abandonment, fear, and loss of control all have some form of conflict as their theme. For example, dreams about missing a bus, train, or plane all point to some kind of tension in the dreamer about failing to achieve a goal. Dreams about being abandoned or left alone by a group of loved ones suggest feelings of anxiety about being left out, or being different from the crowd. Anxiously searching for the right road or path could point to fears about losing your identity. If you are happily wandering alone in your dream, this may suggest a feeling that the source of your problems lies outside yourself. Dreams about anchors and lifeboats also tell of the fight for survival in daily life. If you dream of being lost in dense vegetation, towering trees, or tall reeds, you may feel that your progress is being thwarted by obstacles. As in the tale of Hansel and Gretel, this dream may evoke longing for the comfort and warmth of home.

      See also CHILD (abandoned by parents dream) and SEPARATION.

       ABDOMEN

      See BODY.

       ABDUCTION

      See KIDNAP.

      ABORIGINAL In dreams, an aboriginal is a symbol of that within you which is unsophisticated and natural. It is the basic, life-affirming energy or intuition within you which may have been repressed by experience; you need to get in touch with this simplicity again to understand yourself or a situation in your waking life better. In short, this dream is urging you to reconnect with your intuition and work with it in your daily life.

      ABORTION Dreams about abortion, miscarriages, and stillbirth are likely to leave you feeling traumatized on waking, whether you are pregnant or not. And if you are expecting a baby, such a dream is likely to be a nightmare. If this is the case, your dream was simply playing out your natural feelings of anxiety. However, most dreams about abortion, miscarriage, and stillbirth aren’t to be interpreted literally, as they refer to a concept you may have been mulling over, or an idea that is not realizing its potential or is not supported by your confidence or desire. There may be a need to reject a feeling, emotion, belief, or concept that could be problematic in waking life. Decisions need to be taken which will help you get rid of what is no longer wanted in waking life.

      How did you feel about the abortion in your dream? If you were distressed, perhaps someone or something is trying to prevent you from succeeding. If you were relieved, your unconscious may be urging you to change direction or change your mind. Perhaps the concept is too demanding or the idea is flawed in some way. On the other hand, the dream may also have referred to something or someone about which you feel guilty. Dreams that focus on miscarriage may have the same interpretation but they may also refer to a miscarriage of justice, especially if you felt anger in your dream. Is someone in your waking life taking the credit you deserve? Stillbirth dreams are in some ways more devastating and sad than dreams about miscarriage, as the baby has been brought to full term with the only element missing being the spark of life. In dreams, a still born baby may represent a talent you have allowed to die, or a relationship that has died due to neglect.

       ABOVE

      See POSITION.

      ABROAD If you are going abroad or are abroad in your dream, your unconscious is thinking about your own personal freedom or your ability to move freely around your inner and outer worlds. Your dream is giving you an understanding of your feelings toward the widening of your horizons or the making of changes in your life. Pay attention to how you feel in the dream, as this will help you interpret it. The dream could also be about a need to escape from, or leave, a situation, as suggested by the phrase for having a vacation abroad – ‘getting away from it all’. If someone or something arrives from abroad, this represents a change or something new happening in your life. Someone of the opposite sex arriving from abroad indicates hopes for a new relationship or the need for new life to be injected into a current relationship. The dream may also be slang – ‘a broad’ – expressing desire for a particular female.

      ABYSS If the deep, precipitous sides of a chasm or large hole threaten to engulf and swallow you up in a dream, or if an abyss suddenly opens up in front of you, transforming a previously pleasant scene into a terrifying one, could your unconscious have been warning you that your position in waking life is not as stable as you might think and that you could be facing unexpected mishaps or pitfalls? Chasms and holes in dreams always suggest an element of the unknown or something in some way risky, and they urge the dreamer to make a decision one way or another in waking life. Perhaps you dreamed of teetering on the brink of a ravine, petrified that you would lose your footing? Such a dream may be warning you that you are in danger of falling into an emotional black hole, out of which you feel powerless to emerge. Also, because the earth is a symbol of the archetypal mother, devouring chasms may represent a devouring maternal figure in your life, intent on dominating you or dragging you under.

      ACCIDENTS The traditional interpretation of dreams involving accidents is that we are receiving some kind of warning to be on our guard against possible danger or hidden aggression, either our own or others’. From a psychologist’s point of view, such dreams may highlight anxieties to do with safety or fear of taking responsibility. Spiritual interpretations of such dreams suggest the need for some kind of intervention from an authoritative source.

      According to Freud, accidents in dreams, like slips of the tongue in waking life, are not accidents but dream events with a meaning that can help us to unravel the often incomprehensible maneuvers of our unconscious mind. For Jung, accident dreams, as well as offering insights into our unconscious thought processes, can provide a reaction to a traumatic experience or the fear of it. For example, if you were in a car accident or are anxious about having one, you may dream of being involved in one. People who suffered great trauma, such as rape victims or war veterans, may have nightmares that are exactly like, or very similar to, actual life events.

      The most commonly accepted theory is that accident dreams show how your unconscious has noticed things that you may not have noticed in waking