Rat

What you sense as sick or negative, so can depict your fears or anxieties, frightening instincts or urges, physical sickness or anxieties about health. Perhaps also feelings of sexual repulsion, or using sex to gain material aims. But this was caused by the fallacy that rats carried the plague and are unclean, but rats are very clean.

It was found out by historical research that it wasn’t the rat that brought the plague to Europe but the gerbil was the culprit. Sometimes a rat in your dream can remind you of love that was betrayed, or intuitions about a person being a ‘rat’ or ‘ratting on you’ – doing things behind your back or underhandedly – or deserting a relationship when difficulties arise.

The rats can point to threatening things going on that you are not clear about, or a view of the underhanded side of yourself or others – the evil side of human nature, its dirt and squalor, or time gnawing away at your life. The unacceptable parts or oneself. In some dreams the rat has the character of most rodents, the gnawing inquisitive searching out of things. It can therefore relate to one’s anxieties, self questioning and worrying mind that disturbs or eats away at things like peace of mind or confidence.

Because we may have associations with rats used in laboratories they may suggest healing and sacrifice.

Pet rat: Quite different to general rat associations; vulnerability, instinctive intelligence, the caring feelings or drive to care; responsibility for caring. The rat is an intelligent creature, is a great survivor and explorative.

In China where various types of rat are cooked and eaten, the astrological symbols are replaces by animal symbols. The rat (sometimes referred to as a mouse) is the first of the twelve animals of the Chinese zodiac. People born in this year are expected to possess qualities associated with rats, including creativity, intelligence, honesty, generosity, ambition, a quick temper and wastefulness. People born in a year of the rat are said to get along well with “monkeys” and “dragons”, and to get along poorly with “horses”.

RatsInHinduTemple

Here the rats in this Hindu temple are venerated, and are being fed.

In Indian tradition, rats are seen as the vehicle of Ganesha the elephant god, and a rat’s statue is always found in a temple of Ganesh – the elephant god the remover of all obstacles. In the north western Indian city of Deshnoke, the rats at the Karni Mata Temple are held to be destined for reincarnation as Sadhus (Hindu holy men). Rats are eaten by some people in India also.

Idioms: Rat on someone; rat race; smell a rat; feeling ratty; cornered rat; rats leave a sinking ship.

Useful Questions and Hints:

Am I confronting or remembering something that I feel is repulsive or evil?

Am I in a relationship that I intuitively feel difficulties about?

Am I being a rat in a relationship or situation? Is a worry or irritation eating away at me?

See animalsTechniques for Exploring your DreamsQuestions

Comments

-Lorenzo 2015-08-09 10:41:59

I had a dream that two rats was in my apartment & my roommate was trying to kill it. He would kill it but they would revive after a while. I woke up paranoid & went back to sleep & I dreamt the same thing. why?

-DDove 2015-08-06 16:09:18

I dreamt there were rats in my home and I was a little to comfortable but still a little afraid and began throwing shoes at them… Now I had already been asleep several hours and hadn’t dreamt of anything as usual. Until I woke up for about an hour and went back to sleep for about an hour. Which is when I had the dream about the rats.

-Geena 2015-08-04 17:15:18

I had a dream that my house was in a mess! and under the table it was this giant rat, so I clapped my hands loud and the rat got scared and ran away. The day after my boyfriend and I broke up because I found a condom in his bag, and he told me he didn’t care :/

    -Anna - Tony's Assistant 2015-08-07 13:24:22

    Dear Geena – The way I see it is that in your dream you are digesting this experience and the relationship with your ex-boyfriend.
    The way to deal with this is to work on integrating the influence left in you from the relationship. Try doing this by taking the dream images – like the rat and the mess in your house – and pulling them back into your body. Yes, literally making them one with you. Do this slowly and allow any feelings that arise.
    This may sound strange but all the images in your dream are projections from your inner world onto the screen of your sleeping mind; so taking them back into you is like owning them and integrating them. It is called honouring what you learned, bad or good, from the relationship. Think of it like digesting something. In a relationship you often absorb things from the person. You might take in such things unconsciously, as you did many things from parents and from the culture you were raised in.
    And so when you digest it you can integrate the parts that are usable into your life and the rest is discharged as waste matter.
    Please also read http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/the-house-in-your-dream/
    Anna 🙂

-Lisa 2015-08-01 12:12:01

I dreamt I was sitting in my bed with a hairless rat. I’m not sure if it was supposed to be a pet but it seemed dead when I was holding it. I took it outside where it came back to life and ran trying to come back in.

-Ann 2015-07-29 20:00:32

I dream of white large rat’s in the refrigerator draw and could not get out, some how I was moving the refrigerator down the road.

-Monica 2015-07-27 17:23:38

I was dreaming with rats. 2 small black rats passed me while I was walking in my home, suddenly I heard a crying, painful whining noise. I walked into the room and saw a bigger grey rat laying down with his stomach burst open and some organs hanging out pulsating. An other bigger grey rat run up to the suffering one and gnawed the pulsating organ open, (in my head I knew this is how to end the suffering). When the rat died the other (who “helped” him to stop suffering) kept following me with loud crying, like it was mourning the other one. I -being scared of rats- stood up on a chair but was crying and kept saying “im so sorry” (even though I didn’t cause it’s death.

-Ashley 2015-07-27 10:13:32

I had a dream last night where I came into a house(mine in the dream, nothing familiar) That I’d been away from for a long time, so i didn’t know the condition it would be in. I saw a paper bag with foam and clothing scraps somewhat eaten away, and i bent down to see that a mouse had made its nest. the small mouse was looking at me, i sensed danger for myself, and it started crawling at me without looking away from my face (rather than scurry away as mice usually do). Without breaking eye contact and while i was backing away, it became a very large rat, the size of a small cat, and i knew it was going to try to eat me. It seemed it hadn’t had anything to eat for awhile and it saw me as food, And it seemed much braver than you’d expect. As it came at my face, i managed to grab at its neck, with intentions of slamming it hard once to break its neck, but i immediately woke up.

    -Anna - Tony's Assistant 2015-08-02 10:34:02

    Dear Ashley – The way I see your dream is that it starts with you having found the way within again; the way to your mind; to what is part of your inner world.
    THAT is a courageous step you took!
    When you dream of a house, you are meeting a hugely important and many sided representation of yourself. It is both many faceted and multidimensional.
    Although you cannot see it, your mind, along with your beliefs, has a particular structure or form. If the shape of your mind could be built into a three dimensional model, such as a house, you would probably be able to see that your mind has as unique a shape as your fingerprints. But at the same time there would be features of your mental ‘house’ that were very much the same as most of the people within your own culture.
    Each dream image holds enormous data, emotional response, and created patterns of behaviour. So in considering the house in your dream you need to remember you are in touch with a full surround databank of fantastic information about you, your past and your possibilities. You can interact with this information by exploring it in the right way.
    So try “Being the person or thing” and “Talking as the dream figure” for both the mouse and the rat.
    See http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/practical-techniques-for-understanding-your-dreams/
    Please also read http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/the-house-in-your-dream/
    Often the mice in dreams are eating away at things you have stored, or are infesting a house or ones clothes. This suggests influences that are gradually gnawing away at your energy, well-being or confidence. Or, as with the clothes, attitudes that are unclean or that you feel very uncomfortable with to the point of wanting them out of your life.
    Becoming aware of what lives in your inner world is perceived by you as a threat (at first, it WILL change when you change your mind) to your identity; to the self-image that you have built.
    I believe that is why the mouse transforms into a large rat.
    You explore in your dream if “backing away” or killing the rat will be a helpful approach and then you wake up.
    Perhaps you want to change your mind and learn to just observe your inner world – and so also what the mouse and the rat represents in your mind – without judging it – and so without backing away or trying to kill it – which I see as a more helpful approach toward transforming a mouse in a more helpful attitude.
    See http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/self-observation/
    Please also read http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/you-me-ego/
    Does that give you a start with your dream?
    Anna 🙂

-Shan 2015-07-23 13:57:51

I had a dream the a was sleeping n woke up to two rats jumping up on me in my bed i was so frightened one grey one white

-Zero 2015-07-19 18:02:26

I have dreamt of a rat crawling onto me, i think in my dream it has a mission and i was supposed to catch it, but it came to me instead and crawled to my arms and hair but i got scared so i grabbed it and when i grabbed it, it dies.. I killed it.. Can you help me interpret this, thank you very much.

-Christine 2015-07-06 21:29:39

I have dreamt about stomping and pacing in my attic. There is no room to do that, it wakes me up with my heart pounding. This has happened three times now.

-Jhanny 2015-07-03 6:22:08

I dreamt of chasing two large grey rats. And one rats was carrying something with its teeth. Help me. What does this mean?

-Tina parmenter 2015-06-28 22:54:44

I dreamt I saw a rat crawling along some concrete steps , I was in a car and it jumped at the window and stared at me then leapt in onto me and onto the seat next to me I grabbed it and threw it out the door

-Thelma 2015-06-19 6:36:54

It is 2:30 am and I was awakened by a dream of a white ray with brown patches. I am not a fan of rats at all, so it surprised me that I actually dreamed of it. In my dream I could not catch the whiye rat. It was very fast and everywhere in the house. If I’m not mistaken I think my brother in law killed it for me. What does this dream symbolizes????

-Victoria Scanga 2015-06-16 15:17:42

I had a dream the other night. I was drinking from a water bottle and a pet rat (it was grey) kept trying to drink from the water as well, except it was submerging its head completely. I felt worried the rat was going to drown, so I would pull it out, but it would go right back to drinking. I was looking out a window during all of this, in like an attic or old wooden structure.

-Desiree 2015-05-24 23:01:07

There was a big rat at the bottom of my bed in my dream, it’s head was massive and it was staring at me, I was so scared in my dream and I shouted for my Mum. I don’t stay with my Mum though.

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