Attack Attacked Attacker
In looking at many dreams in which attack takes place, it is obvious that there are many degrees and forms of attack. So attack or being attacked can represent many things such as feeling attacked or threatened by ones own impulses such as anger or sexuality; feeling surreptitiously attacked by other people and their attitude to you or their remarks; a subtle sense of being attacked by age, or a serious attack by an illness – one speaks of an asthma or virus attack for instance, but also one may be attacked by a poison, or food if one is allergic to it; one might personally attack an issue or a project, and so a dream might depict one attacking something in this sense; confidence may be attacked; it is a common term in sport or business, and so may refer to attitude or energy. This aspect of attack may also refer to ones beliefs, or to other peoples, which may be attacked and threatened; attack is also sometimes a form of defence, so may suggest defensiveness about some issue or aspect of ones life. A positive side to attack is that we often feel attacked by an emerging new insight or positive personal change. We feel it as an attack because it threatens our old way of life, our habitual way of ding things and thinking about things.
It is important to define or be aware of ones response to threat or attack in a dream. Experiments in connection with dreams in which the person runs away from attack, or is very passive, show that if the dreamer visualises changing the situation and faces attackers, their dreams and even waking behaviour changes radically. Passivity in dream situations may depict the innate feeling that we are helpless in dealing with the feelings involved. This usually dates from past experience, perhaps in childhood, where in fact one did not have the strength or maturity to meet what was happening. See Life Changes.
Occasionally attack in dreams shows a desire to be attacked in order to live out forms of self punishment or sadism. In most such cases this desire arises out of a need to remember, and make fully conscious, punishment or sadism that has been practised on the dreamer.
Being attacked: This dream usually arises because in some way you are repressing, in conflict with, or frightened off your own emotions, sexuality or anger. Occasionally the fear is about ones own potential or expanded awareness.
Attacked by animal: Feeling under threat from external events or internal emotions, impulses or ideas; feeling a victim in relationship to others and self; taking a defensive attitude. The repression or fear here is in regard to your own natural urges. Sometimes our dreams put into animal form someone who we feel is expressing anger toward us.
Attacked by shadowy or frightening figure: Our childhood traumas and fears may take this guise in a dream. So in this case the attack is depicting our feelings of fear and pain surrounding those past issues. How we meet such an attack is important. If we run from it, the trauma may remain largely unconscious, and therefore capable of influencing our behaviour negatively. Better to explore it or change it. (For help doing this see Stand in Role under peerdream work.)
Attacked by animal: Introverting one’s own aggression or sexuality; fear of one’s own natural urges; anxiety about aggression in oneself or other people; feeling attacked by an external person.
Being the attacker: This is more positive, as you are not being passive and hurt in your dreams. But you are still in conflict with whatever it is your attacking. Considering that what you attack is probably a part of your own personality, it might be better to meet it in some way. Positive self expression; defending oneself against something one feels threatened by; attempt to destroy some urge or feeling in oneself or others. The word attack is also used in many ways, so might refer to an ‘attack’ of an illness, or ‘heart attack’. Can express the difference between feeling threatened by a work/relationship/sex problem, or feeling challenged by it in a way to stimulate creativity or research.
Bird attacking: Fear of ideas, ideals or opinions; verbal attack by others; fear of the Self – a view of things that may destroy ones present more limited views or opinions.
Sexual attack: This has many aspects, and can at times be a re-playing of previous sexual attacks, or an expression of fear concerning them. But we also create dreams of sexual attack when we are frightened of our own feelings and desires. Grof gives the interesting account of a woman who experienced many images of sexual attack. He says:-
…. whenever a boy friend initiated even the most innocent sexual approach, such as touching. embracing, or kissing, she was overwhelmed with terror. It seemed to her that when such a situation occurred, her lover was actually changing physically and assuming animal features. Repeatedly, she fled from these situations in a state of panic anxiety and never wanted to see her partner again. Episodes of this kind were repeatedly relived …. with details of the physical setting, as well as the physical sensations and emotions involved. From Realms of The Human Unconscious, by S. Grof. Published by Souvenir Press.
Someone else being attacked: Anger or aggression toward another; killing off an aspect of oneself represented by the person in the dream. If the person is someone you are in relationship with, it suggests an attempt, however short, to distance oneself from them emotionally. See: fight; War.
Example: I had this dream at a time when there was a lot of talk and anxiety in newspapers and on television about nuclear war. In the dream a nuclear attack had been announced. I immediately thought of my children who are away in boarding school. I go out into the street to see if I can get to them, but realise it is hopeless. In the street everybody is walking about as if it were a holiday Sunday. I realised there was no time to get to my children so decided to join the people on the street. John C.
John had this dream at a time when there was a lot of media coverage about nuclear attack. It is therefore most likely dealing with his real fears about how he would deal with such an attack if it happened.
Example: Whilst suffering from nervous exhaustion three years ago. I had a recurring nightmare that left me feeling totally worthless and wretched. In it I underwent an indecent attack upon my person by my father. I was about four or five in the dream. It was not the attack in itself that left me with these feelings, but rather the look my mother gave me shortly afterwards – making me feel like a specimen in a jar. In the dream I sensed she had refused to be his wife fully, until he had got us into our own home again. I sense she is blaming me for not being able to continue with this threat, and that once more she will have to suffer my father’s attentions because of me. There is no one to help me so I decide to leave. I pack a small case, which I believe someone gets for me. In reality I did try to leave home at this age but got no further than the bus stop across the road. Maria.
Maria gives no indication of whether she was abused by her father, but the dream is certainly dealing with the sexual politics of her parents.
Example: Several men attacked me and were trying to drag me off somewhere against my will. As the dream progressed, or replayed, I began to realise that it only appeared like an attack because I was resisting the process. In fact the men wanted to show me something that was important to me. They were being quite gentle, but because of my resistance, it felt to me like an aggressive act. My thoughts about this are that this may represent the way I feel about events. Because of underlying anxiety, I feel events and changes, such as losing my job are very threatening and difficult to bear. In fact no harm has come from these events at all. The dream suggests that I am being led somewhere if only I would go along with things. Albie R.
Sometimes it is our response to the action that makes it appear like an attack. So it is worthwhile entering the dream again in imagination and exploring it – try Acting on your dream.
Useful Questions and Hints:
If I take the images away what are my feelings about the attack, and where am I meeting those feelings?
Is there any way I can change this dream? For help doing this see Carrying the Dream Forward.
What are the underlying issues here?
Comments
I had a dream last night that I was being brutally cut all over by this yesteryear Indian actor that was my dad’s favourite (strange). He was in costume dressed like one of the roles he played onscreen which I vaguely recollect as that of an Indian god ( in an old movie about hindu mythology I guess).This actor ( Sivaji Ganesan) , known by this generation to over act and over emote way too much was doing exactly that as he was using a blade to make deep cuts in my hands. I felt no pain but was very annoyed. My family was standing around watching this happen but did not react in any way or try to stop him. He started making piercings in the palms of my hands kind of like how Jesus’ hands were nailed. I was the only one to react. I felt like it was up to me to stop it. So I yelled at him, pushed him away and went and washed all the blood away. My mom helped me get into fresh clothes. But didnt react to me being injured so badly. All through this I felt no pain physically. I was just annoyed. Also in the dream I felt like I was undergoing this for no fault of mine as opposed to my husband who was standing next to me.I felt like it was all his fault that I was taking this upon me.what do I make of this.
Dear Veena – What I see in your dream – and please explore it yourself as well http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/dream-yoga/ and http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/acting-on-your-dream/#BeingPerson – is that you dare to look at an aspect of your inner world.
I see the actor in your dream as a reflection of the role of your inner male; your animus; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/archetype-of-the-animus-jungs-view-of-the-male-in-the-female/
The animus can be depicted in a dream by a heroic or spiritual male figure. The animus can be wonderfully creative or powerfully destructive, depending upon your relationship with it. The negative aspect of the animus may show as the man who imprisons or leads you into danger or tortures or beats you. The positive animus shows as the man who solves problems, shows how things work, exhibits love despite trials, and is the deliverer from death.
In general we can say the man in a woman’s dreams represents your mental and social power, your ability to act creatively in ‘the world’.
The cuts in your hands indicate that this is where you are hurt. The hand is an extension of your (creative) power – with your hands you give, take, wound, heal, support or do.
Your inner male also holds in it an expression of your complex of feelings about men, gained as experience mostly from your relationship with – or lack of relationship with – your father;
“Also in the dream I felt like I was undergoing this for no fault of mine as opposed to my husband who was standing next to me. I felt like it was all his fault that I was taking this upon me.”
It might take some practice to learn to take full responsibility for what you have absorbed/created in your inner world.
I use the word absorb, because as children we absorb so much from living with the family we grow up with.
The family in your dream did not react in any way, because they reflect those (religious) values, attitudes and emotional or social responses you have absorbed from them – and your parents from their parents; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/ancestors/ – and so “they” – these inner aspects of you – are probably okay with what your dream figure perceives as nuisance to expressing (more of) your creativity – your potential – in your own way; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/potential/
There is a part of you however that realises that “this has to stop” as you become aware of the self-sacrifices you have to make; the killing of aspects of you – crucifixion – that could be part of a male dominated religion in which women play a secondary role.
Because your IP number shows that you live in India and your name is Veena you might have been raised with the idea/belief that your primary duty is to help your husband in performing obligatory duties and enable him to continue his family tradition; give birth to his children and take care of them. Are you a Hindu?
A part of you – with the help of your inner mother http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/mother-mum-ma/#InnerMother – is willing to develop new ways, new habits and attitudes – get into fresh clothes – without making it into a drama or blaming anybody.
Because Hinduism has been called the world’s oldest religion, blaming your husband also means that you will blame his father, from whom your husband absorbed his (religious) values, blaming his grandfather, from whom your father-in-law absorbed his (religious) values, blaming his great grandfather etc. which will become a never ending list of blaming.
See also http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/forgiveness-as-a-power-source/
Let me know if you have any questions Veena.
Anna 🙂
Hello, I not only moments ago but continuously have nightmares of me being attacked in a perfectly normal environment such as visiting a hotel or a friends house and, after being the only one left the attacker brandishes a weapon (usually a knife) against me. I always fight back until I retrieve the weapon but then I repeatedly stab my attacker until I know he’s dead before I start to run (which is when I wake up). I have no idea what it means but the dreams are so real that I wake up to find myself in a panic and trying to actually get away or feeling as if im in real danger for several minutes after waking up.
Dear Samantha – In general dreams recur because there are ways you habitually respond to your internal or external world. Because your attitude or response is unchanging, the dream that reflects it remains the same.
Recurring dreams can arise because there is a need to learn something. Also the growth instinct is incredible powerful and pushes you through growth, sometimes unwillingly if you resist it can cause recurring dreams.
Your dreams show that the approach you are using – kill and run – is not solving this issue in your inner world and so you might as well try a different one, because you cannot run away from yourself.
I wonder if the attack is a rather enforced form of self-criticism that arises after you have spent time with other people. Do you have thoughts like “I should have said this” or “I should not have done that” etc. after meeting with people?
Because the attacker is a part of your own personality too; you can use “Being the attacker” – http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/acting-on-your-dream/#BeingPerson – to explore/meet this part of you.
It will be helpful to realise that the inner critic isn’t your enemy; he could be just a friend who’s delivering the message too forcefully and without considering your feelings. So it might be helpful to also explore how to get this inner voice delivering constructive thoughts. Like the inspiring mentor who urged you to do your best and didn’t accept anything less – but with a supportive and encouraging tone of voice.
A way to practice this could be by starting a dialogue with the attacker while you are awake; you can for instance tell him that you are willing to listen what he has to say, when he can deliver the message “without using a knife”; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/dialogue-with-a-dream-character-or-object/
While learning to “edit” the way you express your inner voice, it will serve a purpose to allow for some “unedited expression” once a week as well. Taking care of “both sides” will keep you in balance.
Dropping any form of judgment, if only for short periods while you open to the mystery you are, is important. At first it may cause some concern because you are unblocking part of the flow, and it may start pushing out some of the attitudes, past experiences and habits that have been blocking your greater flow. Usually those things would have been cleansed in the normal LifeStream, but unconscious tensions and resistances prevent the healing. This is why we have to consciously take in hand the work of dropping our self-control for periods of time.
See http://dreamhawk.com/approaches-to-being/the-lifestream/#Open
Let me know if you have any questions Samantha.
Anna 🙂
Can someone help me with this dream? I was waiting for one of my best friends to come out of hes house but suddenly I started being attacked by another friend of mine and he kept mocking that i couldn’t get away but oddly enough let me call for help (my best friend) although had an nasty grin on his face. I woke up when my best friend pulled me out of the other persons grasp. It was weird in the dream i was screaming but it didn’t sound like me. does that make sense?
Dear Nessie – Conflicts we feel and/or meet in our dreams are nearly always conflicts with ourselves which is not usually recognised. All the images in your dream are projections from your inner world onto the screen of your sleeping mind. Your dreams are like thoughts, they do not deal with the dreamed of people or things. But they do deal with the reality of your own inner life.
You can use “Being my best friend”, “Being another friend” and “Being your dream figure” to explore what these aspects are expressing and what the conflict is about; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/acting-on-your-dream/#BeingPerson
Another way is to explore what associations you have with your friends in your dream; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/person-and-individuals/
“Being in the grip of this other friend” might mean that you experience something unpleasant that you perceive as having no control over and you need another aspect of yourself to “undo the grip”.
You did not sound like “me” in your dream could reflect that an aspect of you that you do not usually “give a voice” is allowed to express herself now and so it might be that you are learning to ask for help. See also http://dreamhawk.com/approaches-to-being/lifes-little-secrets/
Your best friend in your dream is a living part of you, just as your hand is not a symbol it is a living part of you. As such a person is alive and responsive, with enormous depths. And a good friend is a wonderful aid in your life, an aid that can see you through the difficult times, and show you a new side of yourself.
Let me know if you have any questions so far Nessie.
Anna 🙂
Hi there, I just had an intense dream last night where I was laying on the couch and heard someone trying to break in. He finally saw me and pointed a gun at me and began running into the bedroom, where my boyfriend was sleeping. I chased him and grabbed the gun which turned out not to be loaded. Than I ran into the kitchen, was so busy loading the gun the man had grabbed a knife and went to yet again attack my boyfriend, not really trying to harm me at all but definitely trying to harm him. I was just curious about what that could mean thank you!
I had a dream I just woke up from in which my girlfriend and I were walking down the hallway of (what seemed like, in the dream) our high school after/before school hours. We were trying to get to a place…I wouldn’t be able to explain what place or why, but suddenly, a blonde boy, a couple of years younger than us, started flirting with my girlfriend. Now of course, my jealousy spikes. I mouth off to this boy, trying to get him to leave id alone as I hold her in my arms, walking further down the seemingly endless but short at the same time hallway, but he kept following us. As soon as we get to what seems like the end of the hall, this kid pulls out a flipknife. Two, actually. I try to keep her safe behind me, kicking and growling at this kid. Then, someone unknown, an entity of sorts, passed me my own weapon, a flipknife much smaller than the boy’s. I flinched, not knowing who to thank, but I fought the assailant with it anyway. The girlfriend started fighting back, which made me even more feircely protective. Suddenly, the kid is bruised and beaten on the floor, and I get a rushing sense of relief because that same entity from before helped us again.
I care very much for my girlfriend, I just don’t know what’s wrong with me.
I keep having these dreams of being attacked but they are not the same kind they are sometimes set in different places places I know some I don’t its not always a person but animals ghosts things that look like they come out of a horror film they also attack in different ways I normally jump awake a second before they hurt me scares me so much sometimes I cry I have to get out of bed to do something to slow my heart rate down how can I stop this I’m constantly tired because of this
Dear Joanne – Perhaps it helps to become aware why you jump awake a second before “they” hurt you?
Although the dream process attempts to release difficult emotions, trauma and past experience, most people have inbuilt mechanisms which prevent this spontaneous healing activity. It is natural to pull your hand away from a hot surface because of the pain. We do this ‘without thinking’, unconsciously in fact. Similarly we unconsciously pull away from any painful or frightening emotions, even though it may be in our best interests to release or integrate them.
Similarly we unconsciously pull away from any painful or frightening emotions, even though it may be in our best interests to release or integrate them. The non-release leads to physical tension; a massive (ab) use of energy to contain such emotions (being constantly tired) and development of physical illness. Resistance may also be in the form of not wanting to change; fear of the new; feeling threatened by fresh views of life or any questioning of the values one has long lived by. To free “your selves” from such resistances needs a positive motivation and the learning of new psychological and even physical skills, as presented in present forms of psychotherapy.
It is interesting that many of the ways life heals us are avoided by us or are felt as unpleasant. For instance vomiting, a fever, a boil are often fought against with pain killers – even sneezing is often stifled. And these ways of healing also apply psychologically, and can be allowed instead of stifled or run away from.
See http://dreamhawk.com/approaches-to-being/lifes-little-secrets/
and
http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/practical-techniques-for-understanding-your-dreams/
Anna 🙂
I have had a reoccurring dream for many years now. Sometimes I am myself about 11 years old and sometimes it is my me on the first day of college. Either way, I meet a boy my same age. He seems like a very nice boy, one that I would choose to be best friends with. In the college version he is going to be my roommate. There is something about him that says he is harmless, fun, caring, friendly, loving, loyal, basically every quality that one would want for friendship. Instead of befriending this boy, I viciously attack him usually with a blunt object. I can see that I have seriously wounded him. Instead of getting him help, I either dispose of him in a dumpster, or bury him under concrete in my garage, or if it is the version where I am in college, I usually bury him under a classroom floor where my desk sits. People soon begin searching for the boy as well as the police begin asking questions. I try to keep quite about it, divert them from the area where he is buried and hope that they don’t figure out that I did it and charge me with murder.
Dear Rodney – The way I see your interesting dream – and please explore it yourself as well http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/dream-yoga/ – is that you give it a lot of effort to NOT be your own best friend and you do your best to hide it for yourself.
You cannot be your own best friend when you believe that both “the saint” and “the murderer” have to be in conflict with each other; they are like two sides of the same coin.
A way to step out of this conflict may be to become an impartial, non-judging observer and to not identify with either one of them; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/self-observation/
So you are not “the harmless, fun, caring, friendly, loving, loyal person” nor are you the “harmful, not fun to be with, uncaring, unfriendly, unloving, not loyal murderer”.
Wholeness means you have integrated and come to terms with every aspect of who you are. You have met within you the murderer, the saint, the swindler and the honest trader, the sexual pervert and the straight married person, the homosexual and the heterosexual, the darker and the light filled should find a balance in each individual.
This balance is like a razors edge in which any one-sidedness would lead to imbalance within the individual. But at the same time it is not about being perfect or a saint, but a balanced and whole human being with very wide choices.
See also http://dreamhawk.com/body-and-mind/movement-to-wholeness/
Let me know if you have any questions Rodney.
Anna 🙂
I hope someone can help me make sense of my dream last night. In the dream I was asleep (or half asleep), suddenly someone is on top of my back, pushing me down into my pillow so my screams are muffled. It felt like it was real and went on for at least a minute. Then I woke up. I was sleeping on my stomach in the dream, so I couldn’t see an attacker and the only voice I remember is my muffled screaming.
Dear Heather – I hoped you would have written down anything that you think might have triggered the dream or links with it in some way, and how you feel in the dream; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/not-enough-information/
To dream of being asleep (or half asleep), is to be unaware of something. It is literally saying there is something you are asleep to, something you are not aware of.
My somewhat educated guess is that your dream symbolises that you do not feel capable of expressing yourself properly. (It could also be a memory from your past, which is influencing you again, because you did not digest it yet; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/digest/ )
It could relate to being or feeling manipulated or criticized and you do not manage to tell the person to “get off your back”, perhaps because you feel dominated by him/her.
See also http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/active-passive/
It might help to enter your dream again while awake and explore what you feel in the dream.
If we take away the images and events occurring in a dream and simply look to see what feelings or emotions are evident, the dream is often more understandable than if we try to interpret the symbols. Feelings in dreams are nearly always undistorted. We therefore do not need to interpret them, simply to recognise them and see if we can recognise where they occur in waking life; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/self-observation/
Anna 🙂
Hi! I’ve been having a dream where my family and I are in our house and are surrounded by a sort of army of attackers, and we have to hide and fight them. In this dream my brother and I were running out of the house to get away but someone was captured so we ran back and fought two people. I then had to kill them to save us. What does this mean?
Dear Beca – What I see in your dream – but please dive into it and see for yourself as well http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/dream-yoga/ – is that you are exploring how to deal with thoughts that differ from the values, attitudes and emotional or social responses you have absorbed from your family.
One of the most frequent sources of imprisonment or being captured is your own habits, trapping you in old ways of feeling and responding. But it can be the result of any limiting influence within, or outside of you. If the influence seems to be from outside, it is only because you have not yet discovered your own attitudes that make you subject to that limitation. So they trap you through your own anxiety, patterns of behaviour, and concepts such as right and wrong, good and bad.
“Saving us” I thus see as saving your old way of life, your habitual way of doing things and thinking about things. See http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/habits/ and http://dreamhawk.com/news/avoiding-being-my-own-victim/
Perhaps you feel like exploring other ways of dealing with “attackers” and so with this inner conflict? http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/secrets-power-dreaming/
Let me know if you have any questions.
Anna 🙂
Last night i dreamt about myself, my boyfriend, and a lot many people, out of which i knew few people. We went to the topmost floor of a building which was really dark an isolated. A large part of my dream consisted of being chased by something unknown which is dangerous. Then we hid in a corner of the floor which had staircase. While talking i saw two dangerous unknown things which were chasing us. I was too scared to even inform the people who were with me to run because i thought those two will come to know and kill them. So i ran away as fast as i can. When i safely came out of the building i heard that the people, including my boyfriend, are all killed by those two unknown things. I started to panic and felt guilty about not telling them to run away with me. Later, i found myself in a different place and a man ushered me inside and i saw my boyfriend being treated. His cheek was swollen but he was fine otherwise. I cried profusely and apologized to him for not informing them about those two dangerous things, and we finally hugged.
Dear Kanwal – In the world of dreams our most intimate fears and longings are given an exterior life of their own in the form of the people, objects and places of our dream. Every image and person in your dreams is an expression of your own life process. As such it is alive and intelligent and is something sent to help you. A dream is like a projection from a movie projector, except that you are the projector.
Everything you see as outside you is coming from you, your emotions, your fears, your beliefs, your joys and explorations are all you, clothed in the dream images and drama.
What I see in your dream is that you dare to move to the top floor, which suggests that you take a step towards moving closer to meeting shadow parts of you and/or becoming aware of painful memories that are still haunting you.
Shadow parts are those parts in your inner world that symbolise your our own rejected emotions or potentials. It is the aspect of yourselves you reject; the secondary side of your personality; its non-dominant traits; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/shadowy-figure/
Perhaps you rejected those aspects because you were injured in some way or felt hurt and so you decided to stop living and expressing parts of your inner male? http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/archetype-of-the-animus-jungs-view-of-the-male-in-the-female/
Your dream suggests that despite your fear and your running away you manage to move towards inner healing – “I saw my boyfriend being treated. His cheek was swollen but he was fine otherwise. I cried profusely and apologized to him for not informing them about those two dangerous things” – and towards joining with your inner male again – “and we finally hugged.”
I believe that your inner loving attitude of not blaming/judging and of taking full responsibility for the situation you have created in your inner world, also created a state of mind in which healing was enabled; “Later, I found myself in a different place.”
I feel you have to decide for yourself if there is still a need to explore “the two unknown, dangerous things”; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/acting-on-your-dream/#BeingPerson
and
http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/dream-yoga/
You might have met and released these “things” already when you “cried profusely – http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/cried-cry-crying/ – and apologized to him for not informing them about those two dangerous things”; apologizing can be seen as forgiving yourself.
Let me know if you have any questions Kanwal.
Anna 🙂
I have recurring dreams of being attacked whether at my car or apartment by one or more individuals. It is a typical home invasion/robbery. Most of the time I am properly equipped to defend myself, but when it comes down to it, I cannot defend myself. My attempts all ultimately fail. What is going on in my poor brain? (Several months ago I made the decision to protect myself with a gun carry permit and person defense firearm. I believe I am proficient with my firearm, and my heart is in the right place.)
Dear Joe S – In general dreams recur because there are ways the dreamer habitually responds to their internal or external world. Because their attitude or response is unchanging, the dream that reflects it remains the same. It is noticeable in those who explore their dreams using such techniques as described under processing dreams – http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/processing-dreams/ – that recurring themes disappear or change because the attitudes or habitual anxieties that gave rise to them have been met or transformed.
Dreams about home invasion/robbery might indicate fears or difficult emotions arising from within you in a way that threatens you. If this applies it could indicate neglected parts of yourself which if met could enlarge who you are as a person.
The burglars might also suggest the loss of valuable talents or qualities that you have robbed yourself of through your behaviour – or been robbed of in some way during your growth and development.
So the first step could be to bring your decision to “see” the threat in the outside world back to where it belongs; in your inner world; http://dreamhawk.com/inner-life/inner-world/#MakesInner
Neglected parts are also called “the Shadow” and we often tend to project it; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/projection/
The Shadow is any part of ourselves that we reject, and so do not allow sufficient expression in our life. We may so dislike aspects of our nature we fail to recognise them altogether and instead see them in other people and criticise them.
The shadow develops in us, according to Jolande Jacobi, because as we grow and absorb our culture, we naturally repress parts of our nature as they are not acceptable to parents or society.
See http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/the-archetype-of-the-shadow/
Anna 🙂
I am having reoccurring dreams about being pregnant with my husbands child. All of them are the the same…I’m walking alone and someone is following me. I try to call my husband for help but he never answers. I then get attack by whoever is following me. It’s usually someone from his past that is attacking me, saying I’m not allowed to have his baby. And this last time, I dreamt it was actually my husband attacking me in this time.
Mary – First of all you must realise that when you dream you are not only receiving information from the outer world of your senses but from your inner world. Most people do not realise that their inner world is often more important than the outer world. See http://dreamhawk.com/inner-life/inner-world/#MakesInner
This means that you may not realise that you have an inner husband equally as powerful as an external husband. You have taken in millions of bit of memory, lessons learnt, life experiences, along with all the feelings or problems met by loving and living with your husband, and they are what makes you the person you are. This is true even if your husband was never there for you – you still have all the memories of him not being there for you filed under ‘husband’. The memories and experience we gather unconsciously change us and are not lost. It is part of you and is symbolised in dreams as a person or event. Such an inner husband can appear in dreams because you are deeply influenced by what you hold within you.
It seems obvious from the description of your dream that it is not your outer husband causing the problem in your dream. So what memories or past experiences are linked with your feelings of protecting your baby? Take time with this.
Perhaps you also need to realise that a dreamt of baby usually represent a new aspect of you wants to emerge in your life – perhaps a new ability or interest, but even a part of you, you never allowed expression because of other duties or marriage. See http://dreamhawk.com/pregnancy-childbirth/the-baby-in-your-dream/
It is innate in women to dream of being creative and giving birth in their dreams. So I believe that such a baby is a very real part of you – though an inner and not always an outer part. It is because you are a female mammal and females are designed to have babies – it is instinctive and unavoidable to at least dream of creating a child. You developed in this way because you are a creature of evolution.
But your baby can be creative in new ways such as the urge toward social actions, in caring for others, in creative art work, such as writing or music, or ways beyond counting.
Tony
Can someone help me with this dream? I have dreams with similar happenings at least once every 2-3days.
In my dream I see a group of men attacking a young girl, with the intentions of sexually assaulting her.
I run up, free the girl, and then the men turn their attention to me. In my dreams I always end up murdering all of the men.
I’ve never been sexually assaulted in my life, so I have no idea where this stems from.
Dear Frankie – Sexual assault in a dream can depict the real evil of other people who disregard your personal needs and feelings, abusing not only your body, but particularly you as a ‘person’. Sometimes a sexual assault in a dream can mean that you are overcome by events, by other people dominating you, or by your own internal unwanted emotions.
Please also read http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/sex-and-dreams/
In general dreams recur because there are ways you habitually respond to your internal or external world. Because your attitude or response is unchanging, the dream that reflects it remains the same. It is noticeable in those who explore their dreams using such techniques as described under processing dreams – http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/processing-dreams/ – that recurring themes disappear or change because the attitudes or habitual anxieties that gave rise to them have been met or transformed.
Your recurring dreams suggest that you have not found the right approach yet to this (inner) conflict .
Killing these men could be a symbol of repressing or killing aspects of yourself, so you might want to explore different ways of dealing with this situation in your (inner) life.
http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/secrets-power-dreaming/
and
http://dreamhawk.com/approaches-to-being/the-lifestream/
Anna 🙂
Please can someone analyse my dream,
I was sat outside my house on a longish table and on a chair, a girl I like is suddenly opposite me (I text her before I fell asleep and have been thinking if I want a relationship with her slot recently) anyway, I have a book in front of me to do with driving one of the only pages I rememebr is ‘preperation for secondary stopping’ I don’t even think this is a real thing. I ask her why she is out late and her mum will go mad she replies something along the lines of ‘sometimes you just have too’ she shortly goes and for some reason she runs off down the street with me running (normally) after her and I force a kiss out of her. Somehow I then take a pill (drug) not like a medical sort, I have never taken one before however have been offered a lot in the past 5 days, at first it makes me happy, a car come into the street blinded me people jumped out and I began to worry and get skittish, they both are people I consider friends however not exactly close with every time they got close their face changed I think and I suddenly thought I was going to get attacked (jumped) but when they stood with a good size comfort zone I was happy enough around them.
Thanks in advance much appreciated.
I frequently have nightmares about viciously attacking my own mother before she attacks me first. In the dream, no matter how hard i try she is never harmed no matter how brutal my attack is. There is also usually a lot of crying on my part in the dream, while her portrayal is usually malicious and taunting. I just woke up from a dream like this 20 minutes ago.
Dear Becca – I believe that in your dreams you have given your (inner) mother the role of the inner critic.
See also http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/mother-mum-ma/#InnerMother
The strategy you apply in your dreams is that “attack is the best form of defence”. Because your dreams do not change, I think it is worthwhile questioning this approach by exploring other ways and see how they work out for you.
Because your inner mother is a part of your inner family, I feel it will be more helpful to try to solve this inner conflict.
You could explore if you can learn to communicate with this part of your inner world and explain to “her” what it is that you need.
For instance; “I need to feel loved by you for the fact that I AM a part of Life, not for what I DO in life.
I need you to stop judging me, because it robs me of my innate goodness, worth, talent, values, and ability”.
A useful tool to explore this way of working with your dreams is called Power Dreaming.
So while awake and relaxed imagine yourself back in the dream and continue it as fantasy or a daydream and move it toward satisfaction. Alter the dream in any way; experiment with it; play with it, until you find a way to fully feel at ease with it. In doing this you must not ignore the feelings of resistance and spontaneous emotion and fantasy that may occur. Satisfaction comes only when you have found a way of integrating these into your conscious imagining.
See http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/secrets-power-dreaming/
Does that give you a start?
Anna 🙂