Drowning
This is such a common dream and has been answered hundreds of times, we first ask you to look through the many answers given in Drowning – Many Replies Hopefully you will find an answer to your own drowning dream
Because of the water, drowning depicts fear of being overwhelmed by difficult emotions or anxieties, so it often points to struggles – conflicts – or fighting for survival you may have in your life. But this might apply not to dangerous emotions or urges, but to natural urges such as eating, loving or sex, that some people have enormous conflicts with. Drowning in a dream is also about struggling to survive as a person, so it applies to your identity as it is dealing with relationship with other people, but also with your own internal world of instincts, body activities and needs.
But the feelings of being overwhelmed can be caused by fear or anxiety. But if we can, we can meet and dissolve these. For whenever we dream its images are not like real life, because a dream is nothing like outer life where things could hurt you, but is an image like on a cinema screen that even if a gun is pointed at you and fired it can do no damage – except if you run in fear. So all the things that scare you are simply your own fears projected onto the screen of your sleeping mind.
So in dreams you cannot drown, but fear takes away your confidence, so then you go through the agonised emotions of drowning.
This is about being or feeling overwhelmed by something. One can ‘drown’ in sorrow for instance. So you need to look at your waking life to see what you are feeling threatened or burdened by and see if there are ways you can deal with it. If someone else actually drowns in the dream it may mean some of your feelings, your creativity and responsiveness are no longer ‘alive’. But they can be brought back to life if you care for that side of yourself. Sometimes it is simply anxiety we drown in, and much of anxiety is about situations we imagine. Separating what is imagined from what is real can help this. See Characters and People in Dreams
But such fear can be caused because if un-dealt with traumas from childhood are not faced, or by being exposed to awful film images that you believe are real. Read and Martial Art of the Mind
If you feel you are struggling to you ‘keep your head above water’ in a dream, do not give in for it is only emotions you are facing, not reality.
Water and drowning often indicates you are facing the unknown changes and so are afraid. But in dreams we can never die or even be hurt, for we wake without real hurt except for our feelings.
Going under water in a dream depicts you are going deeper into your awareness, so you are beginning to explore your unconscious. That is a major step in your development and is an evolutionary advance. It can lead to many major new abilities such as a wider awareness of life around you. A person describes one of the possible changes, “Unexpectedly everything changed and my fundamental self was something that existed throughout all time. It didn’t have a beginning or end. There was no goal to achieve. I am.”
Dreamt about someone else: May occasionally show Your apprehension about their health or well being, having the suggestion of death or breakdown.
Example: ‘I fell into a pond. My brother was frightened to be by himself so he jumped in. We were both drowning in the water and we shouted out for Mum. My brother drowned.’ Poppy S.
Poppy dreamt this while feeling insecure and anxious due to her father being seriously ill.
Example: I had been dreaming about sitting on a sofa with my friends – well watching horror movies, when suddenly everything comes to live. I was afraid of the ghost that had been drowning with her husband in the movie, and it comes to haunt me. I asked the ghost’s sister to help and she passes me a necklace with can protect me. And suddenly the ghost appears and tells my friend she was pretty. What does this means?
It means that you need to understand how your mind works. It means that you have nothing to fear about ghosts. As the ghost that appeared showed you, there was no harm in it. Dream images are like images on cinema screens – harmless unless you are haunted by your own fears. But the dream also shows you that whatever you believe in becomes a fact and alive in our dreams. It mean that the necklace gave you confidence, and in fact the necklace is only a crutch for your confidence. But we need such things until we can deal with our own emotions. See Facing Fear
Idioms: drown your sorrow; if you’re born to hang, you won’t drown.
Useful questions:
What powerful emotions or changes am I dealing with?
Am I feeling overwhelmed by something?
Can I define the strengths and ways I use to deal with threatening feelings?
Do I feel as if I am ‘drowning’ in a situation or relationship?
What is it I am feeling overwhelmed by recently?
Is this someone else drowning – if so what facet of me do they represent?
What resource or person could help me survive in this situation?
Another person or animal drowning still suggests it is an aspect of your own personality you need to care for.
Whoever or whatever it is, imagine yourself back in the dream and save them. If necessary imagine rescue services coming to your aid. In doing this you are using imagery to shift your feelings and anxieties.
All water in some way signifies your own inner world of feelings, but the sea often suggests meeting urges and wisdom lying beyond the boundary of your conscious mind. What is it you feel in the sea or river? Try putting it into words.
See Associations Working With; Techniques for Exploring your Dreams; Avoid Being Victims; Secrets of Power Dreaming
Comments
I had a dream where some of my family and I we’re around water, I’m afraid of the deep water so I stayed on some portable stairs that was in the water; my brother in law came to talk to me and we’re just playing around when I see my 2 yr old niece come up the stairs and wanted to jump off the stairs and I yelled no but she jumped anyway. She fell in and I could hear her cry and I jumped in and I couldn’t reach her, it felt like I had a life jacket on and my niece just seemed to go deeper and deeper as if we were in the ocean.. What could that mean?
I had a dream in which I must have fallen asleep in the bathtub, during bath. I awoke when my head was underwater. I gripped the side of the tub and tried to come up for air but then there were 1-2 people pushing my head under. I awoke, fell back asleep and had the same dream. Thus time when I woke I had a feeling of being utterly alone in the world, no family or friends.
Hi. My boyfriend just woke to tell me he has been having a continuous recurring nightmare. It started about a week ago when he dreamed that his son drowned but my son (a lifeguard) saved him. Only it was no longer him but something evil that emerged. Subsequent to that he dreamed that my son then drowned and his son (who in reality is a weak swimmer) saved him. But my son drowned twice, the first time so that he could die, and the second time was in order for the evil to return from the underworld.
Is it possible that the meaning of this/these dreams is my boyfriend’s fear that perhaps he is failing his child as a father and, as we have had some trouble with his son lying and stealing, he fears that his son will corrupt my son?
My 4 year old daughter keeps dreaming that she’s drowning .. Why ?
Dear .. – You will have to do some exploring and investigating to understand why your daughter is having this recurring dream; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/not-enough-information/
You could ask your daughter if there are other people involved in her recurring dream;
like her parents, brothers and/or sisters, other adults, children from kindergarten etc.
I ask because a dream like that could mean that your daughter is struggling to keep her head above water in some aspects of her life – family life, life in kindergarten etc. – because she perceives (some of ) the demands as too much to deal with.
A way to change this “threat” is to question where the demands might be too much indeed and help her learn to cope with demands that are appropriate for a child her age.
Even at age 4, your child is very much her own person. She has distinct likes and dislikes, and her personality is developing more every day.
It could be that your daughter feels that her likes and dislikes are not honoured and that she is struggling to survive as a person, so it applies to her identity as she is dealing with relationships with other people.
Perhaps she needs to learn to express herself (better) and experience that others are listening to her; see her as a unique individual with individual needs?
Perhaps you daughter is a so called highly sensitive child that is easily overwhelmed by high levels of stimulation, sudden changes, and the emotional distress of others; http://www.amazon.co.uk/Highly-Sensitive-Child-Children-Overwhelms/dp/0007163932/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1450159104&sr=1-1&keywords=the+highly+sensitive+child
I hope this gives you a start.
Anna 🙂
I had a dream I was falling slowly into a mass body of water .and I can see myself and feel the water going in my lungs. I could even hear the bubbling sound of water.but it wasn’t scary it seemed like I was at some sort of peace .but it quickly changed to me realizing I was drowning and I woke up .I can’t help but feel that I was trying to drown in my dream like I wanted to and I think that’s what scared me.
I had a dream I was talking with my on/off boyfriend and then the next scene went to me drowning him in a fishtank but I pulled him up on his last breath and woke up with him laying beside me. What is going on??
I had a dream I looked in dirty water and I fell in and I was drowning then when I was trying to get back up every thing went pitch black I couldn’t talk or see anything I was trying to awake from my dream I was suffering for half an hour then finally i woke up then i was alone… Please tell me what it means
Dear Nancy – What I see in your dream – but please explore it for yourself as well http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/dream-yoga/ – is that you make an effort to look at your inner world.
Dirty water suggests that your emotions are in need of some cleaning up and/or that you perceive your emotions as “dirty”.
With the right approach, you can use your looking in dirty water as a means of moving towards inner healing and growth; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/dirt/
It takes practice to learn to look at your feelings without identifying with what you see. When you choose to believe that you are your emotions, then you are more likely to drown into them and you will lose any sense of being able to clarify what was “dirty” before;
what was meant as exploring then easily turns into suffering.
There are several approaches that you might want to explore which could assist you in unlearning to identify with your feelings.
Self-observation is a way of observing your inner world without judging what you see and/or with identifying with what you see. This can produce awareness and an inner transformation; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/self-observation/
Becoming aware that you are not your thoughts, not your body, not your feelings, but “Something Unknown” that is far beyond any change, can also help you approaching your inner world in a different way; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/life-beyond-change-and-pain/
Practice makes perfect!
Let me know if you have any questions Nancy.
Anna 🙂
I just dreamt that i was walking with a friend down the beach and suddenly from nowhere a coach full of mostly children and some adults came rushing through the sea and turned upside down with everyone inside it and started to sink. My friend without hesitation jumped tight in to begin saving people. I stood for longer than i wanted screaming and crying mainly at myself as to what to do as im terrified of water although i can swim but not confidently. I wanted to help so badly but i couldnt. I didnt even try as i was so scared. Children were drowning while i stood there not helping. I was crying so hard telling myself aloud how i failed myself how innocent people were dying and i did nothing….i was a complete failure. Then my friend and others were pulling people out of the coach and just as they were on the edge of the sand i ran to grab each child and put them as far away from the water as possible. So even though i was in bits crying i tried to help drag children from the sand even if i couldnt get in the water. It didnt feel like anyone really survived though as the dream switched suddenly to me and my friend high in water and me holding on to something as we waited to be rescued. This dream has really upset me.
Dear Leanne – What I see in your dream is that you become aware of habits/beliefs that were previously unknown to you. The children and a few adults are all aspects of you (your past) and they still influence the way you approach yourself and situations in your (inner) life.
Being paralysed by fear and guilt makes that you decide to not get near those parts of yourself that perceive a situation as overwhelming.
To make matters worse, you then decide to feel a victim of your decision http://dreamhawk.com/news/avoiding-being-my-own-victim/ and you are about to drown into the inner drama you have created in which you are dragging your (inner) male with you.
To move beyond this approach, it might help to become an honest observer of yourself and the way you approach your (inner) world and to take responsibility for it; http://dreamhawk.com/inner-life/inner-world/#MakesInner
This will also assist you to not judge yourself for the path you have chosen and to not identify (too much) with what you are feeling, which are two components that will aid you to move beyond being stuck in your inner drama towards change and transformation; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/personal-growth/
Observing your own ebb and flow of thoughts and feelings, your own habits and responses to things, is one of the most powerful of tools to use in transforming your life. This also leads to a fuller connection with your intuitive connection with your core.
If one uses observation you may at time realise that you are cycling through feelings or moods. So it can imply that one is experiencing a cycle which you may be trapped in. The way to get out of this cycle is to step back from it using observation; this is like stepping back and not be lost in your emotions or moods.
Please continue reading at; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/self-observation/
Let me know if you have any questions.
Anna 🙂
I had a dream of me and my mom being next to a pond and a animal started chasing us and my mom paniced and jumped in the pond and was drowning and I jumped in to help her but the animal was still after me and kept biting me and I couldn’t get to her.. Then a couple weeks later I had one of me and her again in the beach and a tsunami started to happen and I held her hand and ran but we got split up and I couldn’t find her after that
Dear Laura – When we grow up we absorb a lot from our mother, who then, becomes our inner mother in our inner world.
Many people do not realise that they have an inner mother equally as powerful as an external mother. 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 mother, and they are what makes you the person you are.
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 mother can appear in dreams because you are still deeply influenced by what you hold within you.
You become aware what you share with your inner mother; the fear of the animal inside you and the fear of entering your own deeps, beyond your conscious mind, which makes that you are more likely to “drown in it.”
See http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/animals-as-dream-figures/
Anything moving toward you in a dream usually signifies that you are becoming more aware of it, feeling it more intensely. So being chased in a dream usually denotes that you are feeling something you fear more intensely and are trying to avoid confronting it. This is not usually a good policy, as you can never get away from yourself.
You can learn to become friends with unconscious feelings (what kind of animal was it?) that “chase you” by using http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/secrets-power-dreaming/ and/or http://dreamhawk.com/approaches-to-being/the-lifestream/
In the last dream that you describe, you are exploring what it feels like to go through inner change and growth and let go of your (inner) mother.
So what did that feel like?
http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/growth-of-something/
Anna 🙂
I had a dream I was with these two girls from Disney channel and we were walking by a pool and i saw goggles and dove in to get them. I started drowning and losing air, when I woke up. I was STILL holding my breath and trying to breathe. Something in my head said “see how long you can hold your breath” then i was feeling dizzy and opened my eyes.
I had a dream where a man was on the beach and he was picking (probably drowned) dead babies from the water and he picked so many that all the babies he was caring were holding eachothers hands and legs so none will fall. This dream seriously freaked me out. What does it mean?
In the same night i dreamed about some guys getting people near a glass pool and if the people wouldn’t tell the guys the truth about something they will get drowned in that thing. A girl was trown into it and before she got to the bottom she swam to the top say that she will tell them the truth. The girl lied just to get some air and she drowned later.
The people really knew nothing about what those guys were talking about.
I just had a dream where I was being drowned by someone I haven’t met. They were wearing rugged clothing and looked pretty scary. They would hold me down under the water for a minute or two, pull me back up, and then immediately push me back under. What does this mean?
My boyfriend told me he had a dream that I was drowning him whilst he was trying to swim but after a while I let him back up. Could this mean that I’m holding him back from something?
Meg – Not necessarily – it’s his dream not yours, and so deals with his feelings and fears.
I am guessing he is learning to ‘swim’ in the relationship. Many males feel inadequate in today’s world, and so have a trouble feeling proud of their masculinity – many men shave all their hair of trying to make themselves more like a female.
But that might not apply to you boyfriend, but he felt he wasn’t doing to well, but has now come up again.
Also he wasn’t dreaming about you, the figure in the dream is one he made up from all his memoires and feelings about you he has collected. Nearly always when people dream about someone they know or a strange new person or situation they automatically believe the dream is about that person, situation or animal. But when we think of our friend or partner our thoughts are not them – just our thoughts and feelings about them. See http://dreamhawk.com/approaches-to-being/questions-2/#Summing
Tony
I saw a dream about me and my brother being followed by a lion i escaped but my brother couldnt so i went back for him and me and my brother were bein followed by the lion again so what we did we went to the door next to our home to ask for help shouting but nobody helped us and then i woke up … Can you please tell me what this dream means
My boyfriend has been having this dream lately where he looks into the sea and then falls in, he sinks and sees a little girl at the bottom and tries to reach for her. People jump in to save the girl but never see him and so he drowns. He told me he doesn’t know who the little girl is. Could you tell me what this dream means?
Oliver – It sounds like your boyfriend is trying to explore himself, because going under the surface of the sea – in dreams – represents becoming aware of what was his subconscious, the world experienced after death, so discovering a new world.
The little girl he reached for leads me to wonder whether any of his family died young – a little girl for instance. Or it could be someone he felt love for when he was young, because love links us all in mysterious ways.
But of course it could simply be his female self, and only he can find what it is by ‘being the young girl’. See http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/acting-on-your-dream/#BeingPerson and http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/archetype-of-the-animus-jungs-view-of-the-male-in-the-female/
Death in dreams is nothing like it is seen in many people’s thoughts and feelings. In our inner world of dreams death is simply an end of something we have outgrown and the beginning of a new life. Think of the times you have died in that way – the death of the baby you as you developed into youth; the death of youth in you as you became a teenager; the death of the teenage you as development took place and you moved into adulthood.
His death says he has changed in some way and is ready to emerge with new views or realisations. Tell him to explore being dead by imagining himself – while awake – and watch what happens.
Tony