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
Last night I dreamed I was playing with fish from a concrete wall, and looked over and my two year old daughter had gotten into the middle of the water and had all but forehead down under water. I quickly jumped in a pulled her up. As I was pulling her up I had awoken from this nightmare. Does anyone know what this means?
I just had the most awful dream about my children. We were at an aquarium in an amphitheater. My children sat in another section and me and their stepfather sat higher up. All of a sudden you feel a horrible shake and a groaning of the whole structure. I couldn’t see me kids but I knew we had to get out. Me and my spouse ran up the stairs to get out. We turn around once were out and the kids are no where to be found. In my heart I knew they didn’t make it. I was crying and sobbing so much in my dream it felt hard to actually breathe. All I wanted to do was go back and find them. I felt like the worst parent in the world for being able to save my kids. It felt like some time had passed and we went back to the aquarium. We went back inside the amphitheater and I saw my children, but they were ghost. I went and sat with them and told them how much I loved them and how sorry I was I couldn’t save them, but they seemed at peace. I woke up stunned and trying to wake up enough that when I went back to sleep the dream would be over. Buy when I fell back asleep I was still immersed in the same dream. But this time I made it to my daughter and my mom (who was originally not there). My mom said that my son went to go look for my daughter and took the cell phone and called my mom and said he couldn’t find his sister , but his sister was already with my mom. Seconds after he said he couldn’t find his sister it went blank no more words. So again I knew I had lost my son. I woke up emotionally upset and couldn’t go back to sleep.
I have had 3 dreams in the one week where I have almost drowned. The first one I was in a car with my family and we were driving along a pier at a beach and the car went off the pier into the water, i was struggling to get out of the car but I eventually managed to get out. The second one I was in a shark attack which I also managed to get away from. The third one, I was in a shopping mall with my mum and the tannoy told everyone to evacuate as there had been a burst pipe. Me and my mum tried to get out of the shopping mall but it started filling up with water to the point we were totally submerged in it, but we eventually managed to get to the entrance doors and get out. When I woke up from all of these dreams I was out of breathe.
Hey I’ve been trying to figure out what my dream is really trying to tell me but I am having difficulties with it.
Yesterday I had various dreams in different scenery. I remember my friend and myself as well as a group of I believe “Friends” following me. The same scenario happens a few weeks ago that’s when I noticed that I was aware that I was dreaming. People were following me because I told them I knew the route towards a certain place. (I believe it was towards going to a bus stop) because in my last dream that’s where I was trying to head to but I missed the bus and my friends left me because they were in the bus. But as I was saying I was walking and walking and soon enough there were these stairs and I was confused I saw my friends at the other end and I told them to come and to come and they didn’t listen so I was going to go up the stairs and suddenly it was like I was isolated by everyone. Everyone disappeard out of no where. The stairs were full of water and I was trying to go back but I couldnt . there was a light and I was trying to follow through I was swimming and swimming but it kept getting deeper and deeper and I was trying to fight it. At that point I felt that the more I swam the more I drowned. So I stopped trying and it wasn’t like I was in pain or anything after I let go but I did felt like nothing mattered at that point. That I’m going to die and that’s final. When I was under water I it was like I was swimming in black very clear water and I looked and I got scared so I closed my eyes and as soon as I closed them I realized that I was dreaming and I told myself to wake up to wake up that I’m not going to die that its okay that I can wake up. And after that I woke up but jot to reality to another dream. I dreamt that I woke up from me drowning but I didn’t. And that I missed school and I was late to school and I was freaking out asking my mom why she didn’t wake me up and she said I didn’t have school and I was confused as ever and THEN I actually woke up. What could this mean ? I don’t understand anything
I had this dream where I was in a really weird damp place, it was outside and there was lots of rusty metal and such. Anyway, I was with some family members who were talking about nonsense, but I was stood on the edge of the embankment and there was dark water over the edge (a great fear of mine btw) and there was like another embankment on the other side of the water where the light to a clear day was, out of nowhere I ran to make the jump to the other side, I managed to get my hands on the edge but I fell in. All of a sudden I plunged to the bottom of this dark water and it was so deep, there was loads of rusted old pieces around and I was panicking and then I woke up. I can remember my family say ‘wow look how far down she managed to get’ so they obviously didn’t see how scared and panicked I was. What does this mean?
I had a dream that I was in my hometown, we have a waterfall which you can jump off. I jumped as I normally would but immediately got sucked under into an overwhelming current that never would be that strong there. As I got swept away under I tried to brake the surface for air and couldn’t over and over again. I then realized I was drowning and woke up gasping for air. Any insight?
I had a dream last night of me swimming i cant quite picture if it was a lake or ocean but when i came up from being under its like a Tsunami waves were hitting me. When i was able to get out of the water my 7yr old son was on a little island not far from shore and there were rescue boats going for him i could hear the rescuers saying there also was a baby. I was screaming no please no and when they reached shore my 2yr old son was limp and unresponsive… I tried to perform cpr and told my 7yr old to call 911 and get his father but was screaming and then i woke up. I was scared and it still has me worried.
I had 2 “drowning” dreams last night. One i jumped in a swimming hole and came up to the surface normally. When i got up, normal people who i did not recognize, but knew me by name tried to save me and asked if i was ok. I felt totally fine and did not know i was in danger. The second dream i jumped in a pool. It took me a little longer to surface, but i did so just fine. When i got to the top, again there were people who knew and cared about me trying to resuscitate me that i didnt recognize. I didnt feel like i was dying, but they said i was down there for a long time. Because i never thought or felt i was drowning, I dont know what it means that people i didnt recognize were trying to save me.
I had a dream I was holding my nephew in 1 arm and my niece in the other arm and went to jump into the pool, but it wasn’t deep so when we landed they didn’t go under water. I was holding them standing their in the water then all of a sudden waves like a tsunami came over us and we were underwater. While underwater I could see their faces and I was trying to push them above the water so that they could breathe, I was talking to my niece saying just hold on and to keep breathing I was slapping her check to keep her awake(this was all under water).After many attempts of trying to get the above the water I realised we weren’t going to make it so I just stopped fighting it and then I slowly started to wake up from my sleep.
I’m not sure what this means, could you help me understand the mending behind this dream?
I had a dream that my 10 month old daughter was drowning in the tub but I pulled her out and she lived what does this mean. Its really been bothering me and I don’t know why I dreamt about this. Please help
Dear Kelly – I do not have enough information to explore your dream; what do you think might have triggered a dream like this or links with it in some way?
See also http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/not-enough-information/
In general seeing a child drown may mean that you perceive that a child is struggling and/or having difficulties to overcome life’s obstacles so an inability to cope with whatever is confronting her.
Dreams have many functions however – http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/function-of-dreaming/ – and often one dream may cover several of these.
I feel it serves a purpose to do some inner work and see which functions you can recognize, by exploring your dream.
To give you some examples:
Function 2:
“A dream can be a link between the sleeping mind and what is occurring externally.”
Was your daughter crying the moment you had this dream?
If so then you could have become aware of your daughter “drowning in sorrow” and in your dream you instinctively respond to her needing your help.
Function 6:
“Dreams can be a means of compensating for failure or deprivation in everyday life, and as a means of expressing the otherwise unacknowledged aspects of oneself. Such dreams are a move toward wholeness.”
Perhaps you have felt the day before that you did not respond in an adequate way to your daughter needing your help?
Perhaps you have recently started a new project and you believe/feel you are not doing a good job?
Perhaps you feel very vulnerable in your role as a mother?
See also http://dreamhawk.com/pregnancy-childbirth/the-baby-in-your-dream/
Function 8:
“Dreams often stand in place of actual experience. So through dreams we may experiment with new experience or practice things we have not yet done externally.”
Perhaps you are practicing helping your inner child and with helping her heal, you can respond with less fear and with more inner wisdom to your daughter’s struggles in waking life.
Function 12:
“Dreams may be a presentation in symbols of past traumatic experience. If these feeling can be met this can lead to deep psychological healing. Such dreams are therefore an attempt on the part of our spontaneous inner processes to bring about healing change.”
Perhaps you remember in your dream how you have felt as a 10 month old baby and you become aware how you can be a mother to your INNER child and help her heal that way;
http://dreamhawk.com/health-and-healing/inner-baby-and-child/
and
http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/acting-on-your-dream/#BeingPerson
I trust this will give you a start and please let me know if you have any questions Kelly.
Anna 🙂
I just had a dream that I was in a pool with my friends and the boy I have unrequited feelings for is holding my hand me and he pulls me under water. I struggle and fight to show him that I need to surface to breathe, but he doesn’t let go. His grip is like steel, and it feels as if he had already drowned. My body begins to weaken and I stop struggling. We sink further down, and I recall being very aware of the feeling of his hand in mine. My eyes start drooping and I think “am I drowning? Is this is it?” And before anything else happened, the dream shifted completely.
Dear Eli –I wonder which dream follows after you ask yourself the questions “am I drowning? Is this it?”
Because our unconscious mind responds to our communicating with it, the answer to your question might be in the next dream; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/dream-incubation/
See also http://dreamhawk.com/inner-life/lucid-dreaming/
QUOTE:
Throughout history there have been individuals who have described a different meeting with sleep. They wake up in what is usually a dark, unconscious world.
Or, in the midst of a dream, they become aware of the situation and relate to their dream in a new and dynamic way. This condition, usually called ‘lucid dreaming’, holds within it enormous possibilities that are generally unavailable in waking time, sleep or dreaming.
To understand these possibilities and also something of what takes place during lucidity, it is helpful to appreciate that during sleep your five senses are largely switched off, and while you are dreaming your voluntary muscles are paralyzed. Usually you enter this sightless, soundless, immobilized world of sleep without awareness. However, traveling consciously beyond sensory input into the substrata of your mind and body is an incredible experience: you then enter sleep with all your critical faculties, with active curiosity and with the ability to explore whatever you find. When you become lucid in sleep you carry the bright torch of personal awareness into the depths of your body and mind.
Anna 🙂
I dreampt that my mother evicted me & my daughter from the house that we rent off her. We decided to move into a house boat at the side of a river near where some horses was grazing. My daughter decided to walk across the top of the river boat & i was chastising her for being foolish, next thing a submarine was passing by at the bottom of the river & my daughter was sucked into the depth of the water & im screaming, terrified, trying to jump in the water but something is holding my foot & i can’t reach her. I awoke with a jolt & the image haunting my thoughts. Any ideas of a meaning??
Dear Joanna – Unfortunately you did not share what you think might have triggered the dream or links with it in some way; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/not-enough-information/ nor how old your daughter in waking life is.
What I see in your dream – and please explore it for yourself as well http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/dream-yoga/ – is that your dream starts with expressing the difficult process that was part of you “leaving home” and so becoming (emotionally) independent from your mother.
Your natural feeling reaction to this (undigested? http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/digest/ ) stage of your life is that you want to avoid your daughter having to go through the same difficulties.
The part where your daughter walks on top of the house boat expresses her attempts (her first steps) to become emotional independent from you. See also http://dreamhawk.com/pregnancy-childbirth/example-emma/
I believe that your undigested memories make that you can only respond to her efforts with fear and so you criticize her.
The submarine is a way to explore your own inner content; it is your ability to meet the depths of feelings and experiences of your inner “child” when she had to go through this process.
Meeting these feelings and dealing with them, will give you the freedom to choose with awareness and wisdom how you want to approach your daughter’s individuation process.
The end of the dream shows your difficulties in letting go of your child, because you project your own unresolved, difficult feelings on your daughter; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/projection/ and you becoming aware that you cannot hold on to her.
Let me know if you have any questions Joanna.
Anna 🙂
Hi Anna, thanks for your reply. I think what may have triggered off my dream us due to a large scale arguement & fall out with my mother. It has been going on for a few months now & is mainly due to how controlling of my life she can be. This has been a consistent issue throughout the last 20yrs but when i was younger she was completely the opposite. I have many issues with my mother from when i was a child & i suppose that i am frightened that my own daughter would ever think of me in that way. She is 13yr old & we are extremely close. Its mainly only been the 2 of us throughout her life & we have a very tight & happy bond. One of the last things my mother said to me in an arguement was that i drive everyone to hate me & i will do the same to my daughter… The idea frightened the life out of me & i suppose my subconsciousness was reacting to that.
Kind regards
Joanna
I have had a fair few dreams where I am either trying to cross what looks like a shallow pond, or I am chilling with one or two friends by a lake at night, and I drown. There is always me holding someone’s hand (someone familiar) and they are with me being all ‘I will show you how’ and then I leave their hand momentarily and the waves (!?) Or speed at which we are moving cause me to float/sink ahead. They say ‘hold on to something’ but by the time I outstretch my arm, I am drowning.
I cant swim in real life but I am not scared of water, even in my dreams. But I never seem to make it across the pond/lake. And it’s all so fast.
Dear Asmi – What I see in your dream – and please explore it yourself as well http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/dream-yoga/ – is that you are practicing moving through change (like happens in puberty or when you move from adolescence into adulthood)
Dreams often stand in place of actual experience. So through dreams we may experiment with new experience or practice things we have not yet done externally. For instance many young women dream in detail of giving birth. This function of what might be called ‘imagination’ is tremendously undervalued, but is a foundation upon which human survival is built. See http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/imagination-and-dreaming-2/
You perceive these changes as that you cannot hold onto something familiar anymore when the waves of change appear, and in a way you are right about that.
Important transitions (like changing from child to adult) are often perceived as an emotional rollercoaster – a loss of control – and it takes some practice to learn to move through this stage of your life without fear.
Looked at your dream from another perspective, it is also about understanding and accepting that you are developing your own identity as an individual rather than as a part of the family or your friends.
This “crossing” – growing into “the unknown you” – is a process and it will take many dreams and time in your waking life to move to “the other side”. So please be kind and patient with yourself and know that most of us are scared of diving into the unknown, of uncertainty, of unfamiliarity, of not knowing what’s going to happen.
See http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/individuation/
and perhaps also (you did not mention how old you are)
http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/teenage-girl%E2%80%99s-love-dreams/
Let me know if you have any questions Asmi.
Anna 🙂
I had one dream where I sunk to the bottom of a body of water and when I tried to push myself off from the bottom, I couldn’t. I was very very heavy and couldn’t move. The thought crossed my mind that I was going to drown and then I woke up.
The next dream I had was that I was walking with some people in a resort. The pools and ponds were frozen. I had a Yorkshire terrier and he disappears. I turned around to look for him and found him sunk to the bottom of a frozen pond. I jumped in to rescue him and felt panicked that I was too slow and wouldn’t be able to rescue him. Then I woke up.
Can you give me some ideas about these dreams please? Thanks!
Dear SusieQ – Yes, I can give you some ideas about these dreams and please explore them yourself too; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/dream-yoga/
Your first dream shows that you are confronted with “heavy”, difficult feelings like for instance “the weight of responsibility”, which can cause a feeling of stress too and
you are afraid you will ‘drown’ in them.
In the next dream you have found a “solution” in order to feel relaxed – the resort – by freezing your emotions.
You become aware that when you freeze your emotions, that the Yorkshire terrier that is part of your inner world will disappear and sink to the bottom too.
A dog can be a symbol of the parts of self we usually keep out of sight, but which may express spontaneously; so it can be a sign of enthusiasm, care and warmth.
Your fear about being too slow might also be caused by you mixing up your waking life with your dream life. In your dream life and so in your inner world you can bring the missing parts of you back to life, even if they have been at the bottom of a frozen pond for years;
http://dreamhawk.com/approaches-to-being/the-lifestream/
and
http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/integration-meeting-oneself/
So push on and please be patient with yourself and your inner process.
Another way to reconnect with your inner dog could be to use “Being the dog” – both when it is still with you in the dream and when it is at the bottom of the frozen pond – and feel the difference between the two; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/acting-on-your-dream/#BeingPerson
Questioning your beliefs is another way; beliefs like “and couldn’t move” and “that I was too slow and wouldn’t be able to rescue him”; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/beliefs/
Using Power Dreaming might be helpful to move beyond these beliefs; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/secrets-power-dreaming/
Let me know if you have any questions SusieQ.
Anna 🙂
I often have basically this same dream and don’t know why. I’m always in a car with some of my closest family or friends (usually family). For some reason we always get in a crash and end up in this lake that’s about 30 minutes from my old house. In every dream I do everything I can to help save one of them, usually the youngest first. Then one of two things happen- I either get above water safely with the person I helped first but when I try to get someone to help me get the others it’s like I can’t talk or I’m just not there. If that doesn’t happen then while I’m trying to help someone in the car their seatbelt is locked and I can’t do anything to help them get out of it. I have these dreams at least once a month and they started around the end of last year. I don’t know why I have them or what they mean so I was wondering if you could help me understand?
Dear Serena – I can imagine how you must feel in dreams like these and yet you do not mention any of your feelings once. Are you aware of that? Are you aware of the way you habitually respond to certain situations in your waking life? http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/self-observation/
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.
You wrote; “For some reason we always get in a crash.” Are other people involved in the crash; do you crash with another car? Who is driving the car that you are in? Where do you sit in the car? http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/driving/ and http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/car/#Crashing
and
http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/sub-personalities/
I trust that the information provided will give you a start with exploring your own dream;
http://dreamhawk.com/dream-dictionary/not-enough-information/
What will be very helpful as well is to explore the useful questions in this entry. Do know that the answers are inside you and help is always available; http://dreamhawk.com/dream-encyclopedia/dream-incubation/
Let me know if you have any questions.
Anna 🙂