Rat
What you sense as sick or negative, so can depict your fears or anxieties, frightening instincts or urges, physical sickness or anxieties about health. Perhaps also feelings of sexual repulsion, or using sex to gain material aims. But this was caused by the fallacy that rats carried the plague and are unclean, but rats are very clean.
It was found out by historical research that it wasn’t the rat that brought the plague to Europe but the gerbil was the culprit. Sometimes a rat in your dream can remind you of love that was betrayed, or intuitions about a person being a ‘rat’ or ‘ratting on you’ – doing things behind your back or underhandedly – or deserting a relationship when difficulties arise.
The rats can point to threatening things going on that you are not clear about, or a view of the underhanded side of yourself or others – the evil side of human nature, its dirt and squalor, or time gnawing away at your life. The unacceptable parts or oneself. In some dreams the rat has the character of most rodents, the gnawing inquisitive searching out of things. It can therefore relate to one’s anxieties, self questioning and worrying mind that disturbs or eats away at things like peace of mind or confidence.
Because we may have associations with rats used in laboratories they may suggest healing and sacrifice.
Pet rat: Quite different to general rat associations; vulnerability, instinctive intelligence, the caring feelings or drive to care; responsibility for caring. The rat is an intelligent creature, is a great survivor and explorative.
In China where various types of rat are cooked and eaten, the astrological symbols are replaces by animal symbols. The rat (sometimes referred to as a mouse) is the first of the twelve animals of the Chinese zodiac. People born in this year are expected to possess qualities associated with rats, including creativity, intelligence, honesty, generosity, ambition, a quick temper and wastefulness. People born in a year of the rat are said to get along well with “monkeys” and “dragons”, and to get along poorly with “horses”.
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Here the rats in this Hindu temple are venerated, and are being fed.In Indian tradition, rats are seen as the vehicle of Ganesha the elephant god, and a rat’s statue is always found in a temple of Ganesh – the elephant god the remover of all obstacles. In the north western Indian city of Deshnoke, the rats at the Karni Mata Temple are held to be destined for reincarnation as Sadhus (Hindu holy men). Rats are eaten by some people in India also. |
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Idioms: Rat on someone; rat race; smell a rat; feeling ratty; cornered rat; rats leave a sinking ship.
Useful Questions and Hints:
Am I confronting or remembering something that I feel is repulsive or evil?
Am I in a relationship that I intuitively feel difficulties about?
Am I being a rat in a relationship or situation? Is a worry or irritation eating away at me?
See animals – Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Questions
Comments
1 i see to much many in dream
2 My son going to the trip only said he was going to America.
Sophia – In dreams America is often the place of opportunity and hope that wonderful things will happen. So I think your son is hoping for a wonderful thing to happen to him.
Tony
I was ealking out of my mothers house with my brother in this dream. only I didn’t see my face I had like a bonnet on ,but knew this woman somehow I only saw back of bonnet, as we turned into a part of the yard it became a crossover bridge with water running under it, I noticed the rainbow and then looked down to see two small rats -one was devouring what looked like a white chicken, the 2nd was eating a huge worm that had come up from the ground from the rain, then a large rat came out of water it was dark and big couldhave been a beaver, but I think it was a rat, it devoured the 1rst rat and what it ate, and ate the second one along with the worm it was eating. (worm was a large one)- I looked at the rat who ate the 2 rats and their meals and he went back under the water. What the devil could this mean?
Carol – The dream starts with you leaving you mother’s house, which means that in this dream you were carrying with you the beliefs and way of life you learned with her. In fact you were wearing a bonnet, suggesting that you had an old fashioned view of life and probably of religion. Then you crossed over a bridge, showing that you left behind some of the old influences and saw a symbol of God’s promise, the rainbow.
It was then you saw the rats. Rats are everywhere in the world and are one of the cleanup features of life. In the ecology, they act as scavengers. They are not there to serve humans, but they are important. So it seems something was emerging from within you that needed cleaning up, something that perhaps you found distasteful.
Tony
Dear Toni-
I always get messages in my dreams, but this one was particularly unsettling. I was wondering if you had any ideas about it.
I dreamed I was in a house with my child (I don’t have a child in real life), and we were seeing a lot of large, dark brown rats. They had big teeth and were coming towards us. I was using a kitchen towel to beat them away, and they would stay away when I did this.
I recently broke up with a man I loved very much. We just couldn’t work it out, and I kept leaving, but I wasn’t sure why. I just knew it didn’t feel good when we would settle into the relationship.
Anyhow, at the end of the dream, I was protecting my child and we were outside, in the doorway of the house. A rat was outside and was coming towards us. I beat it away until it layed down and stopped trying to attack us. Then I woke up.
Any thoughts you have would be much appreciated.
Thanks
Paige – The child represents an early stage of your life from childhood. The rats that you are driving away are the negative thoughts you have – probably about your ex partner. Being a person who tries to keep your – kitchen – clean of mess and yourself doesn’t like messy relationships you keep those thoughts away from the more vulnerable side of yourself.
Tony
PS The other dream is again about childhood pains that you felt – did you not have a good relationship with your parents, because you chose a father figure in your dream to hold and adopt you.
Ok this is going to sound crazy but i need some insight on this. I had a dream that i was recieving oral sex from a rat (im a man). It was so creepy and disgusting. When the rat left, i felt a pain on my private part and i was screaming in despair because the rat gave me some kind of disease. Then i woke up and was shocked about what happened. Wth can this mean???
I had a dream I was in the middle of a work meeting, and I heard a voice in the background warning me that their was rats in the building to watch out. All of the sudden I see hundreds of grey rats passing threw the double doors connecting the two rooms on both sides of us. All of the sudden I see one single black large size rat on the cealing towards my side of the room. Looking straight at me with bright white eyes, with one bright white tooth. It starred at me as if it wanted to attack but it regrouped with the other passing rats and left the room. Then all of the sudden a group of grey rats came at me, ran across my back, I ran away from them across the room to get away from them. I accidentally stepped on some…. Then my dream ended…
Can u help me interpret?
Griselda – The opening scene of your dream connects with work. The background voice is usually one giving a message of great importance.
I get the feeling that you should have a good measure of skepticism with what may be presented at work – either that or you are suffering anxiety or stress.
Tony
i often 3 or 4 times a week have dreams about rats ..its always the same a bunch of white rats so rounding me sometimes trying to bite my feet,legs, and jump on me i always seem to fight back n my dream never ends until i wake up..yesterday i dreamed about a rat feeding her babies like dogs do it was very strange i turned around and the rat was dead thats when i woke up…can you explain to me what this dream is about..???
I’ve recently had a dream about a large rat followed by smaller rats popping out of holes. I tried to catch the large rat but it kept running away and then coming back. Do you know what this could mean ?
Marion – I see it as a worry or feeling that keeps disturbing you. You can’t catch it because the cause of it is still hidden from you, and so the big worry of feeling brings others following it.
I would suggest stop thinking about the rat and look at what feelings it causes. When you have that you can think back to when you first felt the feeling and see if that unlocks the dream.
Tony
I dreamt about fighting with a rat who bit me and scratched me. I opened a window and let it jump out. When I went outside it was dying but now it was a kitten. Then the kitten turned into a man with grey hair and I saw him limping away. The dream has made me scared.
I had a dream in which I was observing (the man I had a brief affair that ended very badly) walking in a figure eight formation around two trees. He had very exaggerated rat-like features. In real life his features were borderline rodent-like but he was attractive. The affair ended 2 months ago and over this time, many deceptions and manipulations towards me, his wife, my husband and our respective young daughters have been revealed. The dream took place at our local grocery store where he works.
Anne – First of all your dream is not about him, but about all the feelings, observations even intuitions you have in you about him. The images in the dream point out his almost animal habits. I get the feeling that he is unable to break out of his habits of seeking sex and women. So the dream is warning you that he is all that you felt he was. But of course you could pray for him as that does have an affect.
Tony
I had a dream last night that a growth on my back turned into a head of a white rat with red eyes, whiskers and slightly open mouth showing teeth. I was not scared when I saw it. I just said “I have to go to th doctor to get this thing off'”. I was worried about going out with this growth on my back in publc.
The dream was just too weird. I woke up but when i went back to sleep i had the same dream again.
I would aapreciate any help to know was this dream means.
Dominique – This is something you have been carrying around within your for some time and now it is emerging into consciousness. It is something that you obviously do not wish people to know about you.
It is something that you feel you want to get rid of, and may be related to things or feelings that you see as unclean, something that is unacceptable. And that you are going to the doctor says that it is being dealt with.
Tony
Hi Tony ,
I had a dream the other day and it’s really bugging me .
I was in my mother’s house in the hall way , and my mother and father was coming out of the bath room with cooked meat on one hand , and on the other hand was a burned rat . It looked like it was put on fire but still alive . And it was trying to bite me but it couldn’t break lose from my mother and fathers hand . Please I need help . I’m so scared.
Hello! I always dream about weird things, but never really about insects and rats. I was wondering if maybe you could help me with this, I dreamt last night that I was sleeping in my bedroom (but it was my old bedroom, the one at my parent’s place, I’m now 26 and I live in an apartment) and maggots were falling off the ceiling, on the floor and on my bed but not actually directly on me, One of them was fatter and exploded on the floor. And then, I saw a gigantic cockroach crawling on the wall (but this time it was on the wall of my actual bedroom) and then, back in my parent’s basement, I think I’m sitting on the couch and I turn around and there’s a big rat who bites me, but he kinda swallows my two fingers of my right hand and stick to them, and I have to run outside and shake my hand until I get rid of him. So… That’s it. I think it’s because months ago, I was involved with someone mentally ill, abusive and violent, who was a rat. But, it’s been like 7 months now, is it still possible that I have dreams about that relatonship? Thanks a lot.
Hello Tony,
Thank you for creating this site, it has been very helpful with me understanding my dreams. Please help me understand this one.
I had this dream last night, I was in my home but it was arranged differently. My roommate’s bed was in the kitchen and as I walk to the front door, it looks like a rat has been chewing on everything and it also left a trail. I follow it as I sweep the floor as well. When I reached under the bed I keep find large pieces of wood that I believe is from the bed. I decided to remove the mattress from the bed to find a medium size gray rat in the box spring. My roommate and I started chasing it (She’s afraid of anything that moves in real life). She got close to it, caught it and it slipped out of her hand and she smiled at me, I have this feeling that she purposely let it go.
What does that mean?
Marie – I think this is about feeing you have about your roommate, which perhaps you have not owned up to. This is because a rat can often be used to represent something that it eating or gnawing away at you, or the underhanded side of others. That it was in the bedsprings suggests that it was still and unconscious feeling you are about to realise.
Obviously your dream roommate is not actually her, but represents feelings you have about her. That she has the rat but lets it go says that perhaps she is in league with the rat.
Think it over carefully before you act on it.
Tony
Hello,
i was wondering if you could help me? i had a dream recently i was in a room full of sinks, and i saw a white rat coming from a corner, i screamed to the top of my voice, then they started coming from other corners of the room, at every angle. Then soon after that they appeared from the sinks and drains, They didn’t harm me in any way, but they were running around the room, and after i just couldn’t take any more and i just ran. Do you know what this could mean?
Thanks
Greta – I see it as a description of you as you sometimes feel – overrun by thoughts and niggling feelings.
You said that the rats did you no harm – neither do worries. So when it happens you need to be very firm and say to the thoughts that invade, “I’ve had enough of this, so stop it. Go and leave me in peace!”
Tony
Hi Tony,
My name is Dean (26 y.o. male) – i have often had dreams which were quite informative – whether i heeded them or not.
I was wondering if i could get help with the interpretation of this one.
I recently (yesterday) lost my lovely chocolate labrador pup (real life). I still haven’t found her.
I had a dream that i found her and she had been staying at someone’s house where she was safe – when i brought her back home she ran inside and as i went to put her in the garden i noticed a huge black rat (a little smaller than her) outside with my pup hot on its heels as it hovered out of my line of sight slowly – i yelled out to her not to follow as i was afraid she might get bitten…and thats all i remember.
I know rats indicate deception (especially black ones) but i was wondering if this was to do with my dog or me? Has someone taken my dog covertly?
Any interpretations???
Thanks in advance.
Dean – I have a regret about my ability to really have insight. Some years ago I found that I only had to ask what a dream meant – and some dreams were completely beyond my understanding – and I would ask Life for help and it was as if a voice spelt it out to me. Unfortunately I lost that ability, and it was compounded by the stroke I had. So now I have to rely on my best feelings.
Well I feel as if your dream is suggesting the return of your dog. I also feel you have a lot for love for it. As for the rat, it is certainly being chased off energetically. If we look at a personal interpretation, it could be that the thing you loved has been lost – lost feeling of love. The love is coming home to you, and the dark feelings are being chased away.
Tony