Posts Tagged ‘dream’

Clothes

clothes – The first part of this entry is a general description of the meaning of clothes. Then there is the Clothes situations. For separate items like shirt, dress, socks etc please click on: Clothes Items

Clothes can mean many things depending upon dream context, their colour, style, what period of time they depict, and their condition – i.e. clean or dirty, ragged or smart, etc.

They can depict the stance or attitudes we use to meet other people or special situations such as work or danger; protection, such as might be given by our feelings of reserve, shyness, anxiety or aggressiveness in fending off sexual or other advances. They can also indicate a period or phase of ones life when you wore those clothes, and so associate with the activities, problems, or things you were experiencing at that time. But also the triumphs and realisations you have achieved. See Associations Working With

Clothes depict self respect and how we see ourselves in society – the difference between what we want and what we feel others want of us. Our clothes, especially when we consider their colour, can also express our emotional condition and moods, or even our health. Constance Newland in her book Myself and I, gives the example of dressing in violet symbolising being inviolate sexually.  As colours may be a vital clue to understanding our dream clothes, it is always helpful to look at the possible meaning of the colour. See: colours.

Clothes, clean or dirty, can also show the habits or habitual attitudes we are involved in and express through day after day.

In the following example the clothes are feelings of pleasure and confidence, and also discomfort and lack of confidence.

Example: ‘I am packing for a holiday, surrounded by a lovely selection of all sorts of clothes. I am matching outfits, shoes, scarves, handbags to match. It gives me great pleasure. I am wearing an old navy blue dress which is too short for me. So short I feel panic because there will not be enough time to change. I am now on the top deck of a bus. I have one battered suitcase and am wearing the same dress, trying vainly to pull it down over my knees. Suitcase bursts open and it is full of old clothes fit for a jumble sale.’ Valerie H.

Buying clothes

Changing Clothes – Children’s or teenage clothes in adult’s dream – Clothing inappropriate to dream surroundings – Clothes for a particular role – policeman, judge, etc

Dirty or untidy clothes – if the dreamer’s – Dirty underclothes – Discarded clothes –

Eating clothes

Helped to get or buy clothes

Layers of clothes

Man in woman’s clothes

New clothes

Old clothes – Old but comfortable clothes – Other people’s clothes worn by dreamer

Packing clothes:

Ragged or inappropriate clothes

School clothes – Someone else’s clothes – Stealing clothes

Taking off clothes – Tight clothes –

Undressing

Woman in male clothes – Worn out or old clothes

Clothes can mean many things depending upon dream context, their colour, style, what period of time they depict, and their condition – i.e. clean or dirty, ragged or smart, etc.

They can depict the stance or attitudes we use to meet other people or special situations such as work or danger; protection, such as might be given by our feelings of reserve, shyness, anxiety or aggressiveness in fending off sexual or other advances. They can also indicate a period or phase of ones life when you wore those clothes, and so associate with the activities, problems, or things you were experiencing at that time. See Associations Working With

Clothes depict self respect and how we see ourselves in society – the difference between what we want and what we feel others want of us. Our clothes, especially when we consider their colour, can also express our emotional condition and moods, or even our health. Constance Newland in her book Myself and I, gives the example of dressing in violet symbolising being inviolate sexually.  As colours may be a vital clue to understanding our dream clothes, it is always helpful to look at the possible meaning of the colour. See: colours.

Clothes, clean or dirty, can also show the habits or habitual attitudes we are involved in and express through day after day. See: example under washing machine.

In the following example the clothes are feelings of pleasure and confidence, and also discomfort and lack of confidence.

Example: ‘I am packing for a holiday, surrounded by a lovely selection of all sorts of clothes. I am matching outfits, shoes, scarves, handbags to match. It gives me great pleasure. I am wearing an old navy blue dress which is too short for me. So short I feel panic because there will not be enough time to change. I am now on the top deck of a bus. I have one battered suitcase and am wearing the same dress, trying vainly to pull it down over my knees. Suitcase bursts open and it is full of old clothes fit for a jumble sale.’ Valerie H.

Idioms: Dressed to kill; dress up; dressed to the nines; overdressed; dressing down; dress rehearsal; a stitch of clothes; dress clothes; Sunday best clothes; a wolf in sheep’s clothing.

Clothes types and situations:

Buying clothes: This requires choice, either your own or someone else’s, and is about considering how you want to or do appear to other people – what public image you want to have; who and what you feel comfortable as. But it is often more than just public image, it is also about the choices you make in life, the way you choose to be, how you relate or respond to others, or what you believe yourself to be. Dreams suggest we can be almost anything, but usually we ‘clothe’ ourselves in particular feelings, beliefs or roles often identify with them so thoroughly we can’t see beyond them.

For instance many people cannot choose their  own clothes without other people’s opionion of how they look. This may be a carry over from childhood.

So dreams about clothes and appearance are important in helping you to move beyond or grow beyond what you have ‘clothed’ yourself in.

Useful Questions and Hints:

What am I choosing  – or what is being chosen – in this dream, and what does that suggest about the direction I am taking?

Am I making changes here in the way I present myself – if so what are they?

Do I totally identify with the choices I am making, or can I see them as ‘clothing’?

See Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Secrets of Power Dreaming

Changing clothes: This can be about altering your mode of behaviour, your role or mood, or even seeking a different self image. We are all capable of changing who we are, and changing clothes suggests changing the way you present yourself to other people, or how you feel about yourself. Also you change clothes as you move from one role, or one social environment to another – work to being with friends, or school to home, etc. So the dream might be indicating the shifts you make in the attitudes or ways you feel about yourself in different environments.

Useful Questions and Hints:

What clothes are you changing from and to, and what does that suggest?

Is this a change of role or a change in appearance?

Am I changing because I want to or because circumstances or environment demand it?

See Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Secrets of Power Dreaming

Children’s or teenage clothes in adult’s dream: Youthful or immature attitudes or behaviour. Sometimes particular clothes carry memories and the clothes might hold information from your past.

Useful Questions and Hints:

Do these clothes remind me of past people or events?

What am I feeling in connection with these clothes, and what message is there in that?

Is this telling me I am behaving as if I were a youngster?

See Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Secrets of Power Dreaming

Clothing inappropriate to dream surroundings: Attitudes or behaviour inappropriate to one’s

situation.

Useful Questions and Hints:

In what way are the clothes wrong for the situation?

Am I acting inappropriately in my life in some way?

Do I need to change my clothes or my surroundings?

Clothes for a particular role – policeman, judge, etc: An issue regarding, or shift toward, influence from what the role suggests. See different subjects under roles.

Useful Questions and Hints:

What role do the clothes suggest, and what memories or associations have I got with that role?

Do I feel easy or awkward in the role?

What is being done in the clothes, and what can I see about this that applies to myself?

Dirty or untidy clothes – if the dreamer’s: Difficult or grubby feelings; one’s inner condition, such as an untidy mind, or grubby feeling values. Or simply that you do not care about what people think of you.

If underclothes: usually refers to difficult feelings about sex or ones own personal self. See: dirty;  example under beggar archetype.

Useful Questions and Hints:

Are these my clothes or someone else’s – if someone else’s do I have difficult feelings about them or do they represent an aspect of myself?

What clothes are dirty, and what part of my life or myself do they link with?

If there is need can I imagine cleaning or changing these clothes. (For help with this see carry the dream forward.)

Discarded clothes: Things you have left behind, or purposely tried to remove from your life. Sometimes this is a way of life, or a period of your life that your ‘wore’ in the past. But occasionally it refers to things from the long past, prior to this present birth, that you are coming across that are relevant to your present.

Useful Questions and Hints:

What is it I am aware of at the moment that I left behind, discarded or forgot at some time?

Am I experiencing influences or situations that do not appear to be from this lifetime – if so can I define what they are?

If this refers to something from my past, is it still something I want to discard?

Eating clothes: Trying to digest feeling about your social image – how you appear to others, or how you feel you appear to others. There is a big difference between the two. It might also suggest having a hard time enjoying your life situation or even your own self-image. It mightrelate to the saying, “I’ll eat my hat”.

Useful Questions and Hints:

What do I feel about the clothes being eaten, and where do those feelings appear in my waking life?

What clothes are these – or whose clothes are these – and does this give any clues to what I am trying to digest or integrate?

What do the other parts of the dream suggest in context with the eating?

Helped to get or buy clothes: This suggests you need or are getting the support from someone else to feel confident and socially acceptable, or to change your image. It can also mean you feel impoverished in some way; or that you are unsure of yourself, who you are or what direction to take in life.

Useful Questions and Hints:

Is the help supportive or appreciated, or is there unwillingness – and where do these feelings appear in my life?

Am I looking to someone else to help me in choices or directions?

What clothes are being chosen, and what does this suggest?

Layers of clothes: This refers to wearing something like jeans over a more formal or different type of clothing, and suggests that the top layer is how you present yourself to others, but underneath you feel quite differently about yourself, or are hiding qualities or failings.

If you discover the layer underneath and realise you were not aware of it before, it shows you just realising what was hidden about yourself.

Useful Questions and Hints:

What is the difference between the top and bottom layer, and what different qualities do they suggest?

Am I aware of hiding something about myself, or presenting myself as different to what I really feel?

Am I discovering qualities that I kept covered up?

Man in woman’s clothes: It might point to not accepting the male role, with its connection with bread winning, aggression, being cannon fodder in war, etc.

Sometimes a man takes on the female role without realising it in certain situations – perhaps to care for children, or in nursing – and so the dream might show this. Being a full male in relationship with a woman’s full flow of feminine needs is not something some biological males manage. See: Am I a man or a woman?

There are many other reasons for this type of dream. Males may try to deflect the aggression of other males by posing as a woman. They may wish to attract another male – their father – if there has been a difficult and unfulfilled relationship with their father, thus living as a homosexual. An identification with ones mother may have been extreme, and so this might prompt the desire to take the female role. See: Archetype of the anima; Archetype of the animus.

It could also be that you are accepting you female half.

Helpful Questions and Hints:

What am I experiencing or feeling about this, and can I relate those feelings to the way I live my life or hide myself?

Does this remind me of any particular female?

Am I a latent homosexual?

What is gained for me by the female role?

New clothes: This may come about because of the need for a new life, a new direction, such as occurs after losing a loved partner. It can also show a change in attitudes, new feeling about yourself, or even a change such as in work or relationship.

Example: My parents told us we were running out of money, and that we had to cut our expenses down to the minimum. So we sold everything we had, and started all over. I got some new clothes.

In this dream the change in lifestyle is made more real by the new clothes. New clothes may also link with pleasure and allowing oneself to play or be relaxed, getting what you want.

Useful Questions and Hints:

Are these mine – and if so what is the need or feeling leading to getting them?

If these are someone else’s’ what are the surrounding circumstances and does that link with my present situation?

Have I lost someone, or in need of a change – if so what is that change?

Old clothes: This can depict feelings that you are old, tired, or that something is outworn – such as a relationship or attitudes that do not suit your present life situation or events. It can also link with feelings about your life situation being shabby or worn out, as the example dream of a middle aged woman.

Example: I am getting married but I am at a dentist’s office first and it is getting late. A woman who is ahead of me passes out. Then the dentist takes several inmates in ahead of me. When he gets to me it is 4 p.m. and we decided on a 7 p.m. wedding. (The male dentist is also the minister). I decide to go with a minister whom I had already asked. I call my mother and my daughter to get my dress and to buy me one white carnation. Then I decide to use my artificial bouquet. Then I decide I am too tired and cancel the wedding. The dress is old and yellowed. I didn’t get the dental work finished either.

But old can also relate to tradition, such as a family wedding dress, or period clothes. As such it can indicate past ways of feeling or relating to things and people.

If the clothes are made out of old clothes, then it shows an adapting of old attitudes, or other peoples attitudes or lifestyle to something usable or practical today.

If the clothes are from a past period of time they indicate what you believe it felt like to live in those times, or the attitudes or way of life you associate with them. It might be the period represented sexual repression or struggle for you. If so then it shows you meeting those feelings or that life situation in some way. See: Associations Working With; historic; roles.

Useful Questions and Hints:

If the clothes are something I am not feeling good about, what are the difficult feelings involved?

If I feel fine with these clothes, what attitudes or feelings bring this pleasure?

What role or situation do these clothes suggest?

See Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Secrets of Power Dreaming

Old but comfortable clothes: This indicates attitudes regarding the way you relate to others or yourself that you may not express in public, but depict who you are when relaxed. See: historic; roles.

Useful Questions and Hints:

What is it about these clothes that enables me to feel comfortable?

Do the clothes link with a way of life – if so what is that way of life?

Are these clothes I own – if so when do I wear them, or when did I last wear them?

See Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Secrets of Power Dreaming

Other people’s clothes worn by dreamer: The social attitudes, responses and perhaps way of life we have adopted from others. They might indicate that you are either being influenced by that person, or you admire who they are and are changing.

Useful Questions and Hints:

Whose clothes are being worn, and how would I describe that person to understand what it is that is being ‘put on’? See: people for help defining characters.

What is felt about these clothes, and what does this indicate about my relationship with them?

Am I feeling at ease about the clothes or at odds – if at odds what is it that is irritating or not liked?

See Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Secrets of Power Dreaming

Overdressed or unable to get clothes off: Too cautious in relationships, and in some dreams avoidance of sex. It can also show a difficulty in changing your attitudes or self image.  Clothes can be protectiveness, so inability to take them off could suggest avoidance of showing your vulnerabilities. Also avoiding intimacy, or being stuck in old patterns of behaviour or self image.

Useful Questions and Hints:

Do the clothes I am stuck in suggest particular attitudes or a way of life – if so how does that apply to me?

If I am overdressed what in waking life am I doing that suggests this?

Do I avoid intimacy or being vulnerable in a relationship? 

Packing clothes: This may suggest that you are wanting to go away for a while, or leave home or have a break from your everyday life, even wanting to move. If you think about it you will most likely recognise which one it is.

Ragged or inappropriate clothes: This might indicate feelings of inadequacy, depression, or even  rebellion against authority or society. It can show you feeling marginalised in some way, or made to feel inferior or of no account.

A ragged wedding dress for instance could show feelings of anxiety about your ability to go through with the relationship, or uncertainty about the wedding or yourself.

Ragged or torn clothes can also show you having survived a difficult or powerful experience of some kind – as would be the case if you had survived a plane crash, travelled across difficult terrain or been in a war.

Other people dressed raggedly probably suggest suspicion on your part about relating to them – i.e. difficult feelings about something or someone you are dealing with at the moment. Or it could show you feel they have lived or are living a difficult life and may even be injured or in danger.

Useful Questions and Hints:

What does the overall situation of the dream suggest – ease, threat, danger, suspicion – and can I see that in my life?

What situation do the ragged or torn clothes appear in, and does that relate to what I am meeting?

Am I feeling inadequate, anxious or as if I have come through a difficult situation?

See Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Secrets of Power Dreaming

School clothes: Attitudes or moral rules learned at school. What we learned at school – not lessons but interrelationships, class structure, competitiveness, authority, mortification, group preferences, etc.; habits of behaviour or feeling reactions developed during those years – puberty occurs at this time, and confronts us with many new feelings, choices and drives.

Someone else’s clothes: See: other people’s clothes.

Stealing clothes: This might suggest that you do not feel that you have what it takes to succeed in life, or that you have the right or personal quality to be admired or seen as a worthy member of society – so it could point to a loss of self respect.

If your clothes are stolen – it might be you are feeling undermined or cheated in some way, or that you feel you have lost confidence, or the feelings that usually support you in a situation such as work or public relations.

Useful Questions and Hints:

If you are stealing, what is it you are wanting or seeking in taking the clothes, and how does that relate to your life at the moment?

What clothes are taken, and what does that link with? (See entries on particular garments.)

If your clothes are stolen what are you feeling and is that a feeling you recognise in waking life?

See Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Secrets of Power Dreaming

Taking off clothes: Removing the attitudes or ‘front’ you use to deal with people and social life; becoming more relaxed or intimate if undressing with someone; exposing your real self or moving toward sexual intimacy.

It can also mean you are getting rid of the layers of social behaviour you have been hiding behind, or the attitudes you have defended yourself with – even the parts of your personality that arose from past trauma or difficult life situations.

In some dreams you take off clothes to get at something underneath. This is either to see/understand something that your everyday attitudes or situation keep hidden, or to deal with something, maybe depicted as an injury, lice, or creatures crawling on you. See: naked: wound: insects.

Useful Questions and Hints:

In what situation are the clothes being removed, and what aspect of my life does this point to?

What clothes are being removed – suggesting what attitudes or feelings I am dealing with?

Am I with someone, suggesting intimacy, or alone suggesting isolation?

See Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Secrets of Power Dreaming

Tight clothes: Being too restricted in attitude or being tight emotionally. It can also suggest you feel restrained or held back in some way; or else you want to show your body curves..

If it refers to tight female clothes it can mean a desire to reveal your body in a sexually attractive way.

Useful Questions and Hints:

What is it I am feeling restrained by, or what am I restraining?

Am I trying to be sexually attractive with someone?

Are there attitudes or decisions I am living by that are too tight and controlling?

See Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Secrets of Power Dreaming

Undressing: See: Taking off clothes.

Woman in male clothes: Not accepting female role, motherhood, or being a housewife. Possibly lesbian tendencies, or a desire for father figure. See: Am I a man or a woman?

It could also be that you are accepting you male half. See soul mate

Useful Questions and Hints:

Why is this happening in the dream – i.e. what motivation or pressure?

What is being done and what does this point to – i.e. am I seeking a woman, working at something, exploring being a male?

What are my feelings about this in the dream?

See Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Secrets of Power Dreaming

Worn out or old clothes: Attitudes that you are ready to leave behind, or old habits no longer useful.

It could also point to you feeling worn out, old or tired. See: Old clothes.

Useful Questions and Hints:

Do the clothes link with or typify a period of my life – if so what was my way of thinking and living at that time?

What am I doing with these clothes, and what does that tell me about what I am doing with old attitudes or lifestyle?

Do my present feelings echo the clothes, in that I am feeling old or worn out?

See Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Secrets of Power Dreaming

Cloud Clouds

Clouds are in dreams often happen where feelings of upliftment or religious feelings occur. If the clouds are dull, then it suggests worry or depression of some kind that is obscuring your best feelings.

Sometimes clouds are about obscuring something, or blocking a possible view or realisation of something, especially if they are dark clouds.

Clouds are also the crystal ball of the mind, and in their many shapes and shades depict the intuitions, hopes, fears and wonders of our inner self. So we may ‘see’ things in our dream clouds that are visionary, intuitive or expressive of what we hold within. The clouds may represent or in some way illustrate these inner intuitions and motivations.

Because clouds are so high and often obscure or give a sense of depth to what is even higher, we sometimes use them in dreams to suggest dimensions of experience that are presently either beyond us or only vaguely glimpsed. In such dimensions of our mind we may see beings who live at that level of existence. In a practical way these beings are potentials we have that are not yet manifest in our daily physical life. If advice or communication emerges from such clouds it usually arises from our best intuitions, our highest perceptions. This is why in the past the clouds were seen as the home of the gods. It can also be the place of the ancestors. See Dimensions of Human Experience

Clouds move as they are stirred by the forces of nature, expressing cosmic forces such as the sun’s heat. This movement in our dreams sometimes depicts the force of spontaneous life as it influences us or as we respond to it. Clouds also bring life giving rain, and so can indicate a life giving influence in your life. Sometimes an influence from beyond the clouds appears in dreams, occasionally as beings. This is usually a sign that you are receiving communications from either your ancestors, those who are evolutionarily higher than us, or even the gods.

Example: Next I/we came to a town, high up on the mountain, near the peak. I was very impressed by how interesting, gay, and full of character the town was, quite opposite to the town at the foot of the mountain. I saw the peak of the mountain above the town, and decided to climb on. I went on with my companion and a boy child. It was cloudy at first, and there was no view from such a tremendous height, but the clouds cleared, and wonderful vistas were revealed. I believe I was singing in the dream – singing loud and strong and wonderfully clear and. Then we reached the top, and stood there together, looking out upon the clouds and the world.

The dream obviously shows the dreamer reaching beyond his usual awareness into a wider life.

Example: In both dreams it was shown that a powerful influence was flowing from above the clouds into my life. In the first dream I was marrying Dakota, and in the second a column of something was flowing from the sky above the clouds from these sky beings. So I wonder what that depicts – what that influence is about.

I begin to feel as if I am opening to something of immense power. I have an image of myself seated and almost glowing with this power, and oriental people are backing away from me. They are not doing this with fear, but with something of the attitude or feeling one might have when you stand near to a big fire and it is too hot to be close to.

The dream is an example of reaching beyond the known world into immense forces that can enter ones life.

Clouds clearing to reveal sun: The clearing of feelings and beliefs, or pains, that have clouded your awareness of your innate being and the wisdom innate in your existence.

Clouds obscuring the sun: Attitudes, fears and inner conflicts that obscure your real self, your source of energy and creativity. Imagine yourself as the clouds to feel what these blockages to your core self are. For help doing this see Stand in Role.

Coloured clouds: See: colours.

Flying in the clouds: This can either be about a sense of yourself free from the usual limitations of body, of concepts learned in a materialistic culture – or losing touch with your everyday life and escaping into imagination and longings. If it is the first it usually involves recognising that your essential self is not the body or the thoughts and emotions.

Formed clouds – square, round, etc: An unseen influence is shaping the way you see things and react. It is important to note what feelings you have about such clouds, as this gives a clue to what you are understanding of their message. Clouds usually constantly shift, so something important is entering your life and thoughts.

If bright: Usually feelings of upliftment or religious feelings. They can also indicate the way you have kept a higher ideal or purpose amidst difficult circumstances.

If dull or dark: Depression, feeling overshadowed by something. Such dark clouds are sometimes a warning about things we plan or are undertaking. They show we are not feeling good or confident about it, perhaps even an indication of things emerging. But often suggest things, pains or trauma you haven’t dealt with that are blocking your creativity or well-being.

Storm clouds: Strong emotions; the build up of anger or some sort of energy. See: tornado.

Swirling clouds: These can either depict being lost in a whirl of feelings and thoughts without a clear direction, or the brewing of a strong change or emotions.

Idioms: clouds on the horizon; every cloud has a silver lining; get your head out of the clouds; head in the clouds; on cloud nine

Useful Questions and Hints:

What feeling arises in me from my dream clouds, and what does that suggest to me?

If I imagine myself as the clouds what do I feel? For help doing this see Stand in Role.

Was there any message from the clouds – if so can I clarify what it was?

If I climbed above the clouds on a mountain or flying, what sense of myself and the world did I arrive at?

Try  using Acting on your dream – Associations Working With – Being the Person or Thing

Clown

This can suggest anything from feelings of foolishness and playfulness, to feeling stupid or idiotic, perhaps even treated as inadequate. The clown tends to take the most ridiculous or tragic course of actions, so at times can remind us of our own misdirected path.

Sometimes the clowns face or clothes are a disguise for pain or sadness, or that you feel you have been made a fool of, or paraded in front of others in a way to be ridiculed. Sometimes this relates to childhood memories.

Sometimes the clown is a person with great wisdom to share – wisdom gathered through very full and varied life experience. See: archetype of the fool-clown-trickster.

The clown may also appear in dreams of men and women who are meeting and working with their unredeemed self, their animal that needs transforming. In this form the clown ridicules our pretensions, ridiculous pride, and reveals the ways we delude ourselves, so leading the way to becoming a whole person. See: ape-man.

 

Useful Questions and Hints:

What is the essential message or feeling in this dream – sad, foolish, wise?

If I am the clown what am I communicating by my actions or words?

Is the clown pointing out something to me – if so what is it?

See Characters and People in Dreams – Being the Person or Thing

Coal

Money, good luck, energy. Ancient unconscious knowledge you have brought to the surface. Such wisdom needs to be unfolded from the symbol by exploring the feelings and ideas connected with the image. It can also indicate warmth, or the possibility of warmth or fire.

Coal can also depict parts of yourself – memories or experiences – that were deeply buried but are being, or have been brought to the surface, perhaps to be burnt out and therefore cleansed. There is usually great wisdom in such coal and it needs to be unfolded from the symbol by exploring the feelings and ideas connected with the image. If the coal is burnt and small stones are left in the ashes, this signifies the parts of your deepest self that are beyond time and change. They are influences from your long past that are great lessons and influences from past life experiences.

The coal and coal mining are therefore an analogy for a deep delving into oneself, or an emerging from being deeply lost in darkness. Mark Block in describing his slow return to consciousness after a terrible car accident, writes:

My journey to consciousness was like that of a coal miner’s journey from deep within the mine, getting closer and closer to the surface. As I climbed closer to consciousness, I was able to sense the fresh air, like that of a refreshing summer breeze on the coal miner’s face when he reached the surface and gathered in the warm sunshine of the day.

Useful Questions and Hints:

Am I digging this coal – and if so what in my life reflects this inner uncovering and discovery of the long past?

Does this dream coal in any way link with warmth or the promise of warmth – if so what am I needing or giving in regard to love and warmth?

If the coal is burn are there any stones left in the ashes – if so imagine yourself as the stones and describe what you feel and experience in your body and feelings? For help doing this see Stand in Role.

See Being the Person or Thing – Techniques for Exploring your Dreams

– What we Need to Remember About Us

Coat Jacket

The coat often depicts the ‘self’ we use in public. For instance we might be shy in public but very warm with a single friend. A coat or jacket, if it has pockets, can also represent what we carry inside us – memories, skills, the poser and social facilities our wallet or money gives. But at its basic level the coat is a means of protection – against cold or things getting to your body such as dirt or creatures. The coat can show you the feelings with which you clothe yourself. This is particularly connected with the degree of formality you present yourself with. See: Clothes. It the coat is not new it can represent the past, or what you are carrying with you from the past. Take time to think about what memories link with this jacket and when you have worn it. Of course outer clothing like this is also a means of keeping warm or appearing respectable or otherwise, depending on the condition of the jacket. The colour of the coat may be important too, so see colours.

Example: Found a coat/jacket washed up on the beach. It looked very bedraggled. Then I looked inside  and it was in better condition. With astonishment and pleasure I saw that the inside pocket was full of personal, interesting things. First to see was a pair of gloves.

This is a comment on the dreamer and what he carries with him from the past. At first he judges his appearance as unattractive, but when he looks inside himself he finds a different view.

 Example: I then felt someone’s hand going into my right jacket pocket. Turning I saw it was a woman sitting behind me to my right. She was dark haired, about 40, and had put a piece of paper in my pocket. She now explained, and I inwardly knew, why she had done this. She had received an inner revelation concerning me, and had been told by God to tell me. Being modest and not wishing to show off her insight, she had written in down. She then said, “Keep going. Take care of your youngest son. Press on until you move.”  I was deeply moved by what she said. For mention of my son by name especially made me feel she knew all about me. It was as if I had contacted a highly developed member. Love and tears poured from me and I held the woman very close. She had pierced me.

This time the dream seems to be about something that has been given that has deeply moved and impressed, and is a direct message about his son.

Giving coat to someone else or wrapping them in it: An act or love or protection, in that you are wrapping your own warmth or care about them.

Someone else’s coat: This represents the person whose coat it is. It might depict your feelings about them or your relationship with them.

Taking or stealing from someone else’s coat or jacket: In some way taking advantage of intimacy with someone. Not having enough strength or confidence to deal with your own life situation alone.

Overcoat: Usually protectiveness, or a way of covering up and allowing little of you to be seen or exposed. So to get under someone’s overcoat or getting hands under it shows greater intimacy with the person. But the overcoat is a way of dealing with harsh weather, difficult circumstances. The overcoat may mean you are not giving any secrets away, not showing intimacy or vulnerability.  Sometimes it depicts your belief system, political or religious, you use to meet the world. Such systems may be a way of allaying anxiety about decisions and self responsibility, and without them we may feel vulnerable and exposed. So the coat is used to represent them because it is protective and depicts attitudes or feelings. In a few dreams the overcoat represents the person’s body.

Idioms: Dragged by one’s coat tails; up one’s sleeve; coat of many colours.

Useful Questions and Hints:

What are my feelings or actions regarding the coat and what do they suggest?

What colour is the coat?

What type of coat is it – fashionable, ragged, working, nursing, etc – and what does this link with for me?

See Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Secrets of Power Dreaming – Processing Dreams – Settings in Dreams 

Cobra

See: Snake.

Cockerel

Warning, aggressiveness, masculinity, male sex organ. See: Birds.

A male or the male sexual characteristics; confidence. This can signify feelings of being a strutting proud male. It is often used in dreams to indicate maleness, as opposed to the hen as the female. Cockerels fighting can point to feelings about two men fighting, or family conflicts. Hen and cockerel fighting is about a male and female fight, or power struggle.

Observation or cockerels in their natural surroundings show them to be very protective of the hens and the chicks.

Example: I am in a big crowd of people when I see a large cockerel and a bright yellow canary, but the canary is the same size as the cockerel. The birds start to fight but almost immediately the cockerel overpowers the canary by forcing his head into the canary’s and tries to rip his tongue out. The canary is suffocating and helpless. I become hysterical and start shouting ‘It’s humiliating, somebody stop it.’ My panic becomes worse because nobody else seems at all concerned by what is going on. At this point I always wake.

The dreamer is in the passive role. She feels humiliated and helpless and wishes for somebody else to change the conflict she is experiencing. In this dream there are many options open to her. She could imagine herself stepping forward and parting the birds. She could imagine the canary fighting back. She could imagine the contest stopping, the canary being equal to the cockerel, and seeing the birds mate. She could have a cat come in and kill them -both. But the question is – what would most satisfy her? See – Secrets of Power Dreaming

Example: A large cockerel was amongst them and to my amused pleasure began immediately to chase the hens. They all ran madly away. My father was there now and said the chickens wouldn’t lay with that chicken chasing them. I said it wasn’t a chicken that a cockerel, and they would soon calm down. My mother now came. I said the chickens would stop running eventually because the cockerel was bigger than they. She said, no, it wasn’t the size, but the manner and attitude of his approach. She meant it caused an instinctive responses them.

When I explored the dream I realised that of course I am a cockerel that is inwardly a chicken. I am chicken because I won’t see my own homosexuality. I am chicken because I have made myself a passive female. My mother says it is not the size, its the – inner – attitude. Of course, my inner attitude, as a chicken, is changing. I am the size of a cockerel, but with the soul of a chicken – female. Brian’s series of dreams and his work on them graphically depict what has already been said, that sex is not simply an isolated part of our being.

Sex is intimately connected in the dreamers life, with his self image whether he is a hen or a cockerel; with his relationships, with his mother and father and with his philosophy of life, in which he needs to see sex not as a goal in itself but as a basic pleasure enjoyed for its own sake.

Example: Lying in the road in front of me was a dead chicken, eaten to its bones by maggots and ants. There were sinews and some feathers left. I noticed that as I moved, the head of the dead chicken appeared to look in the direction of my movement. At this point I had the impression the chicken was now gradually taking on flesh again – coming alive once more. Andrew – Southampton

Useful Questions and Hints:

What attitude is the cockerel expressing?

What is the cockerel doing that relate to me?

What is the rest of the dream indicating about the bird?

See Being the Person or Thing – Talking As – Reptilian Brain

Coffee

Many drinks represent a stimulus similar to alcohol, with its property of changing the way you feel and how you act. They release energy, emotions, change feelings, and can thus be associated with spirit. An invisible power, or the power behind human growth, that changes our experience of things. Coffee may also represent sociability, friendship, the giving of affection. See: Alcohol.

Mostly it represents feelings about social ritual, about informal sharing and being stimulated. Coffee is a energizing drug, something that literally changes the brain activity, so alters the way you feel. In this way it is similar to alcohol, though with a different action – an upper instead of a downer. So sometimes it is used in dreams to show an influence that changes the way you feel or relate to life or stimulates you. 

Some people refer to coffee as their ‘friend’. As a symbol in a dream, it might therefore be depicting you achieving a feeling of ease, and the ability to better meet what is in front of you.

Other feelings people associate with coffee is illustrated when they  call it ‘juice’. This is a word used in the US for electricity, and suggests personal energy and the power to do things they might not do as easily without coffee.

Coffee, however much you are used to it, interferes with your depth of sleep. It isn’t that you don’t sleep, but the depth is not the same. So you are more restless and wake needing the next cup of coffee to get you going. So some dreams may be pointing to coffee in a way to tell you what it is doing to your health or well being. See the following dream:

Example: I walk into my dining room  (this shows that the area of concern is food intake). In the middle of the floor is a chicken brooder shaped like a very large coffee pot. On top of the pot is a smoking cigarette. All of the baby chicks die. I feel sad about the dying chicks.

That cup of Joe that gets us up in the morning to perform our secular duties, it says a lot considering what many of us are forced or coerced to do for a living.

While many attribute coffee’s vice-like hold on their physiology to its caffeine content, there is much more going on than a fixation on a stimulant. Its been known for over a quarter of a century that coffee contains a compound with powerful opiate-like properties and which is found within both caffeinated and decaffeinated forms. The average cup of coffee contains five times the amount needed for what is known as the half maximal effective concentration (ED50), which is a measure of a drug’s potency indicating a response halfway between the baseline and maximum. The ‘narcotic’ properties of coffee are no doubt due to a complex interplay between a wide range of compounds, but at least one compound has been identified that is responsible for increasing the release of our own opioids within the body: namely, cafestrol, a diterprene found within the oil of coffee, known to have potent pain-killing properties.

Coffee is also a ‘brain-booster’ and contains a compound called trigonelline which both stimulates the release of dopamine (not unlike cocaine), and stimulates neurite outgrowth, which involves the extension of dendrites and axons in neurons and which may compensate and rescue damaged neuronal networks in the aging brain. One of the greatest nutrition philosophers of all time, Rudolf Hauschka, described coffee’s affect on our body-mind as follows:

Coffee makes us more aware of our bodily structure. And since this structure is so wise and logical, our thoughts become logical in their awareness of it. Coffee thus helps thinking to find a firm foundation. The connection between bodily being and thinking, keeps calling itself to our attention. Coffee has the same effect on digestion that thought has on our upper man, i.e., a properly ordered metabolism goes hand in hand with orderly thinking. Both are founded on a properly ordered physical structure.”  Rudolf Hauschka, Nutrition: A Holistic Approach

Coffee is also one of the only sources of “bitters” remaining in the sweet-fixated Western diet, which sadly comes with a certificate of guarantee that the bearer will likely develop type 2 diabetes, heart disease or cancer at some point in their life. Could the extreme bitterness of coffee be the reason why it has been repeatedly shown to reduce type 2 diabetes risk, as it is one of the only ways we can balance out the highly inappropriate excesses of carbohydrate in our modern dietary configuration? We don’t normally think of grains as sweet, but they are on the glycemic index. Puffed rice, for instance, can make the blood sweeter than white sugar which is why carbs are known as “crouching diabetes, hidden sugar.” Coffee contains a wide range of blood-glucose and insulin sensitizing compounds, making it an ideal complement to a carbohydrate-deranged diet.

40 million Americans are estimated to be chronically ill with sleep disorders. Few people recognise their condition and its cause however. Signs of it are chronic tiredness; needing constant stimulants to keep going during the day; constant falling asleep during work, talks, driving, inability to wake easily in the morning. As sleep plays an equally important part in healthy long life as nutrition and exercise, it is important to assure its quality. If our pattern and quality of sleep is disturbed, we may fail to notice the influence of such drinks as coffee, tea, chocolate and alcohol, all of which disturb sleep.

Coffee grounds: Waste product, something left over from what you have been doing or your way of life and relationship. Sometimes this refers to stuff your body sees as waste to discharge or clear. But it may link directly with what you do to yourself to gain artificial stimulation .

Coffee tipped on you: Could mean someone is  “dumping” on you.

Coffee shop: Meeting of minds and feelings or a time of rest and perhaps review. Being open with someone. Something is being offered – what is it – what feelings or involvement does it ask or give? In some dreams it reflects the satisfaction of a desire and a time of pleasure – coffee and doughnuts.

Drinking coffee: This depends very much on the surrounding atmosphere and events of the dream. It is usually about being sociable and maybe communicative  – but sometimes it shows an attempt to wake up or become alert.

Offering, being offered or sharing coffee: Friendship, intimacy, what you thirst for or desire.

Idioms: coffee talk; wake up and smell the coffee.

Useful Questions and Hints:

The dream of the coffee pot brooder links coffee with the illness of the chicks – what does my dream link coffee with?

What am I feeling in the dream about the coffee?

What are the surrounding feelings and atmosphere?

Try using Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – The power of Habits

Coffin

This is nearly always a reminder of one’s own mortality. So it often points to  your thoughts and feelings about death, as these are often in the background of our mind, and dreaming of a coffin suggests you may be exploring how you relate to death. (i.e. are you at ease with it, do you understand it as an integral part of life, or are you still feeling fear or a belief it is the final end of everything?) The coffin might also be showing you the death of a part of yourself – a hope, feelings about a relationship, things lost and buried in your earlier years. See Dreaming of Death.

Seeing your own coffin in a dream has several possible meaning. The first is obviously to do with feelings and thoughts about death as described above. The second is to do with a reminder that there is an end to your life, so live fully and daringly now. Do and be now with those you love what is in you to do. This sometimes means that you have buried your real self and need to really come alive. The third is that you have a presentiment of your own death and the dream is preparing you. Soemtimes people want to see what their funeral will be like.

If you are in the coffin, apart from what has been said above, it might also show you feeling trapped in a life situation, feeling you have no future and life is like a death. At such times you need to let old parts of you, old attitudes and fears really die, as such dreams suggest a great change and a resurrection into a new way of life – almost a return to the womb.

If the coffin is linked with someone you know, Sometimes it may show a hidden desire to get them out of your life, or perhaps worries about the health of the person, or fear of losing them. This includes the death of a relationship and the feelings of loss, or one’s feelings about the death of someone such as husband. If it is the coffin of someone dead, it can also be a link with their influence in your life now they are dead, or if it is a parent, it can stand for the influence of family traditions in your present life.

Example: My father died when I was 3 – 1973. I recently dreamt I was carrying my fathers coffin at his funeral. On the way to the church I dropped the coffin and the lid fell off exposing his face at the advanced stage of decomposition. I replaced the lid so as not to grieve my mother further. But I followed my father’s spirit into the gaps of the coffin.  Rosina.

What Rosina’s dream shows is that because we all need a relationship with a male figure f to fully mature from childhood, and Rosina missed this, she is  figuratively carrying his dead body around with her to deal with what she missed in life. The dream shows how she is ready to actually progress in the relationship and marks a turning point in the way you will relate to males. The lid  is coming off because those old feelings that are not healthy any more are being exposed. The dream says she is trying not to disturb her mother, so may be ‘putting the lid’ on those feelings again.

Example: I am sitting in a large comfortable room when my husband comes in and starts to take off his overcoat. The garden outside is full of flowers so it seems to be summer. As I turn to greet him I see his dead body lying in an open coffin between us. My husband starts talking of our plans for the following day. Pointing to the coffin, I say, “Yes, but we must do something about this first. We can’t leave it here much longer.” My husband goes close to the coffin, takes a long look at the body, his own, says, “Yes, we must. It is beginning to smell.” There the dream ends. I wake up feeling very sad and haunted. I can’t forget it. My husband died over eight years ago. Mrs P.M.

The dream is clearly pointing to the negative feelings of loss that Mrs PM is still carrying around inside her that she needs to deal with. The garden – her potential for growth – is full of colour and possibilities, so she can actually move on.

In some dreams, death, caves, underground, tombs or coffins often appear together. The living process in us – life itself – is fully acquainted with life and death, birth and resurrection. They are all fundamental processes of life in its fullness. We pass through them all while still living in the body at certain times. Such times are usually when great inner or outer change is occurring, perhaps when we have lost something or someone important to us, or have left behind a way of life or work, or a period of ones life such as parenthood. Thus the coffin can also depict these processes of death and rebirth.

Putting a coffin in the ground is in some ways like planting a seed. Within ourselves the fruit of that person’s life, or of our own past, can now emerge in a new way, shorn of its old forms. See: burial; funeral; tomb.

Example: When I was 17 I met a guy and quickly became involved. I met his grandfather only a couple of times during our relationship before he passed. He had raised my boyfriend, he had only sons and grandsons.. Never had there been born a girl in their bloodline. About six months after we started dating, his grandfather died. I went to the funeral with my boyfriend. Shortly after I had a very vivid dream of the funeral. As I walked to the casket to view the body, the grandfather raised up looked me right in the eyes and said, ” You take care of my baby girl.” The next week we found out we were pregnant. I did give the first girl born to that bloodline!

Useful Questions and Hints:

How am I feeling about the coffin, and what does this suggest about my relationship with death or the person in the coffin?

Is this connecting me with something of myself that died recently or in the past?

Is there a suggestion here of my connection with the long past, my ancestors – their bones – and how it influences my present life?

See Near Death Experiences – Techniques for Exploring your Dreams

Coin

Sometimes a coin has similar symbolism to circle –  your wholeness. This may represent something you value, so can have a very wide significance. For instance two gold coins, in one person’s dream represented his twin sons, who were of great value to him.

Anything to do with money may suggest worries about finance, or an intuition of good fortune.

If the money is dirty, it may be a suggestion that you are living beneath your best motives, earning money in a grubby way. Because we call loose money change in English, sometimes the coins might represent change in your life – small changes.

But money is also energy. We get it usually by working, and so it stands in the place of work energy sometimes. So holding on to coins shows you holding yourself back, holding on to what you could let flow in your life. See: money.

Coins have two sides: Occasionally this is the point made in the dream, showing how the dual nature of life – the inner the outer, life and death – are actually only one thing without duality. See You Are Dual

Coins as jewellery: Coins have often been strung together to form a necklace or bangle, and in many cultures personal wealth was worn in this way. To find or dig up such a necklace of coins suggest the uncovering within yourself or your life things of great value, of abilities or talents, often from the long past. Such influence often comes in the form of new abilities arising, or as intuitive awareness of how to respond to certain situations or relationships in your life. So they can be links with what is usually the hidden side of life.

As simple jewellery that is not ancient,  they suggest richness of character that is obvious to others and expressed in the way you live.

Example: I was the top of a hill on my knees digging in the earth with my right hand. It was fairly easy. I pulled up what felt like coins, and found they were all joined together, forming something one could wear. This was in the form of a necklace from which ran a long loop from one edge to the other, perhaps reaching fairly well below the breasts. There were coins set a little way apart all around this loop. Then in between there were two connections from coins going down in a V to a single line that connected with the bottom of the loop. From this single line, and the coins on it, there were connections to the coins on the loop, reaching low on the trunk.

The coins, or really, medallions, were shining silver, depicting Christian or ancient saints and martyrs. It was, I knew in the dream, like a rosary, which one could use in prayer. But instead of just the Ave Maria’s, and the Our Father’s, all the other saints were included. Thus it was a very comprehensive guide to prayer. Some of the silvered chains between the coins were missing, but these had been mended with something else. The shape of it suggests the sign of the cross people make on their body. But it shows the right way to do this is first touching the brow, then to two breasts, then down to the genitals – the real sources of power. Richard.

Digging up coins: Can suggest uncovering something of value in yourself, perhaps a talent or ability you were led to bury, or ignore, in the past. Sometimes such coins point to abilities of things of value that are emerging in your present life from the long past. Occasionally such coins need to be cleaned, suggesting you have issues to deal with, karma to work out, before the talents or value from the past can be really used in the present.

Money suggests energy too, so the buried coins may point to energy or personal potential that may have been buried or repressed at some time.

Dropping coins into water: Is an ancient way of giving a sacrifice – a wishing well effect. We give to the unseen powers of life in order to either say thank you, or ask a blessing/wish.

Finding coins: Has in it not only a sense of finding things potentially valuable, and therefore allowing you more possibilities in life, but also at times confronts you with possessiveness, ownership, or sharing.

Foreign coins: Are showing things that are valuable but not at the moment transferable into the potential energy they represent. So you need to ask yourself how you can extract their value.

If the money is dirty: It may be a suggestion that you are living beneath your best motives, earning money in a grubby way that your inner feelings suggest you avoid.

Making coins: Might indicate that you are creating something of value out of basic materials.

Putting coins in a vending machine: Is a little bit like throwing a coin in a wishing well. But here we are giving something to get something – or hoping to get something. So the emphasis is on giving to get – hopes and expectations.

Tarnished coin; Depicts something valuable or interesting that has long been forgotten or not recognised in yourself or in your life events.

Idioms: To coin a phrase; serious coin.

 

Useful Questions and Hints:

If I have just found the coin or coins, what am I aware of recently entering my life that is of value?

What am I doing with the coin(s), and what does this suggest about the way I use my energy or talents?

If I am spending the coin, what is it I am seeking by this transaction or sacrifice?

Try using Spiritual Life In Dreams – Techniques for Exploring your Dreams

Old valuable coins: These could depict deeply important memories held within yourself about inherited wisdom from your family, maybe even past lives. See: Bank; Money.

Cold Coldness

Often used in a dream to show how we or someone holds back any warmth or acknowledgment. Therefore it often indicates held back emotions, feeling abandoned, without love or hope and having no emotional warmth, or experiencing fear. This can link with an inward, lethargic, introspective attitude.

In some dreams it suggests feeling neglected or ‘left out in the cold’, and occasionally appears in dreams connected with feelings about death.

Cold flesh is about the lack of sexual or emotional warmth and the living flow of feelings and ease with oneself or others.

Cold spell: This is a term when from warm weather the temperature suddenly drops, and in a dream suggests that the warm feelings you had about someone or life have suddenly ‘chilled’ – or that you are in an environment in which people are cold to you. The following dream illustrates this shift of temperature and also the conflict and death (of love or feelings) that can be associated with coldness.

Example: There’s solid ice and snow all around. Everything is solid white. I’m blinded by the white ice and snow, I feel cold, I’m shivering and I think I’m close to death. Then all of a sudden a huge hand reaches out and grabs me. I recognize the hand. I stare at it for a few minutes. Then I grab the hand. I recognize the hand as the man I have just started to date. What does this dream mean? I’m confused about my relationship with this man, confused about my feelings…

Feeling cold: Suddenly feeling cold, or shivering with cold can be an expression of conflict or avoidance, even fear. When we pull back from something emotionally, or are frightened of our own inner feelings, we often experience a temperature drop, and possible sudden tiredness. It often happens when we are opening to the action life within us, but are in conflict about allowing it. See Life’s Little Secrets

Idioms: catch a cold; cold comfort; cold shoulder; cold storage; cold turkey; cold feet; in cold blood; cold call; cold refreshing; cold murderous rage; cold sweat; left out in the cold; out cold; throw cold water on it.

Useful Questions and Hints:

Can I see any sign of coldness in my waking life – and if so what is it about?

Am I cold, or is someone else cold in the dream?

If the surroundings are cold, can I see there is not much warmth in my environment at the moment?

Try using – Easy Dream Understanding – Being the Person or Thing – Talking As

Collision

This may be telling you that a conflict of opinions, direction or feelings with another person, or that careless behaviour leading to problems in relationship is happening. See car

In some cases collisions are purposeful. It might be the only way to meet or make contact with someone, or it might be a test to see how you will react.

The collision may also be between parts of your own nature, such as your feelings and your intellect – your body and your way of life – your unconscious and your conscious self – your masculine and feminine principles. There are usually hints in the dream as to what it is you are in conflict or on a collision course with. The collision can express an internal conflict arising form a traumatic incident some time in your life – a conflict between loving and avoiding love for instance – avoiding because it was so painful in the past.

Many ‘collisions’ occur between the generations. Adolescent’s often run smack bang into as they make a break for independence and identity.

If this is a dream showing your collision with a car or other vehicle, it is probably depicting your driving or a collision with another person, such as a break in the relationship. But it is worth thinking it might be a warning and so see the following example:

Example: I dreamed my godson had been killed in an automobile accident involving other teenagers. I told him about it and exacted his promise that he would pray for protection every time he got into a car, no matter who was driving.

A month later he and his girl friend were passengers in a car driven by a friend. They were involved in a minor accident on the Hollywood freeway. While the owner of the car was fetching flares out of the trunk, my godson had a sense of immediate danger. Seiz­ing his date by the hand, he ran with her to safety. About two seconds later, a speeding car crashed into the other boy and smashed his car. An eleven-car pileup resulted, sending five people to the hospital. His friend lost his leg, but my godson escaped injury. Quoteds from Dreams Your Magic Mirror by Elsie Sechrist.

See: Car

Therefore in any dreams that appear as predictions ask for help in prayer.

Useful Questions and Hints:

Does this collision show any signs of a power struggle, or a struggle for domination?

Is it a male or female I collide with, and is this reflected in my life I any way?

What attitudes are involved in the collision, what outcome, and what can I learn from this?

See Secrets of Power Dreaming – Associations Working With – Techniques for Exploring your Dreams

Colours – Colors

To quickly find the description of the colour click on it below.

Red

Burgundy

Orange

Yellow

Green

Blue

Violet

Black

Brown

Grey

Pink

Purple

White

In many dreams where colour predominates there is usually strong feelings as in the example. This suggests colours depict our emotions and feeling tones. Where a dreamer is largely intellectual or out of touch with their feelings, the colour would stand in the place of the emotion, instead of alongside it as with S.C.

White is the most frequently mentioned colour in the collection of dreams used for this book. Black is next, then blue.

Example: ‘I was standing in a very beautifully carved chapel or religious place. There seemed to be shadowy nun or monk like figures around. But it was the exquisite colouring of the place which filled me with a sort of ecstasy. Everything was in the most delicate shell pink.’ S. C.

red Even where red appears quite casually in a dream, as with the hat in the example, there is frequently fear, screaming, horror or a sense of danger in the same dream. Red also represents ones basic emotions, earthy nature, and sexuality. In this sense it depicts your strength or vitality and your down to earth health and power. But because of the modern association with traffic lights and warnings such as brake lights on cars, it may sometimes be used as a warning, or a way of saying ‘stop’ or ‘no’.

Example: These men were throwing a big red rubber ball into a field, and if we didn’t catch it, we would get shot.

Example: ‘An old woman with a very pink, lined face, and wearing a clashing red hat, knelt close to my face. The woman leaned forward to poke my hand, and I recoiled, screaming myself awake.’ Joy S.

From findings concerning early humans we know that the colour red, and substances such as red ochre, played a large and important part in their life. In Africa red ochre was, and still is, called the ‘blood of the earth’ and is used in rituals to do with death and renewal. Because red is connected with blood and blood’s obvious link with health, being alive, and the process of childbirth in women, ochre and the colour red were and still are, often used in healing practices. Red wine is also seen as blood in the magical rituals of the church and other groups. See: blood under body; blood under archetypes; wine.

A recent research team of U.S. and German scientists found that the colour red influences the way people function. It reduces the ability to perform well at whatever task they are doing. University of Rochester and University of Munich researchers reported that even if people being tested were aware of even a hint of red, their performance would be reduced in quality to a significant degree. University of Rochester psychology Professor Andrew Elliot, head of the research, said people associate the colour red with mistakes and failures.

Less frequently: Red can link with blood; menstruation; the biological life force; conception; reproduction; death. The sun. Also war and sacrifice. It is often seen in red clothes and lips as a sign of great sensual attraction. Red wine as a symbol of blood and it holiness – holy because it represents a symbol of the human spirit. This is most likely due to its method of production. The separate ‘lives’ of thousands of grapes were squashed so their life blood would pour into a common vat. This then underwent a magical transformation by yeast which turned it into alcohol. The connection here is that people who have a direct experience of God or of the spirit, experience it as a unification of all that has lived and is living. The experience of countless human lives has been linked and transformed into a vast sea of wisdom and heightened awareness. It is this we ‘drink’ when we touch our own union with the ocean of awareness that is our spirit.

Pale pink: Baby feelings; gentle love; weakness.

Red and grey often appear together: Emotions connected with depression or lack of motivation and pleasure.

Red brick building: Homeliness; warmth.

Red clothes or motif: Sexuality; passion; strong emotions.

Red earth: Fertility; richness; the healing power of the body; the collective memory of past human struggles and discoveries which we now inherit as personal or social skills, or ease of performance of things that would have been difficult or impossible for our ancestors.

Red eyes: This usually suggests feelings or fears about sickness or being irrational or deeply emotional.

Red face: Anger; high emotion; illness .

Red hair: Passionate thoughts, angry ideas, great energy like a fire. See: hair.

Red flowers: Love; passion; dangers of passion.

Red furniture or decor; Plush: richness; comfort.

Rose pink: Love, as one might give to a child.

Idioms: paint the town red; redneck; see red; in the red; red carpet; red letter day; red light district; red faced; red handed; red tape; run a red light.

Useful Questions and Hints:

Are there signs of powerful emotions in the rest of the dream – if so what am I feeling passionate or emotional about?

Is there a warning of danger here, or a message to stop – if so what does that apply to in my life?

Do I feel in any way connected to the earth, to the spirit of nature or life in this dream – if so what does that tell me?

See Being the Person or Thing – Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Meetings with Christ

burgundy  The colour burgundy is like red earth, but richer and deeper. It feels to me like the wonder of discovering the deeps within you. It is a mood of deep receptivity and quiet.

orange Blending or balance of emotions and intellect. Orange is a blend of red and yellow, and as such much refines the basic instinctual energy or red with the life giving yellow. So it is often used to indicate refined or transformed sexuality or urges, and perhaps greater wisdom. Its link with fruits such as oranges and apricots also might link it with fruitfulness. It therefore suggests health and energy along with a calm mind. Also with warmth and easy feelings

Orange can also indicate heat or warmth, and so can mean you feel energised, or a warning of getting overheated or burnt depending on the dream.

Some people call some shades of red orange, so occasionally there might be a difference in terminology.

Because some people and cats have orange hair, the colour might at times refer to a particular person or feelings about an animal. In my database of dreams orange cats are referred to again and again, and probably depict the female energy or a vivacious personal trait.

Sometimes: Warmth; religious feelings or insight. In some reams when it is an object coloured orange it suggest something flashy, outrageous or quirky.

Brownish orange: This suggests health problems or a lowering of energy and clarity.

Orange hair: Warm or life giving thoughts or ideas – or reminder of a particular person you know with that colouring. See: hair.

Useful Questions and Hints:

What am I feeling in the dream about the colour, and where do I find those feelings in waking life?

What past associations and memories do I have with orange, and do they throw light on the dream?

Where does the orange appear – clothing, objects or body? In whatever context, look up how it relates to the clothing or body part, etc.

See Associations Working With – Techniques for Exploring your Dreams

– Introduction to Dreams

yellow Depending on the context in the dream, yellow can link with lightness of feeling; intuition; hopefulness for the future; a clear intellect or extroversion. Because it is a colour associated with shining, it may indicate your innermost wisdom shining out – especially if you are dressed in bright yellow.

On the negative side it can suggest cowardice, jealousy, caution or quarantine. So in some dreams it is linked with sickness or some form of inner illness, or a warning that something is not right.

Yellow roses are used to depict friendship without sexual love, or a love that is not leading to partnership.

Because the action of light tends to fade colours, you find the word yellowing or yellowed used to describe an ageing process, or something that is old. So in some dreams it would indicate a sense of something being old, worn or perhaps fragile. In The Great Gatsby, Scott Fitzgerald used yellow to represent moral decay decadence and death.

Corn and sun dried landscapes are yellow, and so in a dream can indicate feelings of content, fruitfulness and richness of spirit. As the sun is thought of as yellow the colour also depicts life giving and warming influences or attitudes, of the expression of your own life flow.

Yellow also links with gold, its ability to remain untarnished and its precious quality. So if yellow in your dream has any of these associations it would link with what is of great value and abilities in you.

In some forms of meditation yellow also signifies a shift in awareness, or a change in the way you sense things.

Cream Gentle relaxed feelings. Cream softens the impact of yellow, so suggests, as with cream clothes or furnishings, an easy, quiet feeling, friendship and relaxation rather than sexual excitement and youthful exuberance.

Yellow-green is sometimes associated with lies or deceit, or even sickness.

Muddy Yellow: This might indicate toxins in your body, and therefore lowered energy and poor health. But it can also suggest lack of clarity in your thoughts and feelings, and therefore depressed thoughts and confusion.

Yellow Orange: Energetic and clear feelings and thoughts. This might also lead to feelings of warmth in connection with others.

Idioms: yellow belly; a yellow streak

Useful Questions and Hints:

What of the many associations with yellow does my dream suggest?

Is this a radiant dream, suggesting the expression of my own inner life in a positive way?

Is there any link with age or decay in the dream, pointing to something in me that is outworn?

See Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Prayer and Dream Interpretation

green Most of the plant kingdom is green, and so many dreams use it to depict something in that you is connected with growth, potential for growth, or capability of fruition and regeneration. A green living thing might emerge from apparently lifeless earth, suggesting a new living direction or feeling is emerging in your life.

These positive associations are linked in some dreams with healing or positive change, and green is often found mentioned in dreams about heaven.

The negative associations are with envy or jealousy. Also when things go mouldy they often go green, and slime or infected mucous is green, so at times green may mean something is bad or likely to undermine your health or positive feelings.

Many growing things are green before they ripen or flower, so green might also suggest not yet being ripe or lacking experience.

Because traffic lights use green as a ’go’ sign, in some dreams it can suggest a positive yes to decisions or directions you are taking.

There is an obscure but sometimes relevant connection for people who are working to unfold their inner qualities. The green leaves of plants are instrumental in allowing light to become the energy in transforming the mineral forces of the earth into living tissue. So in some dreams the green is used to show how your own process of opening to the forces of Light and Life are transforming your lower or less conscious levels of self into greater consciousness and expression. In all it is about transformation.

Sometimes a dream snake is green, and this shows the possibility of great inner growth, healing and change, depending upon your relationship with the snake. See: snake.

Example: In my dream I was watching a fern grow. It was small but opened very rapidly. As I watched I became aware that the fern was an image representing a process occurring within myself, one I grew increasingly aware of as I watched. Then I was fully lucid in my dream and realised that my dream, perhaps any dream, was an expression in images of actual events occurring unconsciously in myself. I felt enormous excitement, as if I were witnessing something of great importance. Francis P.

Breaking through the imagery in this way to the processes and possibilities underlying dreams is a royal road to discovering your own innate talents. You can transform negative memories and habits, and use your creativity to deal with real life events. Jon describes such a transforming experience.

Example: I met a man who seemed to be something of an adept or master; a source of Caucasian white guru type. At first I understood his name to be Faser Dan Li. Then gradually it became Father Li. This I understood to represent fatherly and the name of Faser Dan Li to mean faster than light. Anyway, this guru figure took me into very large greenhouses. Stretching away into the distance tiny seedlings were growing, most of them about four inches in height. As I watched some youths drove in on cross-country motorbikes and roared around the place. Faser Dan Li did nothing to prevent them. But when they had gone he looked at me and said, “Those are your emotions. They are wild and out of control. As such they could damage the tender growth of souls represented here by these little plants. Until your emotions are much more fully calmed and under control you cannot be given the keys of insight into other peoples being.”

Blue green: This indicates healing or change coming from within or from a spiritual dimension.

Dark yellow/greens: Evil intentions; growth of negative attitudes; sickness; envy; jealousy.

Greenish grey: Pessimism and lack of enthusiasm or ‘colour’ or satisfying growth in your life.

 

Idioms: Green fingers; green with envy or jealousy; green eyed monster; green light; green – naive.

Useful Questions and Hints:

Do I sense the feeling quality of green in the dream – is so what is it?

Am I meeting changes and personal growth or healing at this time, and in what way?

If there are negative feelings in connection with the green, what of such feelings can I note in my waking life?

See Avoid Being Victims – Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Questions

blue

Dark blues: In many women’s dreams threatening men appear dressed in dark blue or navy blue overalls. This suggests the woman is meeting her own male/animus side with anxiety. So there is a need to work with this and find a way to express your power and energy in the world. See Archetype of the Animus.

Dark blue can also suggest mature personal insights into life, or if it is a muddy or murky blue, it indicates depression, negative thoughts or intuitions, and being gloomy.

Light blues: Your sense of intuition, or achieving a wide awareness of life. Blue also links with religious feelings and experience of the holy – i.e. an awareness of those things that are universal – such as birth, caring relationship, parenthood – and so recognised as transcending ones own small life.

Light blue can also indicate coolness of nature. Often seen in visions of the womb as a blue grotto or woman with halo of blue, so connects with prenatal and infant relationship with mother.

Blue-gray: Religious feelings produced by depression, fear or gloominess.

Blue skin: Because we go blue when suffocating or having breathing difficulties, it can be used to show what a struggle we are having with life, how bruised we are with experience, or how cold we feel. But as with Krishna and his blue skin, it might show how you are being pervaded by a sense of the universal, of a wider and beautiful life.

Blue-green: Healing or the ability to heal arising form attunement to the forces transcending your own limited awareness.

Blue-violet: Great attunement with insights and powers transcending normal human ability.

Idioms: the air was blue; baby blues; blue film; blue funk; blue in the face; blue moon; bolt from the blue; once in a blue moon; blue pencil; blue stocking; feel blue; out of the blue; vanish into the blue; blue-blood; true-blue.

Useful Questions and Hints:

What do I feel when I hold this colour in mind, and where is that feeling or association fitting into my life at the moment?

Am I feeling tuned into a wider view of things at the moment, and if so what am I realising?

Am I feeling blue – or do I feel like blue skies are here?

See Associations Working With – Techniques for Exploring your Dreams  – Introduction to Dreams

Violet: This colour mostly appears in dreams where the dreamer has a deep sense of one’s awareness of the cycles of Life and the life that includes but stretches beyond the body. It may also include intuitive awareness or universal love. A wisdom arising from an extended awareness. See Wider awareness

You are probably sensitive, appreciative, and well-rounded person. You have high qualities and are devoted and rich in inner understanding. Often a spiritual leader of some kind in a quiet unobtrusive way.

The flower violet suggests shyness, quiet beauty, perhaps a passive quietness, as suggested by the idiom, a shrinking violet.

Useful questions:

What are my immediate feelings and associations with this colour?

What feelings were linked with this colour in the dream, and what do I gather from those feelings?

Have I been thinking on or feeling things to do with the spiritual dimension of life – if so what?

Indigo – violet: This depends a great deal on what you associate with these colours. But suggests the deep peace that comes from being at ease with the spirit of all life.

Indigo: indicates the deep peace of the night.

Useful Questions and Hints:

What are my immediate feelings and associations with this colour?

What feelings were linked with this colour in the dream, and what do I gather from those feelings?

Have I been thinking on or feeling things to do with the spiritual dimension of life – if so what?

See Spiritual Life In Dreams – Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Inner World

black This is the colour of the night, and so because it links with absence of light, opens us to what we can’t see or deal with in the dark – in what is ‘in the dark’, unconscious – within or around us. It is the experience, like sleep, in which the ego diminishes or melts back into unconsciousness, the Core Self.

This also relates to all those things you repress or avoid feeling or being aware of in yourself and life. So the dream will probably include threats of some sort, or what is unknown, hidden or avoided. So this relates to your hidden fears or past hurts that have been buried and remain unconscious. In African traditions black is the colour of night, death, excrement, and illness.

Black can depict what we feel is evil – in other words the unaccepted side of yourself, the parts of your nature you don’t want others to see, and you don’t want to admit even to yourself. It also may indicate depression, what is negative within you or from an outside influence. This includes feelings of secrecy, fear or things we fear, and anxious feelings about death. See It is vitally important – The Con About Evil – Unconscious

Things like a black animal or black vehicle usually indicate that you are dealing with feelings or fears that you have previously kept buried or repressed. Their appearance in your dream shows you are ready to meet such feelings by allowing them to be experienced and acknowledged.

Example: I dreamt last night that a black Spanish fighting bull charged me. I climbed a high wire mesh fence, like that surrounding tennis courts. There I was safe, as the Bull charged again. It charged people. I came down from the fence trying to help divert the bull’s destructiveness.

Here the dreamer is meeting sexual feelings that he had always avoided in the past and still feels threatened by. As the dream shows, he tries to avoid facing these feelings, but in the end has to deal with them. The forgetfulness or repression of parts of ones experience is very clearly shown in the next dream. See – Resistances

I felt very close to the girl. She said, “Do you remember when they made you black all over?”  I said I couldn’t, and she reminded me of being a film extra, when, to cover up my bad skin, I was covered in black make-up to look like a slave. I then said, “You know, there are parts of my life I can’t remember.”

The connection in some dreams between feelings about death and the colour black are shown in the next dream.

Example: Mike is dying. He is taking care of the old folks to gain merit because he knows he may soon be joining them wherever they are. He wants to be sure that they remember him kindly. The black road (death road=death row) has been incorporated into President Bush’s speech and is declaimed as death road or death highway in some of his speeches – as in ‘we want to protect you from death road or highway’. Of course, no one believes him as everyone knows that it is impossible to save oneself from death’s road. We all have to travel it eventually.

Black also sometimes indicate what is earthy, the source of life and growth. What is hidden in the unconscious or body can be powerfully transformative. Like compost, it is full of potentially life enhancing energy. Such black or hidden things often take time to clarify. They have remained in a condition of never having been felt or known fully, and so are unclear and pre-verbal. Knowing them means gradually understanding through experiencing them, and being able to describe and integrate them. There is often a complication here in ones progress, in that consciously you may have hidden or repressed feelings or experiences, or been unwilling to accept things, anything that was not judged good or positive. In this way the so called ‘bad’ is repressed and you become one sided and lacking wholeness. Therefore meeting the ‘black’ is important. Out of this fundamental earthiness the new person – you – can become can emerge. See –The Con About Evil

Black and white: The opposites appearing together. In ourselves the good and bad coexist, and one balances the other. So this would suggest such coexistence and balancing.

Black clothes or under garments: This usually points to hidden or unconscious feelings or sexuality. Black is also associated with a priest or the clergy, so might depict a religious or moral influence in some dreams.

A person dressed in black: This may represent your shadow, or less accepted characteristics. See: shadow.

Black people: If this is a true black person, see black people.

Shiny black: Rather like a crystal ball, this suggests looking into your intuitive perception of what lies usually unconscious within you, looking into the depths of yourself, perhaps beyond the boundaries of your personality.

Useful Questions and Hints:

What is it I am on the edge of being aware of, or have been unaware of previously?

Are there anxieties o feelings I usually do not allow myself to feel fully – perhaps using defences such as smoking or alcohol to help push away?

Is there something emerging out of the blackness that offers new growth – if so what do I notice in waking that is new and living in me?

See Dreams are a reflection of your inner world – Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Inner World

brown As a mood this can depict gloominess, dullness or even depression. But it depends what is brown in the dream so it can refer to the earth or earthiness and processes of the body. A muddy brown can suggest unclear or selfish emotions and thoughts.

Brown is in some ways black that has become more light, and so might refer to things that you are bringing to awareness, or facets of yourself you have enabled to grow and express after being unconscious and unexpressed. So in some dreams brown transforms into other radiant colours, perhaps in a way a plant draws something from brown soil and transforms it into the colour of its flowers.

Excrement is brown and in some dreams the feelings show this depicting things that need to be left behind, recognised as not needed, or like manure something that is rich and needed for or holding in it the potential for growth.

Brown in regard to objects can show them as being old or worn, as leaves are that have served their purpose and are now ending their life. But brown can also relate to parts of you from the long past, or containing much experience – but also perhaps to do with feelings about ageing.

Example: The striking part of the dream is this rough looking dog, for when I look into its deep dark brown eyes I can see and feel such love and devotion and am so warmed. As I take the road away from the house, the dog stays close at my heels and I know I have a devoted friend who will never leave me and I feel much happier.

Example: I noticed for the first time a small brown mark on my left hand. True I have been out in the sun, but I never grow freckles. This is one of those marks old people have on their hands.

Brown animal: Your natural urges that you are probably comfortable with.

Brown clothes: Middle of the road and perhaps feelings that are a bit dull or conformist, but are easy to live with.

Brown eyes: Perhaps relates to feelings you have for someone you know with brown eyes.

Brown skin: Feelings about health and perhaps attractiveness. However, brown marks on the skin suggest either feelings about ageing, or that there is something wrong, or something has hurt your skin. See: hand.

Idioms: Brown study; browned off.

Useful Questions and Hints:

Am I experiencing or moving from feelings lacking colour, vibrancy or life?

Do I seek a comfortable situation that allows me to relax and avoid the energetic processes of life?

Does my dream relate to feelings of ageing?

Is this an old thing – and if so what do I feel it contains in terms of past experience or information?

See Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Inner World – Life’s Little Secrets

grey/gray This sometimes indicate feelings of living an unhappy or colourless dull existence, a daily round without excitement or stimulus, or morbid or serious thoughts. Sometimes it suggests officiousness or officialdom.

Artemidorus wrote that, “.. a sky that is gray, gloomy or full of clouds, signifies failures and afflictions. In fact grey or gray is often used in language to indicate such feelings, as in the following sentence, taken from Castle’s Dreaming Mind. “If a dreamer needs to be sensitised to how gray, confining, or confusing his or her outlook is toward life, dreams may be cast in sombre,  prison-gray  tones  or the dreamer may wander around in a fog.” These states of mind can lead to ill health or at least a lowering of excitation and energy in life. An extreme example of how grey indicates difficult feelings is seen in the following dream.

Example: I have had a series of dreams which feature grey people standing beside my bed, and each time I have woken myself up by screaming, with my heart pounding, my being unable to move. JS

Grey is the mid point between black and white, so in that sense depicts balance or calmness, but it can also indicate lack of clarity, indecision or blurring of distinctions. Like fog, it suggests not being able to see clearly.

With grey hair it has several possibilities depending on the tone of the dream. It can link with maturity, wisdom or gathered experience. But it can also point to ageing, the loss of faculties with increasing years, and the path to death along the avenue of diminished interest or sparkle in life.

Grey clothes suggest neutrality or lack of ‘colour’, or in some dreams officialdom. But as with the grey colours worn by puritans, it can also suggest a moral stance, an avoidance of extremes or vivid passion. Such a stance might be one of avoiding full relationship or involvement in life. It might also suggest lacking anything more than a ‘bread and milk’ diet sort of life.

But some dreams describe grey in a powerful and exciting or enjoyable way. One dream includes a ‘beautiful, grey, old time car’. Another has a grey carpet that reminds the dreamer of home and comfort. Silver grey is sometimes felt to have these positive and life giving qualities.

Idioms: A grey world; a grey area; grey matter (brain); grey power.

Useful Questions and Hints:

Is the dream environment I am in a grey one, and if so what aspect of my life does it reflect?

Does my life lack colour at the moment, and if so in what way?

Is this grey in the dream depicting my own feelings, or is it how I see the environment I exist in?

See Processing Dreams – Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Life’s Little Secrets

Pink This indicates softness, femininity, a baby girl, or babyhood in general, or perhaps tender love rather than passionate love, the sort one might have for a child. It can also suggest happiness, or having a joyful optimistic view of life. See: red above.

Pink is the colour of healthy flesh, and suggests glowing feelings or warmth, something alive and with emotions. Because the inside of the mouth and vagina are pink occasionally the colour is linked with deeply sensual sexual feelings. Pinks are also part of sunrise and sunset, and in some dreams suggest a new dawning of something, a resurrection and so a new life – or the glorious ending. It sometimes appears in dreams of ecstasy or religious wonder.

Example: I was standing in a very beautifully carved chapel or religious place. There seemed to be shadowy nun or monk like figures around. But it was the exquisite colouring of the  place which filled me with a sort of ecstasy. Everything was in the most delicate shell pink.  JAS.

Example: Jesus was looking at me. There was a light all around him, beautiful colours of cream, pink and gold. I could hear the most wonderful music and singing. I said to a young couple standing near, “Look at the Heavenly Choir, Oh! just listen to them”. Tears streamed down my face as I watched and listened. Doris.

Pink and white: Suggests cleanliness and warmth.

Pink and red: Sometimes this includes in the dream, feelings about love and passion, love or pain, or love and real hurt.

Idioms: In the pink; tickled pink; rose coloured glasses.

Useful Questions and Hints:

Are there clues in the rest of the dream as to what feelings this depicts?

Am I feeling gentle love for someone, or is this about just feeling good?

Are there any signs of spiritual wonder in my dream, if so what is it I am experiencing?

See Processing Dreams – Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Life’s Little Secrets

purple This has always been associated with royalty, with spirituality and the law. In terms of the personality it is seen as relating to the ability to deal with practical matters and with spiritual power. But it can suggest an overbearing attitude. It might also relate to the body, suggesting poor circulation, heart problems, palpitations or indigestion.

Example: When I looked into his liquid brown eyes I just saw directly through his soul and it went way out into some deep purple void which I knew to be the ultimate universe. PL

In the example the deep purple suggests an as yet unexplored or known dimension of experience. This links in some dreams with serenity and peace.

Purple is also the colour of a bruise, and in some dreams can either indicate hurts you feel, or sexual passion.

Idioms: Born to the purple (royalty); purple with rage; purple language; purple rank.

Useful Questions and Hi nts:

What are my major feelings in this dream, and where do they appear in my waking life?

Does my dream link the colour with deep wonder or cosmic powers?

Is there any feeling or imagery to do with sickness – if so what does it suggest about me?

See See Emotions and Mood in Dreams – Secrets of Power Dreaming – Easy Dream Understanding

white This colour has an enormous number of different associations. Most commonly it depicts being aware with a clearness of mind. But as with wedding gowns, it indicates purity, virginity, cleanness or light feelings. A brilliant white light usually shows a real and experienced inner realisation or enlightenment. It suggests something from your core self shining through to your waking self.

In certain dreams white is very threatening. Perhaps we have connections with hospitals in these dreams, and depict the anxieties and fear we have about illness or death. Maggots, mould, dead or sick people and shrouds can also be white, so white can depict the same sort of feelings. In some Eastern cultures white is associated with mourning and death.

Example: ‘There was a huge white kitchen. I was scared when I entered it and there was a door leading out of it into a white corridor with a turquoise carpet which scared me even more.’ H. H.

White can also be used to denote attraction, something noticeable or plain to see.

Example: I was looking at my right forearm which was bare. It was very brown from the sun, and at the top of the forearm near the elbow was a white slash. This surprised me and I ran my finger across it, and it felt something like a scar because the skin was slightly raised. The main thing about the slash was its intense white. It was so white it is difficult to know whether it was shining like light, or was simply incredibly white. Miche

In this dream Miche felt the whiteness was a very noticeable part of him, representing hurts (the scar) that had been transformed by hard work and skills (the right arm) and were now apparent to other people.

Black and white: The opposites appearing together. In ourselves the good and bad coexist, and one balances the other. So this would suggest such coexistence and balancing.

Shining white: The emergence of powerful life energy in a pure form. This is often connected with new insights amounting to enlightenment – i.e. the realisation of a much wider understanding.

White animals: Urges and sexuality that have been accepted or integrated with conscious activities. This means urges that at one time your were in conflict with or anxious about, and have been transformed in urges and feelings that are acceptable parts of your present life. They become available and creative energy.

White clothes: A sense of wholeness; purity or marriage. Attitudes that express or allow a lot of your core energy.

White face: Often a sign of feelings to do with sickness or sick attitudes. Sometimes it indicates fear.

White flowers: Love that has grown beyond the physical needs and dependencies.

White hair: Sometimes this is about feelings or fears regarding ageing, but it often indicates you accessing greater insight or wisdom about life and yourself.

White horse: As with any white animals, it shows sexuality and basic instinctive urges or energy that have become transformed into greater and acceptable release, It is the difference between holding back on your feelings and creativity because of doubts or conflicts, and then finding a great flow and ease with self expression.

White powder: Often suggests thoughts or feelings about drugs and your relationship with them, or poison. The dream might be indicating that you are doing something, or have taken in something that is detrimental.

White rabbit: Because of the almost universal connection of this with either a pet or with the rabbit Alice followed into the rabbit hole, it depicts feelings about vulnerability or dependence, as with a pet. If it is linked with a pet, it can also connect with feelings of caring and warmth – even love – felt for the pet. Being white suggests good clear feelings and inspiration. The Alice type of white rabbit links with an entrance into your inner world – a descent into your feelings and the world lying under the surface of your everyday life.

Useful Questions and Hints:

What are the feelings in the dream connected with the white, and what do I gain from them in my waking life?

Is there any fear in this dream, if so can I define what the basis of the fear is?

Am I finding something new here, a new release of innate creativity or realisation perhaps?

See See Emotions and Mood in Dreams – Secrets of Power Dreaming – Easy Dream Understanding

 

Coma

If you are in a coma it could suggest that events or hurts in your life have caused you to withdraw or be largely incapable of interacting with other people and events. It can also portray a situation in which you have become unconscious or unaware of what is going on around you and have turned inwards.

But in most cases this is probably depicting a part of you hurt at some time and it closed down. For instance if you have been deeply hurt emotionally in a relationship, you may still go on being capable of relating at a certain level, but the part of you that enters deeply into sexual and emotional relationships may have closed down, as in a coma.

Dreaming about this usually means you have become more aware of the situation and there is an opportunity to heal and awaken that facet of yourself.

If somebody else is in a coma, this might still be about what is described above, but it can also show you relating to the person in a non-verbal, heart to heart manner. Sometimes this is shown in dreams where you feel out of contact with someone you love or care for. In such cases the dream is showing that it is only the surface level of communication that is missing.

See Signs of consciousness in People who are Considered Vegetative

 

Comb

Something you are doing or thinking about doing, a technique you are using,  to tidy up your thoughts or self presentation. The self presentation means that you are trying to change the way you present yourself to others, or change how they see you. See: Hair.

Example: I’ve been recently dreaming that as I combed my hair a woman came and combed it for me. As she combed she finds head lice and gives them to me. I wish to know what this means as I have been recently separated from my husband.  Z. B. R.

In the dream it is fairly obvious that the lice are the thoughts in her head are doing her no good. They are perhaps unhappy or even angry thoughts that the dream is suggesting she recognise and get rid of.  The other woman is most likely an attitude or another woman helping her see that these are ideas to comb out.

To comb also means to search, to seek something, so the dream and its contents might be showing you searching and perhaps finding what you are looking for. The comb by itself though, links with the method, technique or way you go about your search or self transformation. See: hair.

Idioms: Fine tooth comb; combed the whole area.

Useful Questions and Hints:

What have I been doing lately in connection with straightening out my thoughts and attitudes?

Have I been combing/searching for ideas, direction or a change?

See Associations Working With – Secrets of Power Dreaming – Techniques for Exploring your Dreams

Comet

Sign of coming changes or personal changes. These changes might be very positive, or like problems, depending on the other indicators in the dream. It can also indicate new influences arising from within you, or influences entering your life from an unusual source. So it can mean the birth of a new facet of yourself, a great expansion of who you are.

Useful Questions and Hints:

Do I feel gladness and pleasure in the dream, or a feeling of anxiety?

Are there signs in my life of a great change – do I feel I am the verge of something new?

Am I aware of unusual influences entering my life?

See Indications of Change – Every 7 Years You Change – Techniques for Exploring your Dreams