ANALYZING DREAMS

The first important step in analyzing your dreams is to keep a dream journal.  For tips on keeping a dream journal, see the Dream Journals page.

DETERMINE THE DREAM'S "THEME"

After you have written down your dream, identify the main "theme" or "concept" of the dream. Perhaps the most important thing about dream analysis, identifying the basic theme sets the tone for the interpretation.   Although themes alone are much to vague to be used as an entire interpretation for a dream, they help you find the "big picture" of the dream.

Write down the dream (or record it).

Look at the dream from a different perspective.

Take away the details and look at it as a whole.  Don't get
     lost in the details yet.  Try to just generalize the basic
     idea of the dream for right now.

The secret behind determining a dream theme is to take away all the details, names, things places etc. and leave ONLY the action.

MATCH OR COMPARE YOUR "THEME" TO THINGS HAPPENING IN LIFE

First off, MOST dreams are NOT prophetic. To instantly assume this, will lead to many misinterpretations! Your dreams are usually selfish, meaning that they are about you
specifically, a good 90 percent of the time. With that in mind, you should be able to tie in the theme to some particular area of your life. Here is a good tip: When you ask yourself, "What
specific area of my life is this dream about?" as opposed to asking "What's this dream mean?" you will arrive at a conclusion faster. Always assume, at least to start off with, that the dream is about you, and a message to you. Since you made the theme, you should be able to place it into some aspect or condition present in your life. A real good sign that you thought up the right area of your life it is addressing, is when you get that "Ah HaH, THAT'S IT!" feeling.  Sometimes, if it is a bad dream, the feeling is more like "oh no, that's it!". Either way, when the connection is made, you feel it and you know.

Sometimes your sleeping mind can arrive at conclusions far better then our wakened mind. Theming-to-life is best done through emotion. Only by examining your own emotions as you try to fit the theme into a given situation can you know you hit the mark. Our lives are sometimes so complicated that we many have so many things going on that could fit the theme, our emotions are our best clue to pin pointing the
exact application. Emotions are a very good clue to the dream itself. Pay strict attention to your "emotional state" while in the dream. For example if you were happy through-out the
dream it would have a far different meaning then if you were sad!

DREAM SYMBOLS

Symbols in a dream, are actually the elements that make up the details. Even specific actions are sometimes symbols (such as falling). All the little details mean something. Symbols, for the most part, are a very personal thing. Meaning that a "dream dictionary" may not necessarily have the correct definition to the symbol in your particular dream. Why? Because we associate meanings differently from one another at times. For example, I might associate a candle with
pain, hardship and poverty if I spent enough time with no money living in the dark and lighting my home with a candle. But, I might associate a candle with God, if the only time I ever see one is in church! Two dramatically different definitions of the same thing. When you read a dream dictionary, it is usually not bogus, it merely gives the most "common" definition for that particular item. If you were unaffected at all by an item in your life, then the dream dictionary definition would most likely be valid. However, there are a certain amount of symbols that seem to always mean the same thing for people all the time. These you would do well to write down, memorize or at the very least, bear in mind while interpreting your own dreams. Why exactly these symbols are universal is a mystery to a certain extent, though I am sure there is a good reason.

Animals

They symbolize our own traits, good and bad. When you see an animal doing something in your dreams it usually represents a bad trait.  As it is far easier for us to accept and watch an animal doing something negative then to take the credit for it ourselves. Here is a good example: A woman on a diet and really wants to loose weight but is prone to binge eating. She has tried and failed many times, but this time has resolve. That night in a moment of weakness, she eats a big slice of cake, and a bowl of ice cream. That night she
dreams of being on a farm on a cloudy day, and watching in disgust as a big manure covered sow eats and sucks non-stop at her sloop. She is astonished and ashamed when she noticed what the sow was eating! (cake and ice cream). It does not take a rocket scientist to figure out what that dream means, or what the animal symbolized! Her dream was telling her she would feel about as good about herself as she felt about the sow if she did not control her eating.
 

Automobiles or Vehicles

Vehicles that you ride in usually reflect two things; the direction you are heading in life, and your body (the thing you travel or "ride" through life in).  This might vary if you are a mechanic or designer of vehicles.  Unusually over exposure to a specific vehicle type may easily change the meaning. The
condition of the vehicle might give you an idea of your health. Driving an old beat up car down a muddy road on a stormy night would be considered a pretty bad dream! However flying a jet through blue skies with a song in your heart and the wind at your tail would be a rather good dream.
 

Buildings

The building in a dream usually points directly to a specific area of your life.  Dreaming of being in an office complex, or factory can pertain to your working environment. It does not need to specifically pertain to your exact line of work. In other words, an office worker dreaming of a loading dock still can relate the dock to work, because that's the association made in his mind. A bathroom, may pertain to your general health and hygiene habits, and a kitchen might be about your eating and nutrition, or possibly some idea you are "cooking up." What you associate different locations to mean in general, usually points to what the dream was getting at specifically. To dream of your childhood house, tends to be a reflection of your life today though. A dream of mass chaos in your childhood home can indicate great disturbances in your life either now, or coming shortly.  These kinds of dreams are often prophetic. You should always write down and deeply analyze dreams of your childhood dwelling. Dreams of great buildings like cathedrals and large churches usually indicate the dream has a great meaning, and should be taken seriously, as well as any applied association.
 

Children

A child represents to most of us, something new, different and joyous. Using this logic, it is easy to see why a child represents a new phase in your life or a new project as well. How well the child gets along and fares in the dream is an indication as to how well what it represents is doing. Also, a child symbolizes innocent parts of yourself sometimes, and
at other times, immaturity and childishness. It all depends on
the theme and emotions used in the dream.
 

Clothing

When you get into different moods you tend to choose different clothing, so clothing, for this reason best symbolizes your mood or state of mind. They also signify attitude. We wear clothing for all sorts of different reasons including, work, dating, play and social occasions. Attitudes and moods are similar to clothing in this regard, they are the camouflage we
hide behind, our face we put on for the world in various situations so we can better cope. Take a look at what you, or other people in your dream are wearing to get even more clues to the dream's meaning. Also, a commonly overlooked clue is sometimes you see clothes on a clothes line, or lying around. It would be a good idea to take note as to what style and condition the clothes you see are.
 

Death

Nearly any dream you have that refers to death, dying or attending a funeral, or the like, pertain to change. Most all the time this change is very dramatic and major. It can be change in your life attitude or emotional balance. These types of dreams can also symbolize confronting fear, usually fear of death or change. Since most of use will agree that death is the ultimate change, and many people fear it. Death dreams are generally big changes and should never be ignored. Sometimes they really do signify death! Another possible symbol of a death dream is threat. Whichever suits the dream depends on how well the theme was arrived at. Most death dreams are about major change and not about literal
death though, so don't panic if you have one. Just patiently go through the analysis process, and make sense of it.
 

People

People most often portrayed in dreams are actually reflections of your own personality traits, provided the dream is not prophetic.  These traits are ones that you need to enhance or develop, or if negative, work on eliminating or reducing. You should immediately ask of yourself, what traits do I like, and what traits do I dislike in the characters I dream about? Then look for those traits in yourself. You may be very surprised to
find a match up! People in dreams work most commonly to reflect, or mirror important aspects of your personality. You do well to always make this association.

IMPORTANT NOTE:  Dreams are very efficient. Meaning, they can address multiple issues on multiple topics all in one story line! A dream can warn you of health dangers, predict the future, point out personality flaws (or credits) and solve a current problem all in one dream! Some dreams are worthy of repeated analysis, and just because you can come up with two or three interpretations, does not mean that only one can be right, in fact they could all easily be right.

PERSONAL SYMBOLS

All symbols in a dream create some sort of reaction in you. Look for the symbols that get the most reaction, they are usually keys. Since all symbols are not universal, in fact most aren't, before you pull out your dream dictionary, you need to decide if the symbol has a personal meaning or not. Here is an example: A knife might symbolize happiness to a woman who dropped the knife on her wedding day, and if was a big joke because it stuck handle up in the floor. This is associated with joy because it was humorous at the time and was a fond memory she shared with her husband. However, the next woman might cringe in fear over dreaming of a knife because she was attacked by a knife wielding thug in her teens. There are countless examples that could be given, but I think you get the picture. But how does one know what something means in a dream? How do we readily decode the symbols? There are several methods, lets explore:

Association

A traditional psychological method of looking at something and taking note of the first thing it reminds you of. After you think of something it reminds you of, do it again with the
next association. Example I say "Cat", you associate "dog". Then I say "dog", and you associate "fire hydrant". I say "fire hydrant", you say "Fire". You see how this works? You
have been lead in this example from cat, all the way to fire, two unrelated subjects! You can play this game with yourself with your dream symbols until something "clicks" and you get the ah-hah feeling.

Amplification

Instead of associating, you list what each symbol means to you. Different from the association method, amplification can sometimes work were association falls short. For instance, I dream of a candle, instead of associating I make a list of what a candle means to me personally. Example: candle means happiness, love, romance, mysticism and light. Though
it seems similar to association, it varies because you are approaching it from a different point of view.

Symbol defining is very easy, and you know when you hit the mark by the ah-hah feeling.  There is one factor you should also keep in mind, and that is the laziness factor. You must
devote some time and thought to the analysis of your dream to get a clear picture. If you go about it in a half hearted way, you will get bad results and feel disappointed. If you rely solely on dream dictionaries to do your symbol defining you will have lost quite a bit of the meaning your dreams were trying to share. I have a Dream Dictionary online, but try to only use it when no personal symbolisms can be found.  I hope that you will try to define as many of your own symbols as possible.

HAPPY DREAMING!