Do the dreams mean anything?

I would like to know that does a dream mean really anything……does it hold a special meaning…or its just that people build something up!!!!

-"CharlesMacc"

That's a hard question to answer. Who decides what has an inherent meaning or not? Do our families hold a special meaning or it's just that people build them up in their own minds? Does love have a special meaning or do we just think it does? Ultimately, I guess it IS something we just build up... like EVERYTHING else. 8)

P.S. A little off-topic here, but I didn't want to make another topic. I'm going to be off the forum for a while. Just wanted to tell everyone to take care! And keep up the good work, Fekket! :)

Thanks for the vote of confidence, Jon. Be sure to hurry back.

I haven't done much scientifical research on dreams, but I'm under the impression that they're just subconscious brain-farting. They don't tell you the future or let you communicate with angels or any stuff like that (though I'm less skeptical of 23 Minutes in Hell, but only for religious reasons).

I swear I've had dreams about the future before. Possibly coincidence, but when you get deja vu SO BAD from something you dream about it really freaks ya out.

Subconscious brain farting is a good way to put it though. They can relate to fears you have, desires you have, things you're worried about, etc. Like, a dream where you can't move might be related to a real-life situation you're in where you can't control things. It makes a lot of sense. As far as "good signs" in dreams, I'm skeptical. I don't really think most dreams are a sign of things-to-come by any means.

Most of the time I think it's just subconscious self-fulfillment. Some dreams might stand for other feelings you're having (like, murdering someone in a dream doesn't have to mean you REALLY want to kill people or anything). But I don't think they should be considered a sign of anything.

My general impression of dreams is brain filing. Sure, I've had deja vu from dreams, but for the most part I feel like my dreams are just filling away memories or other things that happen during the day. For instance, I began playing rock band with my boyfriend and I had several dreams about playing it. My honest take on that was just my brain filing away the fact that I enjoyed playing it, or that I wanted to continue playing

In any case, I don't think dreams mean anything spectacular.

There are two faces to it…some believe and some do not. Everyone has his own story. But I feel that the dreams are somewhat a part of our life and they do convey a message. Like I had a dream of going on jogging and I was continuously jogging ….and the dream broke. And when I had the dream analysis I found that it meant my motivation was becoming higher and when I put it in my life…its true. I am feeling motivated with the things around i.e. to be more hard-working and achieve something.

I wouldn't call dreams brainfarts :lol:
It's not just filing away. If it was just filing away, then why are the dreams so strange, why does it have to be a perceptual fabrication that feels like reality when you are in it?

But sure enough you'll often dreams things you're occupying your mind with intensively. You could call that the brain processing information. If you fall asleep/wake up with the tv on sure enough you'll wake up with dreams relating to whatever is on the tv.

However, consider that in your sleeping state you do not have ego-control, or left brain control, or logic control whatever you want to call the part of you that makes sure you don't look silly, enables you to add numbers together and worry about what to eat for lunch...means you get to see what imagery comes when you let that part of you go. In other words you get what is going on in your subconscious, without anything inhibiting you, it is what you get when you lose the constraints that function in your waking state. It's therefore not strange that many people say that in your dreams you get snapshots of what is happening in your innerworld. What your fears are, your hopes, your challenges.

To those people dreams are an important source of information to self growth.

For instance, there is what is called Lucid dreaming, which is basically dreaming while retaining a sense of consciousness and control over your dream. You can practice and have lucid dreams all the time and all of a sudden you got a whole different playing field. In fact there are those that use lucid dreaming as a tool to explore fears or the things that are holding you back and conquer them. You conquer them in your dreams first and you'll see you walk through your waking life is quite different. In fact when you have mastered lucid dreaming you can do anything in your dreams - the only catch is that you won't know how your dream will respond. It's like you're getting a response from the part of you you can't see. Some go around asking questions to trees in their lucid dreams and having conversations with historical figures. In your lucid dreams - anything is possible.

Of course if you subscribe to dreams being random crap - it will feel that way. And it's true that many dreams you can recall might be pretty useless to interpret.

One of the most striking things I've heard someone say about lucid dreaming and its relation to spirituality is this...

In your (lucid)dreams you can't die. You can fly, be a 100 feet tall, change your looks, talk to anyone or anything...but you can't die. If you take the spiritual stance which is the profound notion that although you are living in a human body and you're all the time experiencing an incredibly material world, you are in fact a spiritual being, which can't be killed and is a pure force of consciousness/love/divinity/wisdom, whatever you want to call it. And then if you subscribe to the notion that we're here to grow and remember our true self (the spiritual part) then what better way to practice than living in this world, where you are faced the challenge of discovering, exploring and remembering what you are and what you can be. So here are these (lucid)dreams, a playing ground where you can't be killed or harmed physically. What better way place to explore your fears and practice living from a spiritual knowing. If you can't be a force of power and overcome your fears in a dangerless but realistic dreamworld, what chance do you have in the real world?

And with real world, what do we mean with real world anyway. 'Reality' has been debunked by science as not so real after all. It's just a very persistent one like Einstein once said. Makes you think what life we're dreaming up?

So I'd say dreams can be very significant, especially if you pay notice to them. Keeping a dreamjournal has been very illuminating for me. I've had some very unusual dream experiences myself, one of them literally changed my life for the good. If you have the intention of having meaningful dreams you will. And if you are one of those that simply never remembers their dreams - you can practice it. You'll be surprised.

Western cultures often see dreams as sideeffects of the brain, useless stuff. And there were those theorizing in freudian terms which makes the dreams as brainfarts seem a lot more plausible. But in many other cultures, dreams are profound and every bit as important as our waking life.