Theresa Cheung - The Element Encyclopedia of 20,000 Dreams - The Ultimate A–Z to Interpret the Secrets of Your Dreams

Clean up some aspect of your personality or have you been ‘taken to the cleaners’?

Firehouse

Contains what is needed to put a fire (anger, passion) out.

Funeral parlor

Something dead needs to be laid to rest or reviewed. ‘It’s your funeral.’

Railroad station

Travel, change; waiting to get on the right track in life’s journey. See also TRAVEL.

Restaurant

The nourishment is provided, but payment is needed. The type of restaurant is important. In a fast-food restaurant or cafeteria, the dreamer is required to do much to help; in an elegant setting, the basic needs are provided but more is expected in return.

School

Lessons to be learned; more growth is required; associated with school days; raise thinking to a new level.

Service station

Re-energize your body, physically, mentally and emotionally.

Store

Book store—learning, study, research; clothing store—shopping for a new means of expression; department store—temptation and choices; drugstore—healing prescriptions; health food store—healthier diet; old-fashioned grocery store—inadequate nourishment; music store—harmony; supermarket—eating and living habits. See also MONEY AND SHOPPING.

as you gaze down at the activity below. Were you relieved to be far removed from other people or did you feel imprisoned? Towers in dreams can also suggest an emotionally impregnable figure in the dreamer’s life, for example an authoritarian father, or male authority in general. There may also be a reference to a ‘tower of strength’, or a person on whom you can rely for support and comfort. If your tower has no door, you are not in touch with your inner self. If there are no windows, you can’t see all the good things about yourself.

An ivory towersuggests innocence, but it can also suggest arrogance, intellectual aloofness and the loneliness such an attitude can bring. A square towersuggests a pragmatic, practical approach, and a round tower suggests spiritual harmony. If the tower is round on top of a square building,this suggests harmony in mind, body and spirit. How you get to the tower in your dream is important in your dream. If your steps are difficult to climb, this suggests you are a private person. If the door is jammed, you are not ready to understand yourself. If the door is bolted, you must make the effort to go in. Once inside the tower, you can use other explanations in this encyclopedia to interpret what you encounter.

Dreams about change are common because the experience of change is an inescapable fact of life and whether the change is minor, such as a new hairstyle, or major, such as getting married, all change involves both loss and gain.

Dreams about conflict are also very widespread. This is because, in the same way as with change, we all experience conflict to some degree in our daily lives. We do not, as a result, spend all our lives feeling hostile, but every one of us experiences varying degrees of tension and anxiety.

Understanding conflicts and changes can help us manage them better, and many dream researchers believe that dreams are an invaluable tool for self-understanding. For example, Freud believed that dreams reflect hidden conflicting aspects of our personality, whilst Jung believed that the process of adapting to change or conflict was vital for survival and dreams offered an insight into that process. Adler believed dreams could solve problems, and theorists from the Gestalt school believe dreams increase self-understanding.

Dreams about change and conflict should therefore be listened to closely. They are a way of processing the thoughts and feelings surrounding that change and/or conflict and by so doing they can lead us towards psychological healing and personal growth. See also STAGES OF LIFE.

Dreams about birthdays, weddings, anniversariesand any other rite of passage ceremonyall contain symbolism associated with change. Notice how you felt in the dream. How did other characters react to the change event? Was there a sense of happiness or sadness in the air? Did obstacles prevent the ceremony from running smoothly?

Dreams of yourself or other people in disguisecan often suggest change. The wearing of a maskrelates to the appearance you present to others (as well as to yourself), and sometimes it is hard to remove the mask, perhaps because you are being forced to wear the mask by others. This may be a warning that you risk losing all sense of self. Notice who was disguised in the dream and what they were disguised as. If they were disguised as something sinister, perhaps this suggests fears in your everyday life. If they were disguised as something light-hearted, perhaps this is an element of wish-fulfillment,reflecting a desire to drop pretences and replace them with more fun and spontaneity in your life. According to Jungian symbolism, wearing a veil over your headindicates a desire to be invisible and to withdraw from the outside world.

Given their associations with fertility and growth, dreams about the birth of a baby or animal, or of tending gardens and vegetationare associated with new beginnings and positive change for the dreamer. Dreams that involve other new beginning such as new jobs, new houses and new relationshipsare also symbolic of aspects of life change. To understand the meaning of the dream—and what particular change it is pointing to—you need to pay attention to how you feel in the dream, as well as noting any details within in.

Dream change in art

The subject of dreams and change has often been portrayed in art and culture. For example, in his classic novella Metamorphosis , Franz Kafka used this notion of change when Gregor Samsa awakes to find himself transformed into an insect. Surrealist artists, in particular Salvador Dali, used images of dream change to inform their work. For example, Dali’s ‘Metamorphosis of Narcissus’ is based on the myth of Narcissus, who fell in love with his own reflection.

Dreams that contain images of death, or of saying goodbye or farewell to family and friends, also suggest times of change. Such dreams do not mean that someone is going to die or that certain people are going to leave you, rather that a particular phase in life is coming to an end. The dream should contain clues regarding which phase in life is being referred to. If you are the dead person or the dead person is unknown to you, then some aspect of your personality or some issue in your daily life needs to be left behind. If a friend diesin your dream, perhaps that friendship has run its course, or perhaps your friend is about to get married and the nature of your friendship will change.

According to Jung, the enclosed labyrinthis a symbol of the unconscious, and a dream of entering a labyrinthrepresents rapid change and a journey towards self-discovery. As in the Greek myth of Theseus, who entered King Minos’ labyrinth in Knossos to kill the Minotaur, descent into the unconscious may sometimes involve confronting impulses we would rather ignore because they challenge or threaten us. If you see a mazein your dream, it may also indicate the need to find direction in life and the skills needed to negotiate change. If a map or chart of a mazeappears in your dream, this may be a reassuring sign that you are on the right path.