Everyone's life is a series of challenges. These may be minor challenges, for instance "I don't feel comfortable with my friend anymore", or "I have a meeting with my boss tomorrow", to major challenges, such as having to make the transition from puberty to adulthood, or how to cope with the death of a loved one. All these challenges, no matter how seemingly insignificant, are likely to cause anxiety that is reflected in your dreams. However, to describe this as a reflection is not doing justice to our dreaming mind. Dreams do much more than reflect; they invent stories that enable us to make sense of our experiences and suggest ways in which we can successfully surmount the challenges presented to us.
This can be very helpful on a practical level; perhaps suggesting solutions that we hadn't thought of on a conscious level.
But to understand your dreams, you really do need to learn their language. For instance, you may be anxious about a job interview and dream that you are naked in a public place. This is a very common anxiety theme. Other examples are searching for things, being lost, being late or being unprepared for an appointment or exam. It's strange, when you consider the huge diversity of human experiences, how we all subconsciously experience the emotion of anxiety in a similar way.
Of course it's not enough to simply realise that you are anxious about something. For dreams to serve us usefully, we need to be able to ascertain exactly what it is we are anxious about and why a particular circumstance is causing us to be anxious. For instance, if we dream of being naked in a public place it's likely that we are feeling vulnerable and are frightened of our short-comings being exposed. Perhaps we are fearful that our lack of skill or knowledge will be uncovered and we will be ridiculed or feel humiliated. If, in the dream, others seem not to notice our nakedness, that might suggest that our fears are unfounded and it is only our lack of confidence that is causing us to feel this way. If this is the case, there will undoubtedly be a clue contained within the dream that hints at why we are lacking confidence in that situation. It may stem from an incident in the past or it may be something as simple as needing to take some action in the present to make us feel more empowered. Addressing this by taking action can allay our anxiety at a conscious level and result in more confidence in whatever situation the dream was addressing. |
