Most of us dream. It’s often a topic of conversation and many of us believe that dreams are linked to real-life in some way or other. But are they? What do we know about dreaming….

Dreams occur during the rapid eye movement (REM) phase of sleep. They tend to occur more in the later phases of sleep. Dreams are usually remembered incompletely, sometimes frustratingly so. Some people do try to note down their dreams immediately on waking, which may aid recollection.

Historically, dreams were usually associated with supernatural and or spiritual and or religious meaning. In the late 1800s/early 1900s, the psychologists Freud and Jung published works suggesting that dreams represent the mind’s inner workings and the mind processing experiences, emotions, etc. This is the basis of our modern view regarding dreams. That being said, there is no actual proof that dreams have any meaning at all, and some experts dismiss these ideas.

It does seem that dreams are more commonly “negative” than “positive”. Dreams are more often distressing, worrying, fearful, embarrassing, etc. and less often happy, celebratory, joyful, etc. Some people see this as “evidence” that dreams are indeed a form of psychological processing.

Psychologists sometimes ask clients to recall dreams and use these dreams as a method to explore emotions. It seems that – whether or not the dreams are directly linked to life – this approach can help some clients to explore emotions and emotional expression.

Nightmares (extremely distressing dreams) are more extreme dreams. Nightmares are more common in children and in those with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or generalised anxiety disorder. Nightmares quite often reflect real life experiences, even in altered or slightly bizarre ways.
Some people have recurring dreams and or nightmares (repeated dreams where the content is the same or quite similar), which certainly suggests some form of real psychological need or distress. Such people may well benefit from discussing these dreams, ideally with a professional psychologist if possible.

It is worth noting that many dream may be more “random” in nature. It seems probable that some of our dreaming lacks any particular link to real life. Looking for meaning in every dream may be excessive and even futile.

Dreams do seem, on balance, to reflect inner psychological work being done. At least some of our dreams probably do represent some form of processing or reflection. They can be useful insight into a person’s mental state and as such, are likely to remain interesting and important to us all.

Written by Dr Colin Burns