Do you have 90% meaningless dreams? Do you think 50% have deeper meaning?
0%
But they’re still very fun!
…except when they aren’t!
Mine are usually nightmares, sometimes with anatomically accurate gore, so they’re rarely fun at all.
I don’t dream.
Significant as in “useful for everyday life”? Zero.
… or as in “useful for anything else”? Then maybe 20% or so. I’m an avid roleplayer and sometimes, a particular dream can be the inspiration for a plot, character or story.
But mostly I feel that dreams are the IRL equivalent of animated screensavers. They don’t have to make sense as long as there is something on the screen while the CPU is idle.
0% are significant, but some are fucking annoying, I’ll tell you that.
From a biological perspective, your dreams are part of the process of moving short term memories from the hippocampus to the neocortex. This will involve perceiving symbolic representations of your experiences, feelings, memories, predictions, etc. As far as being “meaningful,” that’s relative to the implications you’re interested in. If you’re looking for meaning, look for the common psychological underpinnings of certain symbols (e.g. teeth falling out, not wearing pants, etc.) and see what that might expose about the things your brain is processing. Just remember that specific archetypes are often offered by people based on tradition and superstition; Make sure you’re looking at reliable sources, especially considering that your brain is going to process a lot more than people have worked out, and not every archetype is likely to carry information you find meaningful.
Zero have meaning.
Less than 1%. I’ve had stress dreams about work and school, which is probably a sign that my life is out of balance.
I see stress dreams as part of the meaningful category. It makes me face just how stressed I am when I try to ignore my mental health for too long
Maybe a few a year, so one percent.
100% of my dreams have about as much meaning as any other biological process.
As someone going through trauma therapy stuff, every dream has some sort of significance to my life.
But it’s mostly about how the dreams make me feel vs any type of symbolism. I usually feel overwhelmed, stressed, terrified and like I’m failing my son. Which all matches with what I’m working on in therapy
EMDR?
We have a winner. Been really beneficial for me but also really hard
I’ve been waiting since March to start and I finally got a therapist who isn’t inept, so I’m starting my first “real” appointment next week.
Even just indirectly referencing my trauma gives me horrific nightmares for days, so I’m extremely nervous. But I just want my life to get better, so I’ll try anything at this point.
How long have you been doing it? Have you seen any improvement? I’m so sorry that it’s been difficult for you. Getting better is never easy, is it?
Yeah, I’ve seen very little good in trying to track down symbolism. Hopefully your dreams mean that therapy is working!
Thanks! Yeah, that’s what they tell me. With trauma work, a lot of times it gets a lot harder before it gets better. But the frequency and severity of the dreams/nightmares has decreased as I’ve worked through some of that stuff :)
Not meaningful, but can be impactful. First time I asked out a girl was because I dreamed about her, and suddenly had a crush. Definitely paved the way for me being able to ask out girls in the future
Loaded question. Metaphysically, dreams are 0% meaningful.
Epistemically though? Dreams might alert you to things going on in your own brain you didn’t know were there.
