I keep having the same weird dream. Could it mean something bad is about to happen?
Not at all, says our elder. Put it out of your mind.
Dear EWC
So, for the past couple of months every now and then I have a weird dream of my mother and I driving, but the car suddenly pulls over and my mom walks to the front driver side window and I see a gun come out from the window and shoot my mom. Then the door to the strange car opens and a tall lady in a long, bright red dress, with black hair comes out and walks to the window next to me. Every time this dream happens, I cannot escape and the lady shoots me with a pistol. Even weirder, that’s not when I wake up. I feel the bullet go into my head and the blood dripping down my face. Then I wake up as the lady turns around. I’ve looked everywhere for answers but none of the web pages I checked have the answer. I have found out that it’s called vivid dreaming but I don’t know what the dream really means, and I think it might be something bad approaching.
William replies
Thank you for writing to the Elder Wisdom Circle for advice. We are not professionals, just retired volunteers who offer help to people like yourself.
I’m pretty sure there’s no scientific correlation between having specific dreams and their association with foretelling the future. No one can predict the future accurately, not even fortune-tellers! I say this because I want to alleviate your fear when you say at the end, “I think it might be something bad approaching.” In my life’s experiences, bad dreams are just that: bad dreams. My first advice is for you to put it out of your mind that nocturnal thoughts are a warning of the future. There are not. I haven’t encountered anyone in my life who could credibly predict future events from dreams. Some people say after some incident happened, “I dreamed about that! Exactly that way!” It’s easy to second guess and declare something like that afterward!
I think the best scientific theory on dreams is that they are simply your brain trying to make sense of the day’s (or week’s) experiences, and sometimes the thoughts get jumbled up and make little sense before it’s all sorted out. We usually forget our dreams shortly after waking, and things seem to be sorted out well. We remember the important stuff, and the jumbled thoughts are discarded. It’s my belief that’s the mental part of the reset and rest we get when we sleep. To be sure, I’m not an expert in this field, but I’ve heard this theory from several credible sources. In other words, most dreams are jumbled, and we ought not to take them seriously.
All of the above said some people claim recurring dreams might mean there is something in your life that’s unfinished or unsettled. Apparently, many people have the same or a similar dream many times. That theory suggests recurring dreams usually mean there is something we’ve not acknowledged that is causing stress. They claim that the dream repeats because you have not fixed the problem. Another theory is that people who experience recurring dreams have some sort of trauma in their past they are trying to deal with. I think that’s an aspect of PTSD, but again I’m not a professional. You haven’t said anything in your letter about past stressful or traumatic events, so I don’t want to go down that road. If you have been through something traumatic, I recommend you talk to a doctor or counselor because they are experts in the field.
That’s about the best I can do. I did find a website on dreams that may be of help:
I haven’t read it at length, but you might find more information there. I hope my advice is helpful and that you will contact Elder Wisdom Circle again if you need us. We are always here. Take care!
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