Every person has had dreams at least once in their life. For most people, their mood depends on their dreams. Many especially impressionable natures are able to see in them a harbinger of some fateful manifestations in real life. They try to remember and decipher each dream by rereading dream books. Others, on the contrary, argue that a dream is simply an echo of those events that occurred during the day and in themselves do not carry any information. So what are dreams and dream books? Should we believe them?
Dreams and dream books
Sleep is a physiological state of a person, during which the entire body rests . And the images that people visit at this time are evidence that the psyche is freeing itself from the information accumulated over the whole day. But there is another concept, which is based on the fact that during his stay in the kingdom of Morpheus, a person finds himself in the so-called other world and receives all kinds of instructions that some events may happen in life.
The dreams you see depend on a large number of factors : the state of health of the sleeper; because of what happened to the person during the day preceding the dream; from the position in which a person sleeps; from the room in which the sleeper is located and from many others.
In order to figure out what this or that dream portends, dream books have been created. These are books that contain definitions and interpretations of dreams. They appeared in ancient times, when people were very attentive to everything that happened while they were in a different state. We tried to remember our dreams and write them down. And then they observed what happened for several days after the dream. Thus, the first transcripts appeared, which were compiled into books.
Currently, there are a huge number of such books. There are more than 40 . The most famous are Miller’s Dream Book, Freud’s Dream Book, Vanga’s Dream Book, Nostradamus’ Dream Book, Tsvetkov’s Dream Book and many others. And everyone interprets dreams in their own way, but their general concepts are the same.
Whether or not to believe dreams and dream books is up to each person. But dream interpretation has its pros and cons.
Orthodox point of view
How does the church relate to dreams? Servants of Orthodoxy believe that you cannot believe in dreams, it is a sin. They fill you with false hopes. Through night visions, a person can be tempted by demons, taking the guise of angels and dragging the soul to the dark side.
The Bible describes cases when God sent revelations through dreams to the most righteous slaves. This phenomenon is so rare that only a truly select few are given the honor. Many priests believe that dreams reflect the hidden spiritual world and help to understand what mental illnesses torment a person. They should not only be dismantled, but also used to curb vices.
By observing, evaluating and working through any nightly “movie,” a person comprehends his own nature and gets closer to the true essence of existence. The main thing is to learn to understand what our brain wants to tell.
The advantages of dreams and dream books
- A big plus is that in a dream a person can really see something very important , a detail that can affect his entire future life and become fateful. And with the help of books you can decipher what exactly can happen.
- A dream can tell you what a person needs to do in the current life situation. It can become a decisive link in making a particular decision. In this case, the dream book will help to explain exactly what actions a person must take in order for the situation to turn positive for him.
- With the help of data obtained in a dream, people can correct many of their actions . For example, making peace with a person with whom you quarreled.
- Dream books can tell you what changes await a person at work (promotion, dismissal), in the family (divorce, pregnancy, marriage).
- With the help of dreams and dream books, a person can avoid many troubles that can happen to him.
- Dreams can warn people about upcoming illnesses or injuries.
- In a dream you can see a dear person who has died and talk to him. Very often the dead come to their family and friends in a dream. They help them make decisions, support them in difficult situations, and encourage them.
Interesting facts about dreams
Since ancient times, people have been trying to unravel the mystery of dreams. A lot of experiments, experiments and surveys were carried out. Scientists tried to understand whether they mean something special to humans.
Many reports have reported that sleep is the link between the conscious and subconscious minds of a person. It is also argued that the brain sends us veiled signals from the subconscious.
In some religions, dreams play a very important role. For example, there is a belief that sleep helps to communicate with the spirit world. There are also practices for conscious sleep, when the sleeper can completely control himself and the events in his sleep.
About 30% of people do not dream at all, and if they do, it is very rare. And almost 20% of them dream in black and white. An explanation for this has also not yet been found.
According to statistics, if a person does not dream, he sleeps much better.
The dreams themselves fall into the REM sleep phase, which lasts about 10-20 minutes. This is surprising, because dreams can feel very long and filled with various events.
Disadvantages of Dream Decoding
- Probably the most obvious disadvantage in dream books is that in most cases, the interpretation of dreams is incorrect . That is, according to the dream book, a dream foreshadows something good, but in life, on the contrary, troubles happen. A person is able to consider a dream that does not mean anything prophetic. Women are especially susceptible to this condition. They often interpret dreams incorrectly.
- Quite often it is simply impossible to interpret a dream, or the dream is a dream that is not described in any known dream book. Then many people begin to look for something similar in dream books, and this is wrong and dangerous.
- If you had a bad dream, then people who are especially impressionable begin to be afraid of everything that happens to them . They become irritable, nervous, and begin to withdraw into themselves. And many generally sit at home and don’t go out anywhere, so that what the dream book told them about doesn’t happen to them.
- Dreams and dream books can push a person to take actions that may turn out to be fateful in his life. But they can negatively affect the rest of your life. A person can commit actions that cannot be corrected later.
- Dream books seem to program a person for any emotional experiences, stress, failures. People begin to transfer everything they see in their dreams into real life. Thus, they harm their physical, mental and emotional state. Psychologists say that self-hypnosis sometimes actually leads to unpleasant consequences. The same situation applies to positive dreams. If, according to the dream book, a dream promises something incredibly good, but in reality this does not happen, then this leads to a spoiled mood and disappointment.
Psychology and observation method
Most dream books were created by psychologists. They analyzed their dreams and the dreams of people they knew. They recorded it and compared it with ongoing events. If after a certain dream the same situation occurred 2-3 times, then it was compared with the dream scenario. There are no guarantees that anything close to the prophecy will happen.
Sometimes a feeling of deja vu - a person is sure that he has already seen this situation and knows what will happen. Psychologists claim that a similar moment from the past came to mind and the dreamer decided that he had seen the future.
Many studies by psychologists, upon closer examination, turn out to be poorly supported by facts. A feeling of déjà vu sometimes occurs in a person who has gone on vacation to the other side of the planet and suddenly realized that he has already been here and knows what is about to happen. And indeed, within 1-2 minutes what he was thinking about happens. You can't blame it on psychology.
Previously, conversations about the materiality of thought caused laughter. Scientists are now seeing patterns that prove the claim is true . Having accepted this hypothesis as a fact, one can discern danger in dream books. A person sees a dream and turns to the dream book for an interpretation. It says that the day will be bad. Unpleasant feelings overwhelm you, troubles are expected every minute. The result: absent-mindedness at work, nervousness, which at home results in conflict.
Indeed, the day was not going well - the man mentally prepared himself that it would be an unpleasant day, and so it happened. It is better never to blindly believe the predictions of a dream book.
What psychologists talk about
Experts tend to approach the issue of dreams with a clear sense of logic. Any unfinished business, unfulfilled promises and individual experiences weigh heavily on the heart. From a psychological point of view, dreams are a reflection of emotional life. It's just that nothing will bother you. Everything needs a reason.
If desired, the origins of any problem can be found by contacting a psychoanalyst. With the help of such uncontrollable visions, a person is mentally cleansed, which allows him to feel better. This is a necessary step that cannot be ignored. Therefore, each person has the right to decide for himself whether to believe dreams. Having made a choice, make a specific decision for yourself and calm down. You shouldn't torture yourself needlessly.
Incredible journeys
Being in the arms of Morpheus, a person stops worrying about pressing problems. In many cases, people fly in their dreams, visit some mysterious planets, and are messengers of divine creatures. Incredible travel is one of the opportunities to feel happier, free from everyday burdens and various difficulties. Sleep strengthens a person’s nervous system and allows him to temporarily forget about upcoming solutions to complex issues. Such dreams, when you are traveling somewhere, should be taken precisely as an opportunity for a good rest. There is no need to try to look for some additional meanings in them that simply are not there. Just enjoy your vacation and don't make any further assumptions.
Some people have a habit of sleeping during daylight hours. Some people consider this phenomenon a bad habit, while other people do not see anything special in it. Should you trust daytime dreams? This question worries many who like to sleep sweetly. As a rule, such dreams are not particularly deep. They are superficial and do not bring the desired satisfaction. The healthy need for sleep is only partially realized. It is better to avoid such useless rest, and if it is necessary, then there is no need to worry about the dreams you have at this time. It is unlikely that they will correspond to reality.
Why are the saints against
So, what is the danger of trusting dreams? The overwhelming majority of the holy fathers, who left teachings, including on dreams, advise not to trust what you dreamed. The most important reason that prompted them to do this was the danger of becoming seduced and deceived. As unexpected as it may seem at first glance, with the help of this practice (distrust of dreams) the saints fought against the main passions of man - pride and vanity.
What connection? The fact is that the devil first catches a person by the fact that through dreams he encourages him to do even good deeds, pushes him towards something good (prayer, for example). After some time, when this becomes habitual for a person, he is instilled with the idea that he is special, not like everyone else (after all, much is revealed to him through dreams, but not to others). A person becomes captivated by the thought of his chosenness and loses his inner vigilance, ceasing to be able to critically evaluate what he dreams about.
Painting by Josephine Wall
And such behavior of the seduced is already the most favorable soil for infernal (demonic) forces, through dreams and visions, to incline him to something clearly bad and, ultimately, to self-worship. The latter happened more than once in the lives of the saints. One has only to remember the life of St. Nikita, the Recluse of Pechersk.
Therefore, those who fought with the mental enemy and imagination in reality considered it necessary to continue the same fight during sleep. For example, Saint Diadochos of Photikis spoke about it this way: “Even if some message were ever sent to us from the goodness of God, and we do not accept it, the Most Desired Lord Jesus Christ will not be angry with us. For He knows that we do this so as not to be deceived by the cunning of demons.”
Abba Arsenius, the Monks Pachomius the Great and Gregory Dekapolite and other ascetics resolutely opposed all kinds of visions and were never in a hurry to believe dreams and any revelations. The Monk Nicodemus the Holy Mountain even goes to the extreme of denying trust in dreams: “Even if you find out for many obvious reasons that the visions that have appeared to you are true and come from God, still always run away from them as much as you can, drive them far away from yourself. Don't be afraid that God won't like this turn...He won't be sorry. He who gives grace to the humble does not take it away from them because of what they do in humility.”
The danger also lies in the fact that trust in dreams gives rise to an unhealthy interest in the other world, a developed imagination, through which, according to St. Barsanuphius the Great, “a horde of demons enters a person’s soul.” Therefore, the saints, fearing to be seduced by demons, did not even want to see Christ.
Shepherds' Answers
The Holy Scriptures often tell how God reveals His will through dreams. Yes, and in the lives of saints there are stories about this. So each of us can easily remember how he or his loved ones had a “prophetic” dream, or even more than one. How to deal with such phenomena? Should you trust what you see in a dream? The shepherds of the Russian Church explain.
– It’s not very often that the Lord reveals His will through dreams. And these are always events of extreme importance, and not ordinary ones. And the people who receive such revelations are also not entirely ordinary. In addition, this is rather characteristic of the Old Testament times.
The attitude towards dreams should be extremely careful. The patristic tradition teaches about this. Without spiritual reasoning, and for this you need to have a highly spiritual life, it is very dangerous to trust dreams.
It happens that saints, even the Lord Himself, appear to people in dreams! If the dream is from God, then He will find a way to explain the essence to man.
YOU NEED TO TRUST GOD MORE, AND NOT DREAMS.
– The Holy Fathers say that sleep is a complex phenomenon from a spiritual point of view. That is, a dream can be both divinely revealed and a consequence of the natural work of a person’s mind and heart, but it can also be inspired by demons, who, as we remember, strive to take on “the appearance of an angel of light,” that is, they try to seduce a person with one or another appearance of good, and it is especially convenient for them to do this in a dream, because a person has less control over his reactions in a dream than in reality.
If a dream is obsessively “standing before your eyes,” you need to immediately switch your attention from it to prayer
So it is difficult for an ordinary person, not experienced and not “honed” by an ascetic and sober spiritual life, to recognize the origin and, even more so, the meaning of his dreams. Therefore, many holy fathers advise not to attach any significance to dreams, not to understand them, not to “dig into them.” And if upon awakening it becomes clear that some kind of dream is obsessively “standing before your eyes,” then you need to instantly switch your attention from it to even a short but attentive prayer, turn entirely to the Lord, and, as a rule, within a few minutes this the dream is either completely forgotten, or leaves a weak and insignificant mark on the soul.
In general, both in relation to “spiritual visions” and in relation to “spiritual dreams,” the well-known monastic formula is relevant: “do not accept and do not reject.” And even if the dream really was inspired from above, if we prudently and humbly refrain from believing it, but also do not dare to reject it as delusion, then we will not sin, but will show commendable prudence. And if the Lord really wants to instill in a person this or that thought through a dream, then such a dream, as a rule, is repeated, and the Lord finds an opportunity to certify the person of the truth of this dream vision. This was the case, for example, with the girl Matrona, who found the Kazan image of the Blessed Virgin Mary on the ashes. And we know many other similar cases from the history of the Church. But these are still exceptions, and a restrained and cautious attitude towards dreams can be considered the generally accepted norm.
Do not forget the simple truth: we are not biblical characters, we are not righteous
– The Holy Fathers do not recommend believing dreams or drawing any conclusions based on dreams, because dreams can have various reasons. We must be very wary of dreams that do not remind us of repentance and the coming Last Judgment. Yes, the Lord sometimes reveals His will to man through a dream. But in this case, the one who received such a revelation, after awakening, as a rule, has no questions left: to believe or not to believe? Is this dream from God or not? Everything is extremely obvious and clear.
– The Holy Fathers suggest that Christians treat dreams with caution and divide them into three types. The first category includes dreams that are a physiological feature of the brain, that is, they are incoherent pictures without any deep meaning. The second category includes dreams that are the influence of fallen spirits. Their main goal is to catch the viewer of these dreams in their networks, manipulate him through dreams or plunge him into spiritual delusion. The third category includes revelation dreams. It is these dreams that the Holy Scriptures mostly talk about. But such dreams are available in most cases to righteous people who have a pure heart and have pleased God in some way. We, sinful people, often have access to the first two categories of dreams, the second of which is fraught with spiritual danger, therefore in the tradition of Orthodox Christianity there is distrust of dreams and their different interpretations.
One must have the chastity of the Old Testament Joseph and the purity of the New Testament Joseph in order to dare to talk about the meaning of dreams
– There is a monastic principle filled with patristic wisdom regarding dreams: “do not accept and do not reject.” Of course, a person’s spiritual life continues in a dream, but one must have the chastity of the Old Testament Joseph and the purity of the New Testament Joseph in order to dare to talk about the meaning of dreams. Expect from the night only “weakness of soul and body” and do not attach any mystical meaning to dreams, because dreams are sometimes just dreams.
About the temptation of a monk
A story about a monk is often cited as an example. He led a very righteous life, but had one vice: he believed dreams, thereby opening the door of his heart wide open. Therefore, the demons sent him corresponding thoughts and images.
At first they were harmless. The monk gave them a lot of attention and interpreted. Then the evil one sent “more interesting” dreams, until one day he allegedly discovered a future life for him: Christ and his disciples are in darkness, and God the Father is in Light. He points to the Jews with the words “Behold My children.”
The monk woke up in horror and, without consulting anyone, went to the Jews to also become the “chosen one.” Three years later, he was attacked by some terrible disease, from which he died in agony.
We do not undertake to evaluate the reliability of this story and the correctness of all the facts. You can definitely agree with a very valuable idea: you don’t need to pay special attention to dreams and try to interpret them.
Is it possible to protect yourself from the nightly temptations of the devil? Are all dreams from the evil one? Is it also from God? How to recognize them? And in general: is it possible to benefit from dreams? Let's deal with all this in order.
Religion
This is an interesting question that deserves special attention. From a religious point of view, dreams are often prophetic, predicting something. They are not thoughtless, not useless, but necessarily indicate some kind of shortcoming that a person needs to eradicate for his spiritual growth. Should you believe dreams? Orthodoxy views this moment wisely and ambiguously. It is necessary to pay attention to what you dream.
But you must definitely correlate this with your internal state. If there are any negative emotions, it is better to understand their nature, atone for your guilt, and cleanse yourself mentally. Then bad dreams will stop bothering you. Religion calls for this.
About scary dreams
In some cases, a person wakes up in the middle of the night covered in sweat. When you have a bad dream, you really forget about everything. I just want to hide my head under the blanket and not think about anything. It seems that anything can happen to you; you completely lose your sense of the reality of what is happening. You jump out of such dreams in the same way that specially trained people jump with a parachute. A sudden awakening is also known to not improve health. Of course, scary dreams can't make you happy.
They tire you out more than even the most grueling work, and form obsessive states and phobias. What can you dream about? Terrible jaws, bloody battles, etc. Should you believe dreams about teeth? Not necessary. You have to take it on faith that they mean nothing. It’s just that the person was overly tired the day before, has unspoken aggression or uncontrollable fear. To get rid of such unpleasant dreams, you must work on yourself. Overcoming fears is not easy, but effort is still necessary. This will help you stop jumping up at night with anxiety.
Fact or Fiction
Sometimes there are chaotic, absurd dreams. They hardly carry any meaning. They reflect experiences, fears, dreams. It’s another matter if you had an obvious, clear dream that you remember well. With its help, deceased relatives, a guardian angel or simply light energy (everyone decides to the extent of their beliefs) gives a warning or a sign.
In this case, there is no point in turning to the dream book - for two people, the same symbol may contain different meanings.
Having seen a vivid dream, you need to think about what it means specifically for a person. Trust your intuition and think through the situation. A vivid dream most likely warns of danger . There is no point in warning about imminent wealth or happiness, while pointing out a threat is important.
The dream book will not help either when you dream of a deceased relative. This often happens after a funeral. Many people see that the deceased is in a brightly sunny field or in another beautiful place - this means that everything is in order with the soul.
When a person mourns a loss too bitterly, a dead man comes in a dream and says that he is drowning. This is a veiled request to stop grieving and tormenting both yourself and deceased relatives. Sometimes the souls of drowned people make it clear where to look for their body. Consulting a dream book is unlikely to give an accurate answer to what a dream means—you need to look at the specific situation in which many factors play a role.
