The Element Encyclopedia of 20,000 Dreams: The Ultimate A–Z to Interpret the Secrets of Your Dreams. Theresa Cheung

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СКАЧАТЬ Such fights usually depict a fight for freedom, independence or the truth. Your unconscious may also be urging you to work out why there is a conflict, and may be suggesting that there is a more subtle way of dealing with it than with fists. According to Freudians, the struggle depicts the battle between your father or mother for the attention of the other parent.

      

Idioms: fight it out; fight like cats and dogs; looking for a fight. See also BAD DEEDS.

       Forbidden desires

      Desires that are forbidden in waking life can be repressed by our unconscious, and when this happens, a conflict ensues between the conscious mind and the unconscious drives that are striving for expression. According to Freud and other dream analysts, we can use our dreams to safely explore this conflict and allow forbidden desires a mode of expression. For example, you may have a dream in which your sister falls ill if you have had an argument with her in waking life; if you are attracted to someone who is married, you may have a dream about having an affair with them.

      Dreams can also express the conflict between what you ought to do and what you want to do so; for example, you may have a dream where you tell your boss exactly what you think of them. Other conflicts can center on thinking versus feeling, or rationalization versus intuition, and your dreams can be used to develop and resolve this conflict (see ARCHETYPES). For example, if you are a scientist you may have a dream that you fall passionately in love with a stranger. Your unconscious is urging you to develop the intuitive, impulsive, unexplored and underdeveloped aspect of your nature.

      KILLING

      If you dream about killing a person, an animal or see people or animals being killed, this does not mean you have latent violent tendencies. Instead it can mean the death of thoughts and actions that have been restricting your personal growth. A deliberate act of murder might suggest hostility, with the identity of the victim and murderer assisting with the interpretation. Killing an authority figure typically suggests a desire to escape social or personal constraints. Killing a parent points to unresolved childhood conflicts, perhaps deep-seated resentments that have not been expressed. If the parent was of the opposite sex, Freudians might consider it as evidence of the Oedipus complex. A dream of poison—either poisoning someone or being poisoned yourself—may refer to some underhand action we are taking or which is being taken against us. Look for clues in the dream. Who or what is being poisoned? Is someone you know in waking life poisoning your attitude unbeknownst to you? What is the color of the poison? Are you poisoning yourself in some way?

      VIOLENCE

      If you have a dream where the conflict contains gruesome, explicit images of violence, try to relate these to your waking life. If you can’t think of any waking parallels, consider the identity of your opponent in the dream? Is this someone you recognize or is it a hidden part of yourself? Was your opponent serious or light-hearted? Was anyone hurt in the dream? Was the conflict resolved and how so? Any violence in dreams is a reflection of your own inner feelings about yourself and sometimes about the situation around you. Seeing yourself as a victim of self-imposed violence suggests self-blame, perhaps related to the end of a relationship or the death of a loved one, both of which you may feel could have been avoidable had you had acted differently. Dream violence towards yourself may also express low self-esteem, self-loathing and destructive urges that should be dealt with before they erupt into waking life.

      If, on the other hand, you are lashing out at others in your dream, this may reflect your struggle to fight the undesirable impulses within yourself. Violence towards an old person can indicate resentment against authority. Violence towards a child may indicate the dreamer’s inability to accept and express the child within themselves. If you dreamed that you were attacked or threatened with attack, it may be a warning of an attack in waking life. This may not be a physical attack but an attack on your integrity or character.

      WAR

      People who have been in a war situation may be plagued by dreams that recall their ordeals, but for those who have never seen war, such dreams usually refer to private battles raging either within themselves, or between themselves and other people. Are such battles necessary, or would reconciliation be better than victory? Are you being too hard on yourself? Carl Jung believed dreams of war to represent a conflict between the conscious and unconscious minds, which is a struggle between the deep instinctive forces and the rules of conscious conduct. However, sometimes turmoil is needed in order for the personality to develop and grow. If you can accept the part of yourself that is trying to find expression, you may be able to draw up a peace settlement. Anger, sorrow or pity are usually found in dreams about war; whichever of these emotions you feel will show the feeling or action in waking life that has provoked the dream.

      The clue to the dream’s subject may be found in the identity of the opposing armies, or the landscape, in the soldier’s clothing and the course of the battle may be suggesting a similar action in waking life. Which army did you belong to? If it was a savage army, perhaps your dreaming mind is suggesting that your true allegiance lies with your instincts, but if you belong to a modern, sophisticated army, the dream may be telling you that your inclination is to follow the rule of your intellect. If you witnessed the outcome of the battle in your dream, or admired the victorious army and its winning tactics, this may give you an indication of how best to resolve the conflict within yourself.

      Although war and battle dreams may indicate disagreement between two individuals, they may also point to explosive disagreements between certain groups of people in your life; for example, disagreements in the workplace or differing opinions within the family. Your dreaming mind may be warning you that you will soon be entangled in that conflict and this is especially so if a battlefield features in your dream. The battlefield may indicate the area of conflict and your dream may be indicating whether you should take sides or act as peacemaker. A battlefield scene may also represent your working environment or a

       Particular weapons

      If you can identify the weapon used in your dream and the symbolic meaning associated with it, you can get a better idea of what your real problem might be.

      

       Axe

      This can be both creative and destructive, as it is often used to separate the valuable from the worthless. An axe or hatchet can be a symbol of emotional readiness to cut out dead wood so you can free yourself from whatever is holding you back. If the axe belongs to an executioner, do you have a tendency for excessive self-criticism?

       Bladed weapons

      Although daggers and knives are symbols of violence—indicating concealed hostility towards someone—they are also symbols of male selfesteem and can stand for the secure presence of a father in waking life. But if a dagger or knife is used against you in your dream, this may suggest a threat from someone or a reminder that you are being confronted with a dangerous or precarious situation in waking life, as in ‘being on a knife’s edge’. A knife has the ability to cut into things and perhaps pinpoint what is bothering you or what needs to be cut СКАЧАТЬ