Recurring Dreams and Why We Dream Them

A few times a year, I dream this dream: For reasons unknown, I’ve decided to get the old rock band back together for a reunion concert. I’m standing there on stage and the house is packed to the gills, the crowd is giddy with expectation at the amazing musical heroics they are about to witness. At this point in the dream, I realize I can’t remember a single note of these songs I wrote some twenty years ago. And my shiny blue electric guitar has turned into a limp cardboard cutout with noodles for strings. Fortunately, just before the angry crowd starts to throw raw meat and expired dairy products onstage, I usually wake up.

So what does it all mean?

 

Your most vivid dreams—and these usually include recurring ones—tend to be about one of two things:

1. Something you secretly desire, but feel you probably shouldn’t.
2. Something you fear deep in your gut, but would rather not look at head-on.

So do I secretly desire a band reunion? Rest easy, friends, I assure you I do not. So what deep fear does this dream express? Well, it’s about not being able to perform some task I was able to perform as a younger man. It’s about forgetting once essential information. It’s about getting older. It’s about mortality. Or maybe it’s just about a fear of once again wearing shiny stretch jeans.

Pay attention to your dreams. You’re dreaming them for a reason. What is your unconscious mind trying to tell you about yourself?