Recipe for Analyzing Dreams

Have you ever woken up with strong feelings of being overwhelmed or feeling fear, guilt or anger because of a dream?

I have.

Through the years I have developed a recipe for analyzing dreams based on research and my own personal experiences.  I hope this helps you as much as it does me:

Dream Recipe

Pray and ask for wisdom to understand what your dream means to you then write down:

1. A list of the emotions generated through your dream (fearful, guilty, excited, angry etc.)
2. A list of people who where in the dream (Yourself, family members, stranger descriptions etc.)                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     3. A list of prominate things or places in your dream (garage, street, at work etc.)

Now you are ready to analyze what it has to do with your life.  Ask yourself:

1. Where in real life are you feeling those feelings?
2. Are you experiencing those feelings with the people in your dream?
3. Do you have negative/excited feelings about the things/places you saw in your dream?     

    You may be surprised at how much insight you can gather as you prayerfull write your answers down.      

The first dream I analyzed had a real impact on my life.  I was caught in a window well with a spider headed straight for me.  Here is how I analyzed it:

Feelings: fear, panic

People: Me, the spider

Places/Things: window well, window

REAL LIFE:

Feelings: I was feeling overwhelmed and fearful about my schedule.  I was stretched to the max as a young mother, a daycare provider and a wife.

People: As I prayed and pondered about it I felt that the spider represented the demands in my life: my own demands, my husbands expectations, my children, the daycare children, church responsibilities etc.

Places/things: I began realizing that the window well was one I could see from the basement when I was doing daycare activities.  It represented being stuck in a rock and a hard place and being unable to escape to freedom.

When I got to this point I could see that something had to change.  I began examining my committments and letting goe of some of my expectations about keeping house, about the number of children I took in my daycare and I talked to Dan about his actual expectations. 

Within a few weeks I made these changes and I was able to reduce my stress and my feeling that I was caught between a window well and it’s window. 

Over the years I have used this formula and included my dreams in my journal.  I have found that the Lord communicates with us in many ways and sometimes it’s in our dreams.  I hope you enjoy trying out this new recipe and I hope it brings you sweet results!