Recurring Dreams

Recurrent dreams, as the name suggests, are a series of dreams that repeat themselves. It may be the same dream over and over again, or there may be slight variations to your dreams.

Many psychologists have put forward the theory that recurrent dreams more often than not happen for a reason, and they are trying to deliver a message that is of grave importance. Recurring dreams are trying to attract your attention to an issue that is perhaps escaping your waking mind.

The sooner you understand what the issue is, the better insight you shall gain about your life and can actually take some action in your waking life in response to the dream thereby providing a remedy to such repetitive dreaming.

In the process the situation that was causing the imbalance in your life and mind would also get resolved. According to psychologists dreams that are repetitive are persistent that they deliver a message to you. Because they are insistent on delivering the message to you they keep on repeating themselves unless you are capable of grasping the message.

• Psychological reasons that are associated with recurring dreams

Analysts have nailed down certain psychological factors that may result into various kinds of recurrent dreams. The major ones are –

o    Anxiety – When one is anxious about something then the subconscious creates a varied number of illusions in the mind which in turn can give rise to recurrent dreams. More often than not when you are having a recurrent dream, then you are having a single message or a series of messages that are related. This perhaps also implies that deep within there is one major cause of anxiety, while there may be several other related factors adding up to such anxiety. It has been seen that when the cause of the anxiety is removed or the problem is resolved, the person no more sees such recurrent dreams.

o    Obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) – This is a disorder that basically stems out of anxiety, and in this a person experiences fears, worries and anxieties in apprehension of something. Often a person resorts to some repetitive activities as a result of such anxiety. Recurring dreams could be a result of such obsessive apprehensions.

o    Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) – Recurrent dreams that border around nightmare are often the most common symptoms that arise out of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. This Disorder is experienced by people who have recently experienced something traumatic like an accident, a bereavement etc. When the trauma triggered by the stress is eased, then such recurrent dreams also cease to happen.

• Various theories that are associated with recurring dreams

Various researchers and scientists have put forward various views trying to ascertain the norms and features of Recurring Dreams. Some of them are –

o    Threat simulation theory – This theory has met with mixed responses from the researchers and there are many who put forward views to counter this theory. This theory was proposed by Antti Revonsuo who believed that dreams perform the biological function of simulating various threats that a person may anticipate, and also rehearse how to avoid such threat in the dreams over and over again. However other researchers like Zadra have pointed out that nearly 66% of recurrent dreams revolve around a threat factor and in most cases the dreams do not offer any solution to avoid or resolve the threat in any way. This is because of the fact that in many threat dreams it has been found that the person seeing the dream is unable to escape the threat.

o    Gestalts’ dream theory – This theory proposes that recurrent dreams often portray a person’s state of the mind, and when one is having such dreams recurrently it is likely that there is a disturbed equilibrium in the person’s psyche. Recurrent dreams are an effort of the subconscious mind to make the person aware of such imbalance so that corrective measures can be undertaken to restore the balance or equilibrium.

o    Freud’s Theory – Freud put forward the theory that recurrent dreams are often the result of the fact that the person having such dream suffers from neurotic compulsions that are repetitive in nature.

o    Jung’s Theory – Jung believed that recurrent dreams have a positive effect on understanding the various aspects of human psyche and integrating them in a coherent manner.

o    Culturalist dream theory – This theory was proposed by Bonime in the year 1962, and this upholds the fact that recurrent dreams are often suggestive of the fact that the person who is having the dream has not experienced any positive change or development for a while either in his life or in his personality or both.

• Various treatments that are put forward to treat recurring dreams

To resolve the issue of recurrent dreams it is at first essential that you find out the actual reason for such dreams. Removal of the causal factor would more often than not offer you respite from such recurrent drams. Now to pinpoint the cause it is important that you interpret the dream properly. For that you need to analyze the content of the dream, the theme of the dream, the characters in the dream etc then look for clues that would take you to the reason for you to having that particular dream. Once the issue has been found out, remedies can be suggested accordingly. Discussed below are some generic remedies for recurrent dreams.

o    Relaxation Techniques – Several ways to relax your mind are propounded which are recommended to be practiced before you go to bed. There are a multiple ways in which you could achieve this.

o    Confront and Conquer – This theory was suggested by Garfield in the year 1974. According to Garfield, it would be best to mold you mind to confront the hostile or resentful situation in your dream rather than trying to flee away from it. Once you confront and confront, you shall be able to escape its clutches.

o    Altering partially the aspect of the dream – This theory was suggested by Halliday in the year 1982. According to Halliday, one can win over one’s dream by changing a small aspect of the dream.

o    Conciliation with dream characters – This theory was suggested by Tholey in the year 1988. According to Tholey, you can in your dreams try to engage in a conciliatory conversation with the character or characters in your dreams that are hostile. You then become your dream ego which looks for methods to strike peace.