Dreams Set the Mood

Dreams often set the mood for the day. I have been waiting for some good examples from my own dreams, and I think last night’s dreams provide them. My dreams all showed that today was going to be a challenging day. They did not indicate a major crisis would occur, but did leave me with an apprehensive feeling upon awakening. And as always, they accurately reflected how the day would go.

You also have probably awakened some days with a general feeling of discomfort. You may have had sufficient sleep, but still feel out of sorts. You drag yourself out of bed and wonder why you feel lousy when you felt fine the night before. The answer is that sleep is not a period of inactivity; your mind is still very active while you sleep. You spend about two hours each night dreaming, which can be an extremely active time. The nature of these dreams often provides the clue as to your feeling and overall mood upon awakening. Did you have beautiful, peaceful dreams that left you well rested and cheerful upon awakening, or were you engaged in life-and-death struggles in your dreams, which left you exhausted and depressed upon awakening?

In my case, this morning and during the night upon awakening several times, I was aware that I would be involved in or surrounded by some struggles today. In one dream, I saw an enormous battle that involved Asians, and in another, I entered my house to feel a chill and see a thin film of snow everywhere. Now most of you are probably aware that the Chinese stock market has been plunging, in addition to the crisis in Greece. Today the problems in China continued with more than half of the stocks no longer trading. To add to people’s concern, trading on Wall Street was shut down for several hours due to technical problems. And the day finished with the Dow down over two hundred points.

I only have a small percentage of my investments in the stock market, so the impact on my finances was minimal. When the market shut down due to technical problems, I decided to go to Whole Foods, which is fourteen miles from where I live, for some organics I purchase weekly. According to articles on the Internet, Wednesday is supposed to be the best day to shop at Whole Foods. Today this was not the case. Two of the items I regularly purchase there and cannot get at the Publix near me were out of stock. Then when I tried to get an answer concerning an item in the bakery from one of the employees in that department, I was told that the item is the way it should be, when it clearly was not the case. I good humoredly thanked her, chuckled to myself thinking about my dreams, and realized it was going to be one of those days.

As I began work on this post, I had many of my thoughts down when Word crashed. I could not recover the work because auto save hadn’t activated yet, so I started over. I felt that the dream about entering my house and feeling a chill and seeing a light dusting of snow accurately captured my day. The house represented my daily activities, which includes my thoughts. The chill and light dusting of snow represents the chilling effect the negative experiences had on those activities and thoughts. If the experiences had resulted in severe loss or confrontations, the dream would have been different. The light dusting of snow would have been a mountain of snow from a major storm. My recall of the dreams was enough to serve notice for the day and its progression. In this case, I recognized that the day was going to be challenging and carefully monitored my feelings as the day progressed. Instead of becoming controlled by external forces and events, I was able to be in control and remain positive.

As an added note, I often have dreams concerning events whose impact extends far beyond myself. Occasionally, I will have dreams concerning a move in the stock market or some national or world event. I find that dreams about the financial markets are sometimes difficult to identify because most dreams about financial markets are symbolic of other events. And a dream about something seemingly unrelated to financial markets may be about them. For this reason, I am reluctant to share such dreams, even if I think they are about the financial markets. I do not want people to make financial decisions from one of my dreams.

I am not a financial advisor, and people should seek out the appropriate expert if they need financial help. You can seek help from your own dreams, but remember that most dreams are not literal. Even a powerful, striking dream concerning the stock market may relate to a sudden change in some other aspect of your life totally unrelated to your finances. If you act on that dream as a literal message, you could incur unexpected losses. Your subconscious mind is simply using your associations and feelings about the impact of a sudden change in your finances to drive home another message. You need to be experienced in working with your dreams and the symbols they use to convey messages to minimize such misinterpretations. Also, before seeking financial help from your dreams, examine your purpose. Dreams are most beneficial when you have the right purpose.