large moon/planets?

29 year old male, single, live alone and pretty private for the most part. I enjoy working with kids, helping people, traveling and studying the nature of reality and the oddity of perception.

i generally don't read much into dreams, but I am at a point in my life right now where I believe I need to listen to everything the universe is trying to tell me. I have no idea how to interpret dreams, if they can be at all.

in my dream I was having a picnic or something like that with some guys that appeared to be people I didn't know, and a young African-American woman I used to work with (whom I find very attractive, if that is important at all). we were sitting around talking, when I looked up at the sky and saw that the moon was very close to earth, close enough to see the mountains and craters in detail, but not too close. the moon was surrounded by several other moons or planets that appeared to be very close as well, there were stars as well, tons of them like when you look at a picture of the milkyway taken from the desert or mountaintop. it was incredibly breathtaking, the most beautiful thing I had ever seen but I had an overwhelming eerie feeling too, like something terrible was going to happen. as soon as I noticed it, others around me did too, people began pointing, gasping and yelling in amazement. I urged my sexy friend Najah to come take a picture because the event would not last long. for some reason, in my mind, I had heard that this event would take place and would be visible from earth from the news or facebook or something like that. I reminded me about when I would watch sunsets and how if you don't take the time to watch them, the light fades quickly and you've missed the whole thing (which has happened to me before, it always amazed me how fast the light fades).

anyway, after noticing the moons/planets, I saw that the earth was shaped oddly. remember on inception when Juno asks about the physics of a dream? she bends the city into an unnatural shape, making it curve which allowed other parts of the city to be seen by looking up (or like the gravity ship at the end of Interstellar). well, it was like that, but in my mind I knew it could only be an illusion and therefore decided that it was not real. I walked up and down the road, looking for Najah, people still standing around staring at the sky. then I heard waves and looked up at the altered world to see the ocean above me, waves crashing and dolphins jumping out of the water. since they were above us, I could almost touch the jumping dolphins from the road I was standing on ( I hope this is making sense, I wish I could draw a picture of what I saw haha).

suddenly I realized that I was on a boat and that there was a storm coming, it was very rainy and thunderous. a young Asian man pulled me to a safe part of the ship, then he dove back into the water to rescue more people. he did this over and over with no regard for his own safety. he said that his twin brother was helping him save people but he hadn't seen him in a while. I remember thinking that his brother was likely dead. I walked to the upper deck of the ship and I noticed that all of the ship's passengers were Asian, the upper deck even resembled a miniature Asian city, like Beijing or Shanghai. I remember thinking that I would be safe from the storm if I went to the upper deck, I was standing at the gate to get up there, I just had to walk through. I looked at the passengers that were not allowed to the "city" part of the ship and I knew that their chances of survival were slim, and they knew it as well.

then I woke up. I do not recall if I walked through the gate to my safety or not. I do, however, recall the moment I went from land to a ship in the ocean, I remember it being odd, but I just shrugged it off as no big deal. but the part of the dream that stuck with me and created such an unexplainable and disturbing feeling was seeing the moons/planets on the sky; beautiful as they were.

I just dreamt this, I stayed awake to type all this out, but I did Google it first. apparently other people have dreamt the large moon dream, and some others even dreamt about the moon surrounded by other celestial bodies.
again, I know nothing about dreams. I am a physics student and skeptical by nature, but I am always interested in seeking knowledge of the unknown, I dismiss nothing as ridiculous. and, as I said, life has been showing me a questionable reality lately and so I find it imperative to listen to any instinct or gut feeling I have; and something is telling me that this dream means something.

so please help of you can! if I need to provide additional info, just ask. thank you much, I can't wait to get to the bottom of this.

Neat dream!

When interpreting dreams, I just enter the symbols into dreammoods.com. Usually I find a common theme amongst the symbols which allows the dream to be interpreted.

• picnic-To dream that you are at a picnic signifies a joyful and tranquil domestic life. You prefer the simpler things in life. To see or sit at a picnic table in your dream symbolizes unity and togetherness.
  
• people-To see people you don't know in your dream denotes hidden aspects of yourself that you need to confront or acknowledge.
  
• moon-To see the moon in your dream represents some hidden, mysterious aspect of yourself. It is often associated with the feminine mystique and intuition. A full moon signifies completion and wholeness.
  
• stars-To see stars in your dream symbolize excellence, success, aspirations or high ideals. You are putting some decision in the hands of fate and luck. Perhaps you are being too "starry eyed" or idealistic. Or the stars may represent a rating system. You are you trying to evaluate a situation or establishment. Alternatively, the stars signify your desire for fame and fortune.
  
• planet-To see a planet in your dream signifies creativity, exploration, and new adventures. You are trying to align yourself with untapped energies that you never knew you had.
  
• earth-To notice the earth in your dream indicates that you need to be "grounded" and realistic. Perhaps your sense of stability and security is lacking. Consider the consistency of the earth for additional significance on how you are feeling. If the earth opens or separates, then it represents a project or relationship that you are afraid of falling into.
  
• road-To see an unknown road in your dream represents a path that has not been ventured. You are setting a new precedence for something.
  
• waves-To hear waves crashing in your dream indicates tenderness and relaxation. It also brings about feelings of sensuality, sexuality and tranquility.
  
• dolphins-To see a dolphin in your dream symbolizes spiritual guidance, intellect, mental attributes and emotional trust. The dream is usually an inspirational one, encouraging you to utilize your mind to its capacity and move upward in life. Alternatively, it suggests that a line of communication has been established between the conscious and subconscious aspects of yourself. Dolphins represent your willingness and ability to explore and navigate through your emotions.
  
• ship-To see a ship in your dream denotes that you are exploring aspects of your emotions and subconscious. The state and condition of the ship is indicative of your emotional state. If you on a ship and experience stormy weather, then it implies that you are going through some dramatic events in your waking life. If you dream of a cruise ship, then it suggests pleasant moods. If you dream of a warship, then it means that you are experiencing feelings of aggression. To dream that you are sailing the high seas in a ship denotes that you are still standing tall despite the emotional turmoil occurring in your life.
  
• storm-To see a storm in your dream signifies some overwhelming struggle, shock, loss or catastrophe in your waking life. The storm also represents unexpressed fears or emotions, such as anger, rage, turmoil, etc. On a more positive note, the storm symbolizes your rising spirituality. It may signal rapid changes ahead for you. To dream that you take cover in a storm foretells that whatever disturbance or problems is occurring in your life will quickly blow over. Consider also the phrase "weather the storm", which refers to your ability and strength to withstand whatever comes.
  
• rescue-To dream that you are being rescued or rescue others represents an aspect of yourself that has been neglected or ignored.
  
• gate-To see or pass through a gate in your dream suggests that you are walking through a new phase of life. It also represents new opportunities and possibilities, especially if the gate is opened or swinging.
  
• city-To see a city in your dream signifies your social environment and sense of community. If you dream of a big city, then it suggests that you need to develop closer ties and relationships. You are feeling alienated and alone.

So, from this, I believe the dream suggests you're living a joyful and tranquil domestic life, fantasizing about the future. But what if you set off in search for a companion? That might cause a struggle for you, but that would quickly blow over and open the door to new opportunities and possibilites.

very interesting... I'll have to remember to check out that site next time I need to interpret a dream. that's a lot of symbolism for one dream haha, all that seemed to happen in a minute's time, as I said before, the thing that stuck out the most was that eerie feeling I got looking at the moon and planets, like something horrible was going to happen. I'll look into that as well, but thanks for the help!

Just to add that the dramatic events of the giant moon and stars etc. along with the “warping” of the Earth point to this being an “archetypal” dream.

Such a dream usually comes from the very deep layers of the psyche at times of transition which seems to fit your situation as you described it.

The aim of this type of impressive dream is to provide an objective view of the dreamer’s current situation and to provide advice on how to proceed, albeit in a usually very complex symbolic language based on analogy and metaphor. This advice is meant to help the dreamer reach his or her overall potential in the long run.

The background information which you provided is very helpful because it describes the overall context out of which the dream emerged, allowing for a better interpretation although dream websites by their nature aren’t really the ideal place to properly explore dreams.

So the following should be viewed as consisting only of a few tentative ideas about what your very important dream may mean.

For example, another approach to the image of the picnic in your dream could be that your attitude towards finding out about the nature of reality and so on needs to be balanced out in some way.

This balancing out of the ego’s outlook is a chief goal of dreams, and given what happens at the picnic in seeing the stunning vistas of the moon and stars might be expressing the idea that your attitude isn’t quite correctly attuned, and that actually exploring “reality” is in effect the opposite, i.e. it’s “no picnic” at all but can be a very challenging, lengthy and even frightening process.

The young, pretty African-American woman likely symbolizes such things as your emotions, values, relationships and feeling life in general, and because she is presumably in some way “different”, “foreign” and outside of your usual circle, this would point to the idea that this area of yourself is not probably a very large part of your everyday awareness.

You likely found the outer woman attractive partly because she somehow reflected the nature of this largely unconscious side of your life.

While the unknown guys can represent unconscious aspects of yourself, in addition, they can perhaps symbolize an attitude that is generally common in society but whose effect on yourself you don’t fully recognize.

For instance, 19th Century Scientific Materialism tends to underpin “modern” approaches to every scientific endeavour, including physics.

This of course is a big topic but in a nutshell, science most often excludes the “symbolic” and deals only with the “mechanical”.

Another way of expressing this idea is that science views the universe from the outside whereas the psyche looks at it from the inside.

So perhaps you’ve picked up from the zeitgeist a kind of underestimation of the power of the objective psyche and part of the dream’s intent is to balance out any such attitude by showing stunning images of “what it can do” as it were; e.g. in a symbolic sense, it can totally reverse “normal” and “habitual” views of the world and everyday matters at the drop of a hat, potentially causing all sorts of problems.

As you know, the moon, the heavens, the stars and the planets etc. were viewed in the past as being gods, goddesses and other semi-divine beings etc.

Science of course has relegated these views to the realm of childish remnants of human understanding but in reality, these figures always have and still do mostly represent timeless energies inside the human psyche which are reflected, for instance, in eternal outer cycles and typical events etc.

Since you’re with the African-American girl and the appearance of the giant moon happens soon after, this appears to be the dream’s way of saying “You have to look at the feminine part of yourself very close up” in order to become more aware of its current state.

Unfortunately, perhaps this side of you is too often “dry” and “barren”, e.g. you apparently see the “moon” from a scientific point of view which is generally too literal and since others in the scene are also greatly affected by the giant moon, it looks like this is a very common situation in our global society.

So to sum up, the moon is usually connected with goddess Artemis and such “feminine” aspects as the body, the “earthy”, the always changing, the intuitive, the indirect, along with various instinctive natural reactions and our emotional and relationship life in general.

These symbolical attributes are in contrast with the sun’s which are generally connected with the god Apollo, the sky and air, the fixed, the rational, opinions, the piercing intellect and with thinking in general.

Such traditional ideas, mythologies and beliefs etc. regularly appear in dreams because their source is the same one as dreams, namely, the psyche itself.

Lately, you’ve apparently felt in influx of the “Lunar” part of yourself, e.g. in listening to your instincts and gut feelings.

The dream could be hinting that seeing this part of yourself and acknowledging it might tend to be a fleeting experience (e.g. you urge the girl to quickly take a picture and compare it with the fleeting light, i.e. consciousness, of a sunset).

Also, the connection of the event with photographs, Facebook and newscasts, along with the reactions of those around you, could be hinting that it’s important to avoid looking at the phenomenon of the objective unconscious from the currently collective “news bite” point of view and one which involves, for example, hundreds of millions of photographs, few of which are created by “focus” and careful “composition”.

This could relate to the feeling that something terrible was going to happen because you then notice that the earth has changed its shape in a drastic way but you don’t take this as being real.

But then the ocean is above you, symbolizing the entirety of your unconscious mind which unfortunately could potentially come crashing down and “drown” you in a worst-case scenario.

If that happened, the normally helpful dolphins would be viewed as a negative symbol because what they symbolize could possibly “overwhelm” you.

All such symbols tend to be very complex and contradictory in nature, but some ideas linked to the dolphin include the fact that the Greek for dolphin is “delphis”, similar to “delphys” which means womb.

Therefore the word “delphys” moves us away from the other symbolic connections to dolphins that are more masculine (e.g. the god Apollo was also related to the images of dolphins) to the more feminine connections and therefore, to the earlier image of the moon in your dream.

Other feminine connections with a dolphin include the Greek goddess Demeter who had the dolphin as one of her symbols (likely because of the womb idea).

She was a goddess representing Mother Earth, wheat, growth, seasons, and birth among other things. Demeter became “Ceres” among the Romans.

In England, dolphins are connected with the sea and with wells, that is, with the “deeply feminine” but as mentioned, in your dream, they “aren’t where they’re supposed to be”, i.e. below you in a stable, “normal” ocean environment.

The dream then appears to advise obtaining a reliable method (the ship) of moving through a needed encounter with the feminine-within which apparently could be very “stormy”.

It looks like you need to rely on a generally unknown and “foreign” part of yourself to help you in this endeavour (the Asian man and his missing brother) which could possibly consist on a very embodied and emotional dedication (the man is seized with the need to rescue the others without any thought for himself).

Perhaps tellingly, you don’t offer to help the man in his very difficult task but instead, you want to “escape” to the “upper” or intellectual pursuit of “safety” via the model city which is like a Beijing or Shanghai.

Given the rampant growth of these Chinese cities, the ship-city could symbolize a kind of hyper drive approach which relies on the intellect, science and commerce as a method of escaping reality as it is (i.e. the Feminine) even more drastically than Western societies are indulged in.

This “reality” according to the dream appears to be a global revolt of the unconscious against mankind in general (e.g. the giant frightening moon and planets, the ocean being in the sky etc.) because mankind is trying ever more energetically to dispense with genuine feminine values which are a vital component of feeling meaningful as a person.

As you’re aware of, a basic fact of outer nature is that it constantly seeks “balance” and because we are products of nature, this appears in the human psyche as well.

As humans, in order to grasp something, we need to react emotionally as well as intellectually, so inner factors that are related to “control” and “balance” etc. were spontaneously pictured by the psyche in primeval times as being powerful “gods” and “goddesses”.

Your dream appears to be warning you that it’s important to separate yourself reasonably well from any such obsessive-compulsive zeitgeist which values only sensation-reality and the intellect because the “gods” and “goddesses” have been aroused and could “drown the world” with compulsion, angst, violence and any number of other problems (e.g. as symbolically expressed, for example, in the story of Noah’s Ark).

It might seem odd, but using etymology can help to support this approach overall (If you continue to explore how to interpret dreams, you’ll find how etymology can be a key component in deciphering a dream).

To follow along with this approach, the dream could be saying that you’re trying to explore matter in an outside sense through physics but you’re also apparently in danger of being caught up by the materialistic approach of society in general (e.g. to desire to produce great wealth for some while ignoring impacts on the environment (“Earth”) created by extracting oil, spewing chemicals and pollution into the air and water as well as by the harsh exploitation of hundreds of millions of people).

The linguistic roots of both “matter” and “materialism” are “mater”, that is, “mother”, so it’s in effect possible that it’s the goddess “The Great Mother” or “Gaia” who feels “offended” and who could therefore “drown” people through the psychological use of compulsive “materialism” and its devastating effects because her values are being largely ignored by businesses, governments and the individuals who make them up.

This is probably the “eerie”, “terrible thing” hinted at by the dream which you should try to avoid both inside and outside.

Anyway, I hope that these ideas weren’t too confusing and that they can be helpful in some way. If you want to look into your dreams in an ongoing way, a couple of valuable starter books are “Inner Work” by analyst Robert Johnson and “Jungian Dream Interpretation” by analyst James Hall.

And if you feel that you’re basically a quiet, mostly inward looking person and that this won’t change too much as you have more experiences in relationships, then you might like to read “The Introvert Advantage: How to Thrive in an Extrovert World” by Marti Olsen Laney, Psy.D.

Please feel free to ask any questions or to make any comments about this way of looking at your very important dream.