Recurring Fear related dream

[Addineen]

The dream im referring to is a dream that has occurred atleast 4-5 times in the last month alone. I'm in a high school setting... Usually a classroom or walking about the halls. In these dreams I'm a super senior who stayed in highschool so that he could take every conceivable Ap class offered in our school's curriculum. These dreams are usually coupled with severe insecurity and anxiety. In these dreams im ashamed. I'm often in the hall ways hiding my face with my text books from teachers that walk by. I don't want them to know I'm still in school and that I didn't graduate with the rest of my class. The most recent dream I had involved a girl that I've had a crush on since sophomore year in highschool. For some reason I've been thinking about her a lot recently. She now attends our local university as a full time student pursuing a business degree. In the dream, she comes into one of my high school english classes. When she comes in im suddenly scared of what she thinks of me. Will she wonder why I'm still in high school? Will she think less of me if I am? (Once again just genuine insecurity) It's strange because in real life im not in high school any more im just taking a gap year. I'm going to attend the university of Washington in the fall. Unlike the other dreams this one offers a solution. Push my university enrollment to this winter instead of next fall (which is technically impossible considering winter break has come and gone). Recently, I thought I had shed my old fears and insecurities through meditation. Is it possible however that by spending so much time alone recently I've mearly hidden from my fears rather than address them? My friend who is a psychology major says recurring dreams mean that your subconscious is desperately trying to tell you something urgent and important. Do with this what you will. I am curious to see your analysis of this one 😅

[Addineen]

I just remembered a few tidbits I forgot to include. In the Dream I was returning to school after not showing up for a week. In high school I had a history of getting some minor illness and milking it to an extreme because I didn't want to go back to school. This in turn stressed me out and made it difficult to finish large amounts of makeup work. Also, in the past dreams my crush didn't make an appearance but old friends who left for college did make an appearance (it felt as though the had come back to visit and we had just bumped into each other). These instances were very similar to when my crush made an appearance aside from one key difference. When my crush made an appearance I somehow wanted to impress her despite the insecurity I was feeling.

[Athanor]

Your friend who’s a psychology major is accurately describing why recurring dreams appear and they usually won’t stop until the underlying problem is resolved in some reasonable way. They’re symbolically describing an attitude etc. that could potentially seriously block the dreamer’s overall self-development over time if the situation isn’t fixed. Rarely, they can be alerting the dreamer about a developing physical condition which needs attention but it doesn’t look like this is the case regarding your recurring dream. Being in high school pictures the fact that apparently, you could be hesitant to move forward into life as a result of certain unknown issues, especially because the dreams emphasize that you’re purposely delaying graduation. In today’s difficult economic situation and with the presence of other major issues such as climate change and so on, this situation isn’t at all unusual among very many young people. However in addition, you described a history of avoiding high school classes by prolonging minor illnesses and the current dreams could unfortunately be showing that this sense of insecurity which you mentioned isn’t yet being dealt with effectively enough. Generally speaking, depending on the form it takes, meditation can help a person “recharge” and go back into the fray but maybe instead, it’s tended to remove you even further from interactions with others which you may find hard, and this is what the dreams are focusing on. For example, you’ve been thinking a lot about the girl you’ve had a crush on and she turned up in the recent dream. You suddenly feel scared about her reaction if she sees you as still being in high school. The image of a girl in the dreams of a guy generally picture in some way the overall relationship he has with his emotions and values. In addition, she symbolizes what he may be less at ease with in another area of his life. For instance, if he tends to prefer his own inner world of thought and reflection etc., outer practical realities may be harder to deal with at times. So the overall quality of this inner relationship with the “woman within” will tend to color the quality of his outer relationships and interactions with people in general. In this particular recent dream, the idea could be that you SHOULD be more concerned about the state of your involvement with the outer world of relationships and “practicalities” (e.g. you have a crush on the girl and in addition, she’s a business major, i.e. she’s apparently competent in dealing with outer facts and realities). The dream appears to be saying that addressing this problem can’t wait by symbolically suggesting the moving up of your enrollment to this winter instead of waiting until the fall. Also of course, it’s encouraging you to plunge into solving this situation even though you’re understandably unsure about doing so (i.e. when your crush made an appearance, you somehow wanted to impress her despite the insecurity you were feeling). Anyway, without knowing much about you, this approach to your recurring dream might not fit your personal circumstances very well, but I hope that these ideas can be helpful in some way. If you mull over this way of looking at your dreams and it seems to click in some way, they should stop or at least happen much less often, especially if you take any practical steps to improve the situation it looks like they’re describing. These steps could include, for example, the simple one of brushing up on your assertiveness skills by practising ideas described in “Asserting Yourself” by Bower and Bower. And if by chance you’re a quiet, inward-looking person and this seems to be the “real you”, you might like the book “The Introvert Advantage: How to Thrive in an Extrovert World” by Marti Olsen Laney, Psy.D. In any case, please feel free to ask any questions or to make any comments about this particular way of looking at your recurring dream.