Dreams of Dying

There is certainly plenty frightening and unfamiliar territory as we journey together through this thing we call life, but nothing strikes fear into our hearts like the prospect of death and dying. Death is something that will befall every living creature, and as such, it is a common bond that connects everything on the planet in a fundamental way. No surprise then, that dreams of death and dying are and have always been a common experience across the whole of the human race.

Of all the questions I get about dreams of death, the most common is whether or not these dreams are actually omens of what is to come. The general answer to this is no. Your dreams are about YOU, with a supporting cast. Your inner core is talking to you while you dream, and if you dream that someone close to you dies, you should closely examine exactly how that death would impact you. At your very core, you are feeling that there would be a void in your life without that person, and your dream is an inner effort to face whatever that fear is. Often after a dream of the death of a close relative or friend, the dreamer comments that "He died and I didn't know what to do." Bingo! That statement says it all and the dream has forced to the surface the difficulties you will experience if that person is no longer around.

It is fortunate that we as humans have apparently been hard wired specifically not to be able to see the time and date of our own deaths or the deaths of others, with virtually no exceptions. Yes, there is anecdotal evidence that there have been people who on single occasions dreamt of someone dying and it happened, but verifying this is impossible since it is all in the mind of the one who claims it happened. Thus, stories like this should be taken with a grain of salt. Humankind as a whole has most emphatically NOT been given the tools needed to foretell death.

Having said that, if you dream that your spouse falls off a cliff and dies, you certainly shouldn't go mountain hiking the next day. For one thing, the stress would be unbearable, and for another, it's never wise to tempt fate. Engaging in dangerous activities certainly could result in a death dream coming true, making it look like you actually had a premonition. However, the fact is, if you engage in risky activities, you are increasing the likelihood of accidents, injury, or death whether you dreamed it or not.

Although we were not given the ability to foretell death, we were given perceptive abilities to varying degrees and these abilities might account for a lot of the stories we hear about death premonitions in dreams. For instance, someone runs into an old friend by chance, and cognitively or not senses there is something is wrong physically with the friend. That night, they dream of the death of the friend, and sure enough, the friend dies suddenly of a brain aneurysm, heart attack or whatever a few days or weeks later. On the surface, this looks like a premonition, but it is likely more that the dreamer on some level sensed something in the voice or manner or energy of his friend and this nagging feeling manifested in his dreams. His core self in his dream then brought to the surface the possibility of the death of the friend and how the death might affect him. His dream is merely manifesting what his core being thinks is a worst-case scenario and is making an effort to deal with it. To further clarify, say you have a friend who constantly drives his car too fast. You tell him that if he continues, he will get a speeding ticket. The very next day, he gets a speeding ticket. In this situation you don't go around saying you had a premonition - you just say I told you so! In this case, you cognitively expressed a possible outcome and it manifested. In the case of the friend dying suddenly, you picked up signals that suggested there might not be a good outcome and presented it to yourself as a possibility to be dealt with. Does this imply some psychic ability? Attuned or perceptive are better words. Does it imply that you can portend death? Not by a long shot. Your core self simply presented you with a worst-case scenario that just happened to manifest - a lucky guess or educated guess at best. If you had dreamed the date and hour and minute then maybe, but just having someone die in a dream means that there are issues that you will have to deal with in that scenario. Even though they seem to you to be the star of the show, it is your dream and they are only supporting cast members orbiting around you within that dream.

But what about if YOU die in your dream? Dreams like this do not portend your own death, thankfully. There are many things that can trigger a dream in which we die, and for each individual that trigger is a different thing. If you dream that you die, look closely at your life, starting with your overall health. Your inner core is trying to work something out, and that little cough, headache, indigestion, or whatever might be weighing on you more than you realize in waking life. If you have no real health concerns it could be that you are anticipating an end to something such as a friend moving on, or family member behaving oddly towards you, an imminent divorce, a job change, or millions of other reasons for change that could arise in your personal life. While it is usually relatively easy to determine what sparked a dream in which someone else dies, it takes a hard look inward to determine what sparks a dream of our own demise - it might even turn out to be that you don't like something about yourself and you wish it would go away. Essentially, dreams of your own death are about something you are uneasy about, dislike, or want to change permanently.

Finally, HOW a death occurs in your dream can be a huge clue as to what the underlying problem is. Breathing issues such as asphyxia and drowning are a sure sign that you feel closed in and smothered by someone or something. This could be a job, spouse, parent, friend, or whatever. If the death occurs violently, it is probable that you feel trapped and harassed, or it could be a job-related issue if you work in a high-risk field. If you fall to your death, it could be that you feel you have reached the heights and there is nowhere to go but down. If you die alone, you are feeling lonely whether you admit it cognitively or not. Often, when someone dies in your dream, there is no cause offered at all - you simply know that they are gone. In these cases, that person is likely a big part of your support system and you are just working over the prospect of what would happen if you lost them.

Incidentally, for the sake of completeness, if you watch a violent horror movie just before bedtime and then dream a violent dream of death whether or not you know the cast of characters, that dream means that you watched a horror movie before bedtime and are paying the price.

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