A dream about the own death

One of the most traumatic dreams, which is bothering you for a long time after waking up, is a dream about the death. Especially when you are the person who dies..

There are a lot of version of a dream about own death. The death may be caused by a disease, an accident, a crime, or…even a suicide. Sometimes we can feel that we are dying, the other time we are just passive watchers – we see our death and the reaction of our surrounding.

How to interpret a dream about the own death?

Dreams about dying are assigned a positive meaning – often dreaming about dying means the symbolical purification and release from bad memories, emotions, feelings which have been limiting us and making our life hard. It is also believed to be the metaphor for changes in life – something is ending, something is beginning, but it is not easy to get used to it, we need some time to adjust.

Dreams about death may be also related to the dreamer’s will to avoid the responsibility for a difficult situation in real life – that is why the dreamer is escaping to the death in dream to the eventual way of solving a problem (especially when the death is suicidal). However, it does not express the subconscious will to die, it is rather a will to get rid of the problem immediately.

Dying may also symbolize a radical decision we have recently made, and which we were not sure of, but now we know it was the right thing to do.
If we are dreaming about being a victim of a crime, it is worth looking into the character of the killer – is it somebody familiar, or a stranger? What does he look like, what are his qualities? Is he speaking to us? Is he behaving the way which reminds us of somebody from our surrounding? Discovering the source of our anxiety will help us regain the internal balance.

How would Freud interpret a dream about the own death?

In Freud”s opinion, people do not remember dreams about their own death, as it is too traumatic experience. However, our mind uses various less violent and more gentle symbols to express this motif, like, e.g. missing a train.

How would Jung interpret a dream about the own death?

According to Jung, dreams about dying are the signal which informs the dreamer about the need of the internal development – time to move forward, to leave all bad habits and behaviors behind, to learn how to control our feelings, etc. Even dreams about suicide have a positive overtone – we are ready to change our life, to find the new self – so we should devote some time and think which of our qualities, relations we should improve, what to take care of…