Visit World Dream Atlas
Read more in The Atlantic
World Dream Atlas
“There’s just one dream that I remember from many, many years ago. I’d lose the magic if I told you, so I can’t. I can show you this tattoo though. The tattoo is part of it.”
- Austin, Texas, USA
“I gave birth to an alligator on my bathroom floor. At first, I thought that he was going to eat me, but I tamed him.”
- New Orleans, Louisiana, USA
“When I was 16, dreamed that I won the lottery. Of course, the first thing I did was buy my high school. When my actual alarm clock went off, I kind of half-woke-up. I thought, ‘I don’t have to go to school. I own the place.’ Then, I rolled over and went back to sleep.”
- Vancouver, Canada
"I love it when people talk in their sleep. I whisper in their ear, 'Yes? Yes? Tell me more! Tell me where the treasure is!'"
- Amsterdam, Netherlands
“This is a dream from the age of 2 or 3. I’m underneath the dining room table, and my mother hands me a glass of warm milk to drink.”
“What does that mean to you?”
“My parents had this paradox. They would take care of me, and yet they kinda wouldn’t. So, this handing me the glass under the table is like, “Okay, we’re going to provide you with the necessities of life – food and shelter – but we’re not going to nurture you. I’m handing this to you under the table so that we can’t make eye contact, and you can’t see me while you drink this. There’s no intimacy there.”
- Brooklyn, New York, USA
“I was riding a sea monster. It was pink.”
- New Orleans, Louisiana, USA
“I was a satellite circling the earth and I wanted to zoom into the world. So, I zoomed into a city. Then, I zoomed into a street. Then, I saw a van, and I zoomed into the van. And, I was like, ‘Wow, look at that! There’s a little human in there!’”
- Berlin, Germany
“In this dream, I was playing on a beach with my friends – laughing, and rolling around, and flipping through the water. Then, I turned and saw a lush forest. I thought, ‘I should go there.’ Then, I woke up.”
“What would have happened if you had gone?”
“This was right after I spent a week in the country. So, in the dream, it felt like the forest was calling me home.”
“Are you a different person in the forest?”
“I feel like I’m myself. When I’m in the city, I feel like I have to put on protection. There’s so much stimulation. I actually even visualize it – this dragon-scale armor I put on when I go out. In the wilderness, you hear crickets, and you hear trees moving, and they talk – they do. If you sit with them and you ask a question, you’ll get an answer. I don’t hear them when I’m here.”
- Manhattan, New York, USA
“A few years ago, I was staying in the east of Iceland in a room with no windows. There was no light coming from under the door or from the keyhole - nothing. It was pitch black inside. The darkness was so heavy, I could not breathe - like being in a coffin. But, I turned on my side and tried to sleep. Suddenly, I saw something on the wall, a shade of light. ‘What is this?’ I thought. ‘Probably I had been lying on my eye and that’s why I’m seeing the light.’ But, I turned to the door, and I saw this small light inside of the door. And then, the light came out of the door and started to float around, and suddenly it came very close to me. Inside of this light was a tiny, tiny person. And I was watching this light all night, until I fell asleep. In the morning when I woke up, the light was still there, up in the corner of the room. Suddenly, someone knocked on my door and the light disappeared.”
“What do you think it was?”
“I think our brain can’t let go of the world. Our ego can’t say ‘I’m nothing.’ The brain has to have a point in the universe to feel it exists. That’s why I think my brain made this light. Because it was so dark, that the brain couldn’t bear to think, ‘I’m nothing. I’m not here.’ Or maybe, the light was from some other universe. I don’t know.”
- Reykjavik, Iceland
“My mom passed away seven years ago. After that, I dreamed about her a lot. It sounds silly, but I felt like she would visit me in my dreams to come check up on me. I had this one really vivid dream about it. I had just heard about a study that ranked the happiest and most depressing cities in the U.S. The most depressing place to live was Detroit, and the happiest was Boulder, Colorado. Anyway, a few nights later, I had a dream that I was Skyping with my mom. I was crying because I hadn’t seen her in forever. I said, ‘Where have you been? I’ve missed you! I’ve been worried sick!’ And, she looked at me, and she goes, ‘I’m in Boulder, Colorado.’ It really stuck with me.”
- Brooklyn, New York, USA
“I had a dream the week before I broke up with my girlfriend. It was the apocalypse, and we had to get these guns and drive to this cave. Anyway, I couldn’t find her. For some reason, we couldn’t talk in words. We could only talk in emojis. So, I was trying to describe where we should meet with emojis. I was like: Tree-tree-rock-smileyface-corn. And, she just wasn’t getting it. So yeah, that’s pretty much when I knew I was going to break up with her.”
- Los Angeles, California, USA
- Los Angeles, California, USA