How Anger Dreams Help Us Release Tension and Hostility

Have you ever had a dream that just left you feeling angry when you woke up?! Maybe you felt angry in the dream – or maybe something happened in the dream that left you feeling mad when  you stepped out of the dream.

Maybe both!

Anger dreams are actually pretty therapeutic. They allow the dreamer to…

1. Release hostility they fell unable to express in their waking world.
2. Release tension and even anxiety.
3. Cope!

As I often point out in Dream Interpretations, one of the most beautiful things about dreams is the fact that they allow our brains to “wrap” themselves around ideas that may elude them when we’re completely conscious.

When we’re awake, a lot of things are going on – not just around us, but in our minds as well. There are situations (and often individuals) that we have trouble coping with when we’re in the middle of so much commotion.

However, when our subconscious mind takes over when we’re sleeping, it can try to sort out and process information.

The same holds true for EMOTIONS. When we’re fully awake, we may feel a great number of emotions – and often all at once.  It’s hard, sometimes, to figure out which emotions are the “truest.”  When we enter our dream world, our subconscious minds gets to work.

Our emotions (as well as “information”) play out in our dreams as mini movies as our brain sorts through everything.

Have you ever stopped to think about just how fascinating this all is?!!?

If there are people, events, or situations that leave us frustrated – and yet we feel completely helpless about the feeling – we’ll often have “anger dreams.” In our daily life, lashing out at a co-worker or confronting someone in our family might not be the wisest or coolest thing to do.  Telling them that the way they chew with their mouth open could hurt their feelings after all!

But, seriously, how uncouth is that?

If we’re unable to react in our waking world, it’s as though at night the brain says… “Okay, NOW I’ll blow off some steam!”

Ironically, more times than not – after the initial anger – we wake up and realize that what we thought was a huge deal… one worthy of so much hostility!… isn’t really that big of a deal. We’re able to put things into perspective and even feel thankful that we didn’t lash out or overreact in the “real world.”

That drama is better off in dreams.