Dreams of Schools – What Does It Really Mean?
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Many of our opinions, ideas, and beliefs about the world develop during our school years. From preschool and kindergarten all the way through high school, college, and beyond, school ingrains within the psyche. It’s where we formulate our personalities and morals. It shapes who we become as adults and embodies our fears, inhibitions, apprehensions, and preferences.
Being at school in dreamland is a very common theme. These can be good or bad depending on the context, sensations, and other details of the ream. These types of dreams can reflect a sense of nostalgia or an ordered and logical life. They can even give a glimpse into mischievousness, regret, shame, or guilt.
Age of the Dreamer
When children dream about school, these are often a reflection of their current experiences. However, there are some instances where it could mean something more. For example, if they’re very young and dream of college, it may relate to the child’s advanced learning capacities. But it can also indicate the pressure they feel to do well in school.
For older adults who are a long ways off from school, such dreams can reflect conscious reality:
- Nostalgia
- Regret, shame and/or guilt
- A person dominating your life
- Looking to escape responsibility
- Anxieties and fears around work, job, or career
- Dread over choices, mistakes, and lessons in life
Interpreting School Dreams
As with most other dream interpretations, your activity at the school, seeing other students, and the appearance of the school will all carry weight. Of course teachers being part of the picture also come into play, but that is an entirely different subject to explore.
You Are at School
School in the land of Nod suggests that someone is domineering in your life, especially if you find yourself in elementary or middle school. It means that you’re uncertain about how to handle this person. You will not let them go and they’re holding you back from achieving your true potential.
School Levels/Grades
Seeing yourself at any level of school in your dream indicates the degree of difficulty with a course of action you’re taking. But specific school grades hold additional symbolism.
- Primary/Elementary School – You’re going to have to make a few changes with your life and your beliefs if you hope to advance and grow.
- Middle/High School – You will have many choices to make in the coming weeks.
- Boarding School – Supportive friends surround you.
- Private School – The risk you’re taking could have serious consequences if you aren’t careful.
- College/University – This is either telling you to apply past lessons to your present issues or you want to do something outside the norm. If there was a sense of failure, you’re afraid to move forward with plans. Disorganization and confusion at college indicates repeated mistakes or your anxieties which preoccupy your mind.
You Are a Child in School
When you see yourself as a child who feels sad and is looking for your mother, it actually portends optimism. This can also mean you’re trying to resist authority in waking reality if you’re trepidatious about going into the classroom.
Coming and Going to School
Your arrival or departure from school will also mean something if it featured in your dream. There are many possibilities, but the following are the most common:
- On the Way to School – Your attitudes and reactions to certain events in life aren’t right or moral.
- Entering School – Foretells a business trip or exciting project that will bring satisfaction, gratification, bliss, and contentment.
- Leaving School – Your domestic situation is about to improve. Running out of school is a desire to escape current problems.
Returning to School
Returning to school can play out in several diverse ways that carry variations of interpretation. One type is a sense that you’re going back to school as if you had been there the day before. Another can manifest as reliving the days of a school you attended or having to repeat school altogether.
If you return to school as a continuation of attendance, it suggests you will achieve your goals smoothly. But when you have to repeat high school, it reveals great amounts of stress due to health, work, or family obligations.
Seeing your old school reflects anxiety with current episodes of apprehension and concern that will continue to build. You must face certain issues or concerns. Alternatively, it could point to your own immaturity and unwillingness to take responsibility. Other suggestions indicate a huge mistake or something you neglected to do.
Seeing School Buildings in Your Dreams
There is a smattering of interpretations for seeing school buildings in a dream. The condition of the school will be particular to what dream symbolizes:
- The School – If you can see the school in your dream, it portends a good omen. When negativity or anxiety is present, it can also mean you’re about to repeat a mistake.
- New School – Something good is going to flourish and you should take advantage of opportunities. It can also indicate happiness, comfort and abundance.
- Shabby School – A school that’s dirty, old, disheveled, or falling apart portends a miserable and helpless financial situation. It’s a warning to be cautious with fiscal decisions.
- A Strange School – If you don’t recognize the school and you never attended it, be careful what you wish for. You aren’t considering certain aspects that can create a real-life nightmare.
Dreaming of Schoolmates: Friends and Foes
There are a host of meanings when school friends, foes, and crushes you once knew become part of the dreamscape. Most often, though, it refers to a nostalgic period. This is so profound yet there’s a disconnection between your subconscious and conscious mind.
Another possibility is that you tie yourself to tradition and can’t abandon old habits. This can also be a warning in how you control yourself, your emotions, and how you feel inside. You want an escape from current stress and tension, but you don’t allow yourself to figure a way out of it.
Dreaming of Being Lost or Can’t Locate Places in the School
When you can’t find your classroom or get to your locker, there are huge worries surrounding you. You’re concerned about acting like a fool or you’re incapable of finishing projects. If you’re lost or can’t find your way to school, you have unrealized and undefined plans.
Dreaming of Classroom Settings and Activities
There is a myriad of dream scenarios that can take place in a classroom. Some of the more common ones are as follows.
- Negative feelings in a classroom generally means you desire authority and lack confidence around others in waking life. But it can also indicate a lack of spiritual attainment or even improper morals.
- If you see yourself learning something in school, you have a desire to improve in your profession. But if you’re not learning, you hide yourself away from the world far too often.
- If you dream that you’re not prepared and are missing important items, like homework and pens, this can have two completely different meanings. It can either relay that you are entirely prepared for the challenges coming up or it can imply a metaphor for your hidden shame and guilt.
- Making a presentation to the class or a teacher calling upon you suggests your level of expertise about a particular subject. If you know the material, it connotes a good omen. But if you couldn’t present or answer the question, you’re ill-equipped to deal with surmounting problems.
- Feeling frozen in a classroom mirrors your mind in conscious reality. It isn’t able to rest because of pressing issues. It can also suggest cognitive dissonance, where you hold opposing views and perceive them as one truth.
Dreaming of Students and Behaviors
When you see yourself as a student along with other students or observe student activity and behavior, these give glimpses into possible precognitive preludes.
Misbehavior at school has many implications. If you see other children misbehaving, it’s a warning you may become the subject of a hoax or prank. When you are the one misbehaving, serious problems may come to the fore. Skipping class in your dream can indicate your avoidance of responsibilities in waking life.
Watching multitudes of students leave school indicates a period of confusion and discord. This will most likely happen with acquaintances and people who you do deal with on a surface level.
Seeing boys run out of a classroom is telling you that others are experiencing the same distress as you. But they are finding ways to avoid the trouble.
Dreaming of Disasters Occurring at Schools
Witnessing a disaster at school in a dream almost always reveals the depth of anxiety you have in waking life. But this will depend on the degree of chaos you envisage. If you see the school under attack or in a lockdown, this may signify that there is an important lesson you have to learn.
A flooded school can allude to social problems that will come crashing down. Fires or explosions refer to distractions that prevent you from achieving your goals.
In Brief
Dreams of school come in a wide array of variations with an infinite number of elements and details. The potential for symbolism is rich, dependent upon the events that unfold. But, at their core, these dreams indicate some sort of anxiety in your life.
You’re looking for an escape from current struggles or it’s your subconscious pointing out your choices and decisions. While some of these dreams can denote self-opinions, they can also convey our feelings around money, work, and family.
