Dreamed of an Owl − 8 March, 2008
This morning, just before I awoke, I dreamed of an owl. Owls are not creatures one sees often, especially if one lives in the city, like I do. Dream interpretation web sites say similar things about owl dreams:
“The owl is a symbol of wisdom, seriousness and thoughtfulness. Dreaming of an owl in the dream means that your judgment of a personal situation or a person was correct. It also could mean that some vague matter became much clearer. [This interpretation would resonate well with the lesson I learned in The Dangers of Email-Only Communications] Seeing an owl in the dream may also mean that you should take good advice from others.”
- http://www.experiencefestival.com/a/Dream_Interpreation_Owl_owls/id/255967
“To see an owl in your dream, symbolizes wisdom, insight and virtue. The owl is also synonymous with death and darkness.”
- http://www.dreammoods.com/dreamthemes/birds.htm
“The owl is the archetype of wisdom in many cultures' parables. The owl is often a sign of longevity, as well as knowledge. This knowledge pertains especially to the future and the mysteries of the night. You may be seeking such knowledge or be receiving an oracle hinting that you may be in possession of such knowledge.”
- http://predictions.astrology.com/dd/owl.html
Although the commonality is in the symbol of wisdom, the differences are interesting. However, I've never put much stock in dream interpretations of these kinds. I think that the primary reason that I dreamed about an owl is that last night, we watched the “Dynasty” segment of the History of Britain, by Simon Schama. This documentary often depicted the hawk when speaking of King Henry II. The only question, then, is why did I turn the hawk into an owl? The symbolism of a hawk dream would have been very different, for example:
“The hawk is the warrior-visionary… To dream of hawks is to see oneself as engaged in, but outwitting, opponents through the ability to perceive more completely. It may also be a dream of providing adequately through skillful acquisition or insightful maneuvering.”
- http://predictions.astrology.com/dd/hawk.html
“To dream of a hawk, foretells you will be cheated in some way by intriguing persons…. A need to be watchful. A need to view a situation from a different or higher perspective
Something swift, driven and powerful, perhaps suggesting an approach towards a situation at hand…Generally a dream of hawks means increase in your fortune.”
- http://en.mimi.hu/dreams/hawk.html
I don’t feel much kinship with these hawk dream interpretations. I feel a definite kinship with the interpretations of owl dreams. Interesting. Perhaps there’s something to these interpretations after all.
As an interesting side note, my father is interested in totems. His most important totem is the hawk. Reading these dream intepretations, I can see how kinship with the hawk would be helpful to him as an attorney.
Comments:
edunn (March 8, 2008. 06:58pm)
Interesting. Makes me nervous to look up the meanings of my dreams. I have a lot of scary bizarre nightmare type dreams.
peahayes (March 8, 2008. 07:05pm)
Ah, well, you know best what is going on inside your noggin. I personally think dreams are closely related to our own experience!
edunn (March 8, 2008. 07:06pm)
Yup it is stress showing it's ugly face!
bmccosar (March 11, 2008. 02:16am)
I'm not sure it's possible to assign rigid interpretations to dreams. Context matters a lot. An owl could be anything from the one I hear at night (somewhere in the neighborhood) but have never seen, to Athena's symbol of wisdom, to Jerath the Goblin King. So you're probably right about the relation to our own experience. I do know that I sometimes dream these stories with incredibly complex plots that take me about 25 minutes to explain (the length of one morning dog-walk). Many times the stories are surreal, and don't make much sense in the obvious way, but I can trace them back and see where the elements that made them up came from.
bmccosar (March 11, 2008. 02:17am)
[And as for totem animals, mine is Godzilla.]
peahayes (March 11, 2008. 03:30am)
Wow, that's a hell of a totem. I didn't know it, but according to my dad, you can have many totems. So don't limit yourself! Where do you live that you have an owl in the neighborhood? That seems a bit unusual.
bmccosar (March 11, 2008. 07:01pm)
North Central Florida is basically still "the woods." Developers haven't turned the entire place into a strip mall just yet -- but they're trying! The houses in my area are all on acre lots, and we have a large wooded area to the east and north of our house. Some other wildlife "guests" we've seen: a peacock (an escapee from the nearby zoo); crows (my dog hates crows), turkey vultures, and buzzards; foxes; deer; wild turkeys; and a red shouldered hawk (used to live in our yard). We've also had some run ins with a pack of wild boars, but that's another story for another day. Actually, if I told the highlights of the Neri vs. the Crow With the Ham Sandwich story, it'd make a good post.