Dreaming about waiting
A large share of dreams contain waiting and almost none contain the arrival. It is the most common unresolved structure in the database and it runs through the station, doctor, bank, queue and anticipation reports alike.
Also searched as: waiting for something, a waiting room, nothing happening, waiting to be seen
The characteristic report is duration without progress. Dreamers describe waiting and describe not knowing how long, and the thing waited for does not come.
Waiting rooms specifically are reported with an unusual flatness: dreamers describe the chairs, the other people, and nothing happening.
Being called, or not being called, is the second theme and connects to the being-ignored material where a name is not heard.
A queue that does not move is the third and is the same structure with other people in it.
Common associations
- Duration without progress.
- An arrival that does not come.
- Not being called.
- Other people waiting too.
Positive readings
Little, though there is a practical use: a dreamer who notices they have been waiting a long time has noticed something dreams do badly, which is a route to lucidity.
A few dreamers report waiting as restful, and those reports are worth keeping.
Difficult readings
Wearing rather than distressing, and it is the background texture of a great many unpleasant dreams rather than a subject of its own.
Where somebody is genuinely waiting on something real, results, a decision, a person, the frequency tracks it.
Psychological perspectives
Dreams do not represent duration reliably, as the time entry describes, so a wait has no length: it is a state that persists until the dream changes, which is exactly what dreamers describe.
That also explains why the thing waited for so rarely arrives. Arrival would require the dream to produce a resolution, and it is markedly better at producing continuation.
Stating that here saves the station, doctor, bank and queue entries from each explaining it separately.
Cultural and historical
Waiting is treated as a discipline in several contemplative traditions and as an ordeal in most narrative ones, which is a fair summary of how dreamers report it too.
There is no traditional dream material of note, which is unsurprising for a state rather than an image.
What the sleep science says
Reasonably supported: dreams do not represent duration reliably, so a wait persists as a state rather than elapsing.
Reasonably supported: dreams generate continuation far more readily than resolution.
Not established: any meaning in what is waited for.
Your own context
- What were you waiting for?
- Did it come?
- How long did it seem?
- Is something real pending?
If this recurs
Log what was being waited for. Dreamers frequently find it was never specified, which is the same finding the box and anticipation entries report.
Emotions often reported
- anticipation
- fatigue
- frustration
- detachment
- unease
- calm
Specific waiting dreams
Each of these is written separately, not generated from this page.
What state it was in
Questions for reflection
These are for your journal, not for us. Nothing you write is shared.
- What was I waiting for?
- Did it arrive?
- Was there anything real pending?
Dream interpretation is subjective. Nothing here is a diagnosis, a prediction, or medical advice.
Sources and reviewed references
4 references. What these labels mean
- 1.Smooth Tracking of Visual Targets Distinguishes Lucid REM Sleep Dreaming and Waking Perception from ImaginationPeer-reviewed research
Stephen LaBerge, Benjamin Baird and Philip G. Zimbardo (2018) · Nature Communications
Cited for: That eye movements in a lucid dream track dreamed objects smoothly, as in waking perception rather than imagination.
- 2.The Scientific Study of Dreams: Neural Networks, Cognitive Development and Content AnalysisAcademic book
G. William Domhoff (2003) · American Psychological Association
Cited for: The continuity hypothesis (that dream content largely reflects waking concerns) and a sustained critique of symbolic dream interpretation as an evidential method.
- 3.Dreaming: A Conceptual Framework for Philosophy of Mind and Empirical ResearchAcademic book
Jennifer M. Windt (2015) · MIT Press
Cited for: A modern philosophical treatment of what dreams are, including the immersive-spatiotemporal-hallucination account and the status of dream reports as evidence.
- 4.Gender Differences in Dream Recall: A Meta-AnalysisPeer-reviewed research
Michael Schredl and Iris Reinhard (2008) · Journal of Sleep Research
Cited for: Dream-recall frequency as a measurable, individually stable trait, and the factors that move it.
Dreamers’ accounts
How dreams of waiting have gone for other people, in their own words. Nothing here is an interpretation of anyone else's dream. It is a record of what happened and what it was like.
Nothing here yet. Be the first to say how this has gone for you.
Related records
- PersonDoctorDoctors appear in dreams mostly around waiting and around being told something. The reports are dominated by an appointment that does not happen and by a diagnosis the dreamer cannot afterwards recall.
- PlaceStationStations and airports are waiting dreams, and the waiting does not end. What dreamers report is the departure board: the platform that changes, the time that will not resolve, the destination that is not listed.
- ActionBeing earlyThe counterpart to being late, and it is reported a fraction as often, which is the finding. Dreams are far better at generating a deadline missed than a deadline met, and the imbalance is enormous.
- EmotionAnticipationThe feeling of something about to happen, sustained indefinitely and never resolved. It is the emotional signature of a large share of dreams and it is produced by a structural feature rather than by anything in the dream.
- ActionChasing somebodyThe active counterpart of the most reported dream there is, and it is reported a fraction as often. When the dreamer is the pursuer they still do not arrive, which shows the failure belongs to the dreaming body rather than to the role.
- ActionA gameGames in dreams have rules the dreamer does not know and cannot ask about, and everybody else appears to know them. That structure is the clearest statement of something the first-day, examination and competition entries each describe in part.