CROSSING A RIVER IN DREAMS:Understanding dreams is not so difficult. In practice dream symbols translate into certain words within the English language. For instance a "river crossing" dream may simply capture an everyday thought such as "I need to get out of this rut". In that way your dream picks out one features of crossing a river - wanting to cross over to a new set of emotions but finding obstacles in the way.

FULL LIST OF KEYWORDS
In practice crossing rivers have several symbolic meanings. Here is the full list.
- "wanting to get out of a rut" (crossing a river is often difficult and it can represent anything that we wish to escape from which is bad including a bad mood)
- "get over grief" (crossing a river can signify any difficult emotions we are wishing to escape from)
- "get over a break up" (crossing a river is a lot of hassle and this can be a metaphor for any big change in your life - especially a relationship which is ended)
- "finding it difficult to make time for something" (we can often only cross a river at a certain point and certain time and so this can be a metaphor for us wishing to make time for something)
- "distance yourself from someone/somewhere" (if you have tired of a group of friends and wish to distance yourself then its often not so easy. A river crossing can symbolise any major change in your life and so can represent the difficulties in making that change)

Its a fallacy that dreams capture unconscious thoughts - dreams represent thoughts that we are all too aware of. A typical dream would translate into the types of thoughts that we might write down in a diary or tell a best friend. Dreams represent your key thoughts which pinpoint the problems right now. Try to write down some quotes which capture your feelings right now and try to include the words and phrases above. For instance if you have been trying to get over the grief from the death of a loved one then crossing a river is a metaphor for this. Crossing depicts the wish to cross over to a better emotional mood and the river itself is a symbol for the things in the way of this.

Dreams can represent very sophisticated thoughts. For instance, one dream in our database features a castle. The dreamer is then trying to cross this little rock bridge over a little stream. As he crosses over the bridge falls apart. In real life the dreamer was trying to distance himself from a group of friends. Previously they had been a source of great support. But now he felt that they had served their purpose and he wanted to move on. Crossing the river symbolised the difficulties in distancing yourself from a group of people. The castle was a symbol of their previous strong support. If you put these two symbols together then you can form this into a wider dream meaning. The dream captures this exact feeling - "they have been a strong source of support but I want to distance myself from them. But if I cut them off then I may find it difficult to get back with them."