Dreams are manifestations of our subconscious. They occur during the deepest part of our sleep cycle, known as the REM (Rapid Eye Movement) cycle.
More often than not, we don’t remember our dreams, although sometimes we remember them vividly, and others seem to be recurring. Others happen during our waking hours but aren’t associated with daydreaming.
Interestingly enough, even with much research on dreaming, it’s difficult to pinpoint what they are scientifically speaking. We can only theorize what they are and what they could mean.
They’re typically said to be reflections of the day or a new chain of events, and they’re often fragmented and indecipherable. Then there are the types of dreams that hold valuable meaning—and they don’t necessarily happen to us at night.
These are the psychic dreams, or, more specifically, premonition dreams.
What Exactly is a Premonition?
A premonition is a feeling, as in a gut feeling that comes on strong to let you know that something is about to happen. It’s a forewarning if you will. A vision often accompanies this intuitive power, but not always.
When talking about psychic abilities, it’s essential to understand the distinction between premonitions and precognitions, as they are terms that often overlap one another when discussing psychic-abilities.
While a premonition denotes emotion in the form of intuition, precognition is more like a brain phenomenon that grants an individual awareness of the future. This ability to foresee a future event is said to be done by the paranormal means of extrasensory perception, aka ESP. It’s the gift of clairvoyant individuals.
While premonitions and precognitions seem to be almost the same thing minus a feeling or two, they do have one key difference: They operate as day and night, literally. Precognitions can only happen while you’re in a dream state, and a premonition vision will occur during the day, usually in the form of déjà vu.
So, when we talk about premonition dreams, we are talking about déjà vu—during the daytime. There is one caveat, however. When talking about premonition dreams, we are also referring to how we feel when we wake up from a dream—especially if those feelings are of dread and anxiety even if we don’t remember the dream.
Now you have an understanding of the interplay between precognitions and premonition dreams.
Precognitive Dreams vs. Premonition Dreams
Since the two psychic abilities seem to overlap and can easily be confused, the best way to demonstrate them is by using anecdotal stories. In the following stories, take note of the details, which classifies them as either precognitive or premonition.
The Sunni Ingalls Precognitive Life Saving Dream
A woman by the name of Sunni Ingalls dreamed that she was ahead in a race when her husband pulled up in his car and told her that she needed to get into the car. While she didn’t want to quit the race, he insisted, and so she got in, and he drove her home. When she got home, she noticed in the mirror that her neck appeared unusually swollen, and while peering into the mirror, she also saw that her mother was looking over her shoulder.
Sunni remembers this dream in vivid detail, and because it was also a reminder that her mother had a thyroid problem, she decided to pay a visit to her doctor. Sunni was diagnosed with Stage 1 breast cancer, which she, fortunately, was able to beat it and recover. She was convinced that her dream was her body’s way of telling her that something was wrong.
While the dream didn’t have anything to do with breast cancer, it’s vividness and detail is what classifies it as a precognitive experience.
A Premonition in the Form of a Warning
One morning, a woman woke up with an intense feeling of dread. She couldn’t remember what she dreamed of, or if she even had a dream at all, but that dreadful feeling stayed with her for the entire day. That awful feeling caused negative thoughts to creep into her mind throughout the day. One of those thoughts involved her child being hit and killed by a drunk driver.
For the rest of the day, she decided to watch her children carefully, just in case. Later that evening, a friend called her with some bad news. A mutual friend of theirs was hit by a drunk driver and had died as a result.
While the woman couldn’t recount her dream, understand the resulting feeling of dread, or foresee her friend’s death, it is still classified as a premonition dream.
While the phenomenon of premonition dreams are most often associated with intense feelings of dread, impending doom, and anxiety, they’re not always a sign of imminent danger or death. They can also be as innocent and as casual as knowing who’s calling without even looking at the caller ID.
Where Do These Psychic Abilities Come From?
It’s safe to say that the study of premonition dreams is largely anecdotal. Science would suggest that we face a probabilistic universe, one that is not fixed and where the mind can calculate to make an educated guess on events that are about to occur. Of course, when anecdotal accounts weigh-in, the scales tip in favor of our natural “psychic” abilities.
Dr. Daryl Bem, a well respected social scientist from Cornell University, has conducted a series of studies that prove the defiance of probability in favor of psychic abilities. He argues that it’s an evolutionary advantage that allows for the survival of species.
For example, there is the ability in men to sense future sexual opportunities while in women, there is an ability to sense danger. This has ensured that over the past 200,000 years, all species in the animal kingdom have survived by their senses in terms of reproductive advantages as well as the capacity to sense danger and, in turn, protect our young.
If this is true, then we are all hardwired with the ability to sense the future, whether that be with a gut feeling or paranormal aid.
There is an unprovable theory that when we enter a dream state, time does not exist. There is no past or future, only the present, and during this present time, we can tune into all time and no time all at once. During this “present time,” our brains accept their subconscious scenery as fragmented imagery, unable to be discerned.
When certain images come into clear focus, that is when we are experiencing precognition or a premonition—and how we feel afterward gives way to their meaning.
Keeping all of this unprovable science in mind, it cannot be said where psychic abilities come from specifically. All we can deduce is that they come from within, as part of our biological and psychological makeup. Having said this, there are individuals out there with much stronger abilities than others.
How Do You Know When You’re Experiencing a Premonition Dream?
As we’ve been discussing, a premonition can be as subtle as a nagging feeling to an intensity that’s so overwhelming it can bring your entire day to a halt. This can make recognizing a premonition dream difficult at times, especially if you don’t fancy yourself a very intuitive person.
Here’s what we know so far: when we’re considering the phenomenon that is the premonition dream, we know it can be separate from or concerning a precognitive dream.
We know that it’s something that can occur as a strong gut feeling or be as innocent as a strong connection among family members (i.e., knowing that it’s your aunt calling upon hearing the phone ring). We also know that it can take the form of déjà vu, accompanied by the recognition of our surroundings or a new vision all on its own.
Regardless of how well you trust your intuition or believe in psychic abilities, there are four distinctions of premonition dreams that you should not ignore:
Distinction #1: A Premonition Dream Concerning Health and Safety
The first and most prevalent form of premonition dreams that we’ve been discussing are those of impending doom—which ultimately save lives if you recall the Sunni Ingall story. There are plenty of anecdotal examples of this, and you may even have a few of your own.
You may not be able to pinpoint the who, what, why, and where, but you may sense that it involves a vehicle, a dangerous person, or some other sort of incident that could cause harm to you or your loved ones. The emerging feeling of discomfort that heightens your senses beyond the point of regular anxiety should not be discounted or ignored.
That feeling of impending doom that seems to come out of nowhere is telling you something—pay attention to it.
Distinction #2: A Premonition that Comes as a Vision
Some people experience premonitions dreams in the form of a vision. These visions are said to be so realistic that they play out like a movie, in which the person having the premonition at that moment is watching a specific scene unfold. More often than not, the scenes in these realistic visions show danger and tragedy.
If you experience such a vision, don’t keep it to yourself—warn whoever you saw in your premonition right away. It may save their life.
Distinction #3: A Recurring Premonition
Often when we need help making a decision, signs will appear all around us. Many premonitions, in this case, may come to as metaphors or unrelated stories that gather around the same meaning. They can also take the form of recurring dreams, which is an interruption of our sleep/dream patterns.
Considered as “recurring,” these dreams, metaphors, or signs can occur as little as three times a decade, a year, a month, and so on. This is also where the déjà vu phenomenon happens as you watch a familiar scene unfold before your eyes with the uncanny feeling that you’ve been there, done that, and said this before.
The point is, someone or something out there is trying to tell you something. If you’re experiencing a recurring premonition and the signs are unclear, it’s a good idea to try and meditate on its meaning to gain some clarity.
Distinction #4: A Premonition Associate with Physical Symptoms
Sometimes a premonition will come with a physical symptom, such as a headache or a sensation in another part of your body.
Premonitions that affect the physical body while also causing a gut feeling about something can be an indication that there’s a specific area of your life that needs to be taken care of. If you’re experiencing this type of physical premonition, it may be time to do some soul searching to figure out which of life’s challenges you need to face.
Remember, not all premonitions have to signify death and danger, so don’t panic if you’re feeling physical symptoms. You may have had a past trauma that you need to heal from so you’re not doomed to repeat the same mistakes in the future.
Understanding Your Premonition Dreams
To understand your premonition dreams is to become comfortable with your psychic abilities, no matter how vague they may be. Of course, the distinction between a regular nightmare or underlying stress, causing you to be filled with dread and the actual phenomenons, can be a bit tricky.
The key to understanding your premonition (and precognitive dreams) is being able to distinguish the phenomenon from the non-phenomenon. One key difference between the gut-feeling a premonition gives you and anxiety is the example of fear.
According to Gavin de Bekker, there is a “powerful knowing” that fills and directs you when you are in true danger. Your nervous system will be jump-started by signs of resonance, prompting the hairs on your arms to stand up, chills to run down your spine, and goosebumps to appear suddenly. At this moment, you become hyper-alert and may feel as if someone is guiding you through the danger.
If you’re feeling plain anxiety, it could be from unnecessary worry or neurotic fears that stem from trauma or trying new things. It’s less of a psychic phenomenon and more so pent up energy with no place to go.
In terms of our dreams, the distinction between fiction and prophecy is even more tricky because you’re asleep during your dream state. The biggest signs that tip the scales towards a precognitive dream usually has the do with the vividness of the dream and the role you play in it.
This is another great example of how precognition and premonition dreams differ. A person can have a precognitive dream that applies to someone else’s future, without having ever met them. A premonition usually involves the individual or someone they’re close to. It is believed that all humans and animals are connected on a subconscious and spiritual level; therefore, the difference can easily be a matter of proximity.
Understanding the specific meaning behind all of these psychic phenomenons and a persons’ purpose in them can be just as perplexing as to how you can dream of a person you’ve never met or seen before.
What to Do With Your Premonitions
So, you’ve had a clear cut premonition. Now what? Whether you’re prone to premonition dreams or just recently had a very strong one that came to fruition, the most important thing you can do is document it!
It’s okay if you don’t document every single time you predict who is calling when the phone rings. It’s the bigger things you want to keep track of, and for three good reasons.
The first reason being that if you don’t document it and something crazy happens, who’s going to believe you? The second reason is that the future of scientific studies in terms of psychic capabilities heavily relies on anecdotal evidence.
The third reason is that if you have consistent déjà vu and recurring premonitions, you’re going to want to need to be able to figure them out at some point, so writing down the time and place they occur as well as what you see around you in great detail will help.
Here’s what to do:
Keep a Diary
Call it a diary, call it a journal, call it a notebook—just write it all down someplace. As mentioned above, write about your premonition dreams in great detail. The more, the better. Write what you felt, saw, tasted, smelled, observed around you, who you spoke to, where you were when it happened, and so on.
Most importantly, document the time and date you experienced it. If it’s a recurring premonition, it may recur at the same time every three days, or on dates involving the same numbers. Those dots may connect for you later.
Tell Others About It
If you think you’re onto something or if you feel that someone’s life may be in danger, tell the people you trust about your premonitions. Think of this spoken documentation as a secondary piece of evidence, as a written document can be fabricated if there are no witnesses.
Additionally, if you think something bad is about to happen to someone close to you, you’ll have warned them by telling them about your premonition, possibly saving their life. Of course, it’s up to them whether or not to believe you, but one way or another, if major details about your premonition come to fruition after you spoke about it, you’ll have your credibility.
How to Become More Open to Premonitions
While premonition dreams aren’t necessarily something you can call upon to happen in an instance, there are ways to strengthen your intuitive abilities. Here are a few things you can do to “tune in” to your premonition intuition:
Listen to your gut. It’s not as easy you may think, especially if you’re not an intuitive type. It’s also positive to self-sabotage that little voice inside your head if you’re trying too hard. When it comes to honing in on your intuition, practice by paying attention to how certain situations and certain people make you feel and don’t second guess them.
For example, if you meet someone for the first time and immediately dislike them or get a weird feeling around them, it’s your gut telling you that something’s off.
Keep a dream journal. If you remember your dreams when you wake up, write them down in great detail as soon as possible. They may not all be winners, but it’s a good way to track down any symbols and metaphors that have been coming your way for some time unknowingly.
As you reflect on them, you’ll also get better at discerning which is prophetic and which is just plain subconscious nonsense.
Meditate. Quieting the mind is essential to unlocking the doors to your subconscious. Practicing meditation can help open your mind and bring to light the things that may have become lost in your subconscious, helping you to find the answer to a question you’ve been asking. It also helps you to be mindful and stay in the present, which is necessary for deciphering premonition dreams.
Believe. Believing in the spiritual aspects of life and the power of intuition will help you to be more open to the premonition dreams and feelings you receive. That way, you’ll more easily recognize them when they come compared to someone who is closed off and does not see the signs around them.
Remember, premonition dreams are a gift. So, be grateful for them and pay close attention to them as they come.
