Example: ‘My husband’s mother, no longer alive, came and slid her arms carefully under me and lifted me up. I shouted “Put me down! Put me down! I don’t want to go yet.” She carefully lowered me on to the bed and disappeared’ (EH). Most dreams in which dead people appear are expressive of our attempts to deal with our feelings, guilt or anger in connection with the person who died, or our own feelings about death. In the example the dreamer is feeling fear about being carried off by death.
When someone close to us dies we go through a period of change from relating to them as an external reality, to meeting and accepting them as alive in our memories and inner life. In the next example the man has not only come to terms with his mother’s and his own death, but also found this inner reality. Example: A dark grey sugar loaf form materialised. This pillar lightened in shade as I watched. It didn’t move. I began to think it was Mrs Molten who died in 1956.
The feeling grew stronger but still the colour lightened. Then it bent over and kissed my head. In that instant I knew it was my mother.
An ecstatic joy and happiness such as I have never known on earth suffused me. That happiness remained constantly in mind for the next few days’ (Mr M).
[1]