Meaning
In a dream, a tree usually represents your life and how it grows as you get older and become more mature. Although a tree can often symbolise your family, working your way up it suggests that this is about your career and the particular branch of the business that you are in. This tree suggests that some insecurity in your workplace is making you feel anxious and putting the wind up you.

You are feeling out on a limb and you are worried that you will lose your professional position and have to work your way up all over again. However you have the opportunity to become involved in a thriving business in similar area. This new company seems to be very strong and healthy but is going to require a bit of a leap of faith to make the break from your present position.

You are concerned that moving to this new company might end in failure and you may be sad about leaving old colleagues who have become like a family to you. It is time to be courageous and branch out. This will give you much more opportunity for growth and provide you with much more security.

Meaning
Dreaming of doing a crossword suggests that you are trying to work out some sort of real puzzle in waking life. It also indicates that you prefer taking a black and white approach to most things in life because it minimises uncertainty. This is probably a situation that has been puzzling you for some time and you are trying to work out the correct response.

Although you feel that the answer to your situation should be quite straightforward, none of the responses that you come up with seem to fit. Even though your solutions aren’t working, you keep trying them again and again because you are sure you have the right answers to the problem. However, the more that you give the same old answers, the messier things become.

This makes you very cross because you feel that you can’t seem to communicate what seems a simple answer to a simple question. Rather than giving up on this frustrating situation and moving on, the most obvious answer to your puzzle is to tear up the rules and make up some new ones of your own. Take a more colourful approach to this problem and you will open up new opportunities.

Meaning
When you have a dream about playing a computer game, you are often trying out various scenarios and options for some new situation in your waking life. An aeroplane usually symbolises a particular plan or project that you are working on and taxiing out to the runway suggests that you are preparing to launch this project with the hope that it will really take off and become a success.

The big jet shows that this project means a lot to you and that you have probably have been making these plans for quite a while. Although you have been considering all the theoretical possibilities, it is now time to put your ideas into practice and this is making you feel anxious. You are frightened that the project will fail and come crashing down around you.

Instead of allowing your project to spiral out of control, try doing what a professional pilot would do in your situation. Use all the data sources you have to establish your position and monitor the progress of your project. The calmer and more professional you can be, the more likely that your project will become the flyaway success that you would like it to be.

Christopher Nolan is a wonderfully gifted storyteller but his latest film ‘Inception’ is just that -- a story. It’s a fantastic story but not a real reflection of how lucid dreams can be created and used. In the film, Dom Cobb (played by Leonardo DiCaprio) proclaims ‘We create the dream, we bring the subject into that dream, and they fill it with their secrets’.

Although there are certain methods that can be used to induce a lucid dreaming state, a dream can only be truly created by the dreamer. Even though Cobb and his cronies try to control the dream, it is unlikely that the dreamer will divulge any secrets in a format that they can understand. When they are desperately searching for a vital piece of information, they are more likely to find the dreamer washing a giraffe or looking for a packet of biscuits.

It is possible to share dreams and this works best with dreamers who have recently shared and intense and powerful experience in waking life. Christopher Nolan is trying to share his own dream of what a 21st centry film should be and Inception will either draw you into his dream world or leave you yawning and confused.

As sex dreams are some of the most exciting and intriguing dreams (and one of the most popular searches on this site!) I will reveal some more of their mysteries by sharing the material I sent to Catherine with you. Here it is…

Intense Experiences
Dreams involving sexual content are among the most intense experiences a dreamer can have. Sex in a dream usually reflects a situation that is arousing and exciting the dreamer in their waking life. The cause of this arousal is usually non sexual in nature but the dreamer’s unconscious uses the experience of sex as a way to represent this excitement.

Certain Qualities
In the dreaming process, the dreamer uses particular people to symbolise certain qualities that they would like to discover and develop in their own inner life. Usually the dreamer is not sexually attracted to this particular person in waking life but they are unconsciously connecting with some qualities that the person appears to embody.

Romantic Betrayal
As a result of this, dreamers can often find themselves dreaming about situations involving inappropriate intimacy and romantic betrayal. It can be easy for the dreamer to assume that they are suffering from sexual confusion or that their partner is having deep and intimate connection with someone else. However, the dreams are usually trying to tell the dreamer how to achieve a deeper inner connection with their own self.

Most Common Sex Dreams
The most common sex dreams include sex with a boss, an ex, a platonic friend or colleague, same sex partner (or different sex partner depending on orientation), celebrity, a crush or beloved, a stranger. A partner having an affair is also a very common dream. Here are their real meanings.

Sex with a boss
A boss often represents the power to make decisions and put plans into practice. Sex with a boss shows that you are becoming more intimately aware of your own power and ability to choose what you want in life. Sex with an authority figure such as a policeman or military officer often indicates that you are seeking permission to be yourself and want to have your talents formally recognised by other people. Intimately connecting with a president or world leader shows that you are realising that you, and you only, are the ultimate authority in deciding what you want to do in your life.

Sex with an ex
An ex usually symbolises the quality that you most powerfully associate with them. If your ex was unreliable and untruthful, then you are letting yourself down in waking life by not facing up to the truth about something. A warm and generous ex shows that you are discovering your own warmth and generosity and are being encouraged to express it. An ex often appears in a dream to warn you not to repeat past relationship patterns with a current romantic partner and this is an encouragement to let go of old behaviours that no longer serve you.

Sex with a platonic friend or colleague
A friend or colleague tends to reflect a talent that you admire and would like to possess yourself. If your friend has an easy social charm, then you are realising that you are becoming more at ease and charming in social situations. A colleague with a particular skill indicates that you are becoming aware that you also have the innate talent to develop that skill. A work colleague often suggests that you realise that you will need to work at developing this talent and it may involve some dedication and discipline for you to do this.

Sex with a same sex partner (or different sex partner depending on orientation)
A same sex or different orientation partner shows that you are becoming more tolerant of different behaviours and beliefs. An intimate encounter with someone of a different orientation indicates that you are becoming more curious about the needs and drives of others and also becoming aware of your own unspoken needs. A same sex partner often suggests that you are becoming more comfortable and connected with your own body image.

Sex with a celebrity
Celebrities represent the ultimate awareness of your own special talents and qualities. The celebrity that you dream of being intimate with reflects a unique talent that you have and are beginning to recognise. This may not be the obvious talent associated with that person but is one that you are unconsciously identifying with. It indicates that you are keen to have your talents publically recognised and accepted by a wider audience. As you do this, you start to recognise your own talents and begin to accept them too rather than rejecting yourself as a nobody.

Sex with a crush or beloved
Someone who you have a crush on or who is your beloved embodies a quality that you are inexorably drawn to. This may not be a physical or emotional quality and may be something quite subtle and imperceptible instead. Although this can be easy to dismiss as mere wish fulfilment, the object of your affections is reflecting a fundamentally attractive quality that you want to embody yourself. The qualities that you unconsciously identify in another person are as varied as all the reasons why people fall in love.

Sex with a stranger
A stranger usually represents some part of your own character that seems strange and unexplored to you. The stranger is often beautiful and alluring and this dream is urging you to find out more about your own hidden beauty and allure. Sometimes the stranger has no face or is wearing a mask and this indicates that you are concealing a natural talent that you feel shy about expressing. If the stranger is foreign or an alien, then you are connecting and resolving parts of your character that perhaps seem strange and alien to each other.

Partner having an affair
Dreaming that your partner is being unfaithful is usually triggered when you begin to lose faith in your own sexiness and attractiveness. It can be tempting to think that your partner is being unfaithful but this dream reflects that you are feeling unattractive to yourself for some reason. This can often happen when a situation in your waking life is frustrating you and making you feel less confident than usual. Rather than sharing your frustrations with your partner, you may start hoping that some other potential partner will find you attractive and you might even end up daydreaming about having an affair yourself. The more confident that you are in waking life, the more confidently you can step into your new future and become the person that you always dream of being.

Intimate Partner
As these dreams illuminate the fundamental identity and needs of the dreamer, they will also reveal their deeper sexual and romantic truths of what the dreamer really needs within an intimate relationship. By being more aware of what qualities they are attracted to in a lover, the dreamer can make conscious decisions about how to attract the intimate partner of their dreams.

True Intimacy
Sexual dreams can also be experienced when the dreamer is becoming particularly excited about a new creative idea or project. Dreaming of the procreative act reflects the fact that the dreamer possesses the spark to create something new and unique and then bring it to life. The dreaming process is also non judgemental. It releases the dreamer from guilt and criticism and enables them to explore and enjoy the true intimacy of their own inner being.

Excited and Aroused
The body also becomes sexually excited and aroused when dreaming, whether these dreams involve sexual content or not. In women, vaginal lubrication increases dramatically and the clitoris engorges and enlarges. Dreaming men experience unconscious and sustained erections. These physiological functions make the dreaming experience even more intense.

“I have this recurring dream sometimes where there’s a phantom in my home and he takes me into a room, and there’s a blond girl with ropes tied to all four of her limbs. And she’s got my shoes on from the Grammys. Go figure—pyscho. And the ropes are pulling her apart. I never see her get pulled apart, but I just watch her whimper, and then the phantom says to me, ‘If you want me to stop hurting her and if you want your family to be OK, you will cut your wrist.’ And I think that he has his own, like, crazy wrist-cutting device. And he has this honey in, like, Tupperware, and it looks like sweet-and-sour sauce with a lot of MSG from New York. Just bizarre. And he wants me to pour the honey into the wound, and then put cream over it and a gauze.”

Dreaming about her home indicates that Lady Gaga is thinking about her own self and the room represents some aspect of her own character. This part of her character is personified by the phantom and being taken to the room shows that she feels as if she is unwillingly under the control of this character trait.  The phantom also suggests that she finds it difficult to acknowledge this controlling part of her own personality and usually tries to ignore it.

The girl with the ropes tied to her limbs is also an aspect of Lady Gaga’s character as shown by the fact she is blonde and wearing Lady Gaga’s own  shoes from the Grammy’s. The Grammy shoes indicate this other part of her character is the girl who creates and performs and loves being recognised for her artistry.

The ropes tied to all four of her limbs show that her perfomer self often feels like a puppet being pulled in all different directions by the demands of her controlling self. This inner tension threatens to pull her apart and makes her feel as if she is at the end of her tether.

Her performing character makes  a few whimpering protests to her controlling self but she doesn’t consciously acknowledge these cries for help. However, she unconsciously makes attention seeking cries for help in waking life such as falling off her shoes and various other public mishaps.

To reduce these inner tensions and anxietis, she knows that she has to be less controlling and cause less pain to her creative self and to her creative team. Her wrist connects the power to shape and control her creative future – symbolised by her hand – to her arm which represents her ability to take action.

By cutting her wrist she will separate her artistic talent from her need to control every aspect of her image. She knows this might be a little painful at first but she has the tools and resources to do it. The honey balm in the Tupperware shows that she will find this separation of her creative output and her image management to be sweetly fulfilling as it will release all the tension and be far healthier for her.

She knows that doing this might be a sweet and sour experience with a few ups and downs but she wants to connect more deeply with her own natural talent rather than being influenced by the seemingly artifical tastes of other people in the New York scene.

So it’s not really an Illuminati ritual and the Devil isn’t trying to take her. She just needs to remember that underneath her micromanaged Lady Gaga persona is the passionate artistic soul of Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta, the girl who she really is.

Jenna, one of the show’s producers, got in touch with me to ask me what the dream might mean. Kathie Lee was delighted by the accuracy of my interpretation and if you didn’t catch it on the show, here it is…

When Kathie Lee dreams that her mouth is filled with chewing gum, she knows that there is something that she really needs to say but is having some difficulty in expressing. Although Kathie Lee is very gracious and extremely articulate, she is finding it quite challenging to put her feelings about this situation into words.

Kathie Lee is concerned that she will cause a sticky situation in waking life if she actually does voice her deeper thoughts and that it may lead to her feeling as if she has bitten off more than she can chew.

The issue that Kathie Lee needs to resolve is that she seems to be involved in a particular activity that absorbs much of her energy but does not provide her with the deeper feelings of fulfilment that she needs.

Kathie Lee may spend a lot of time chewing this situation over as she considers the most equable way of dealing with it. It may have started off as an apparently small issue but now appears to have become blown out of all proportion. However, the best way for her to release the frustration is to say what is on her mind by just spitting it out!

Many people, particularly dentists and orthodontists, associate the chewing gum dream with grinding teeth. Their view is that the sensation of chewing is caused by the tooth grinding and therefore the tooth grinding is the cause of the dream.

However, the reverse is actually true. Tooth grinding is usually experienced when a person needs to say something that is on their mind but feels frustrated and unable to do so. The same issue in waking life that is causing the dreamer to have the chewing gum dream may also cause them to grind their teeth.

Both the chewing gum dream and the tooth grinding usually cease when the person resolves the situation by expressing what they really need to say. It is a common dream among people who have a demanding creative lifestyle.

hey Ian, im wondering if you could help with my boyfriends dream. he always has a dream that he is in a big house its very scary and he’s trapped in lots of corridors and rooms he cant get out of, he knows there is something bad and horrible in the house but never sees it n doesnt know what it is. the dream always starts outside but he keeps going in the house even though he knows its bad??? I’d appreciate it if you could give us some insight as to what it might mean? thank you x

Hi Colette
When we dream about a house, we are always dreaming about our own selves. Houses have insides and outsides and so do we and that’s why we use them to represent who we really are. The bigger the house, the bigger our potential to achieve what we really want to in life.

Your boyfriend knows that he has the potential to achieve a lot in his life and to be very successful at doing what he really wants to do. However,  he finds the idea to living up to his potential to be very scary. The rooms in the house represent different aspects of his character and the corridors are opportunities for transformation.

He feels trapped because he is trying to live up to other people’s expectations of him rather than just being himself and doing what he really wants to do. He may lack confidence in his own talents and abilities and so it can sometimes be easier for him to keep everyone else happy rather than risking failure or looking silly.

The dream always starts outside because he is thinking about who he could be and how he might appear to other people. Your boyfirend is drawn back to the the house because he know that his real self is in there, waiting to be released and his potential to be liberated. He has to have the courage to stand up for himself and make his own decisions. The more that he does this, the more that the bad and horrible feeling will fade away and be replaced by feelings of happiness and excitement.