Dreaming about a goblin or elf: meaning, variations and what science says

Dreaming about a goblin: the direct answer

Dream interpretation is not prediction and not diagnosis. This article separates what sleep research observes from what popular interpretation associates with the theme.

Dreaming about a goblin does not mean a spirit is in your house, or that someone worked against you. Small, mischievous beings usually appear when something petty bothers you: things that go missing, tasks that pile up, a mess that seems to have a life of its own. When the goblin is friendly, the scene comes with lightness, nostalgia for childhood or a wish to play.

Read also: Dreaming about a ghost or spirit and Dreaming about an unknown person.

Where the dream goblin comes from

Studies on the continuity between waking life and dreaming, reviewed by Michael Schredl in 2003, show that what we see and feel by day tends to return at night. Goblins are in Christmas films, cartoons, garden ornaments, grandmothers' stories and the Saci of Brazilian legends: there is no lack of material.

Real noises also enter the plot. In 1958, William Dement and Edward Wolpert showed in the laboratory that outside stimuli, such as a sound or drops of water on the skin, are incorporated into the dream. The creak of the roof, the cat walking in the kitchen or a door banging in the wind can become the little steps of a goblin running through the house.

Sources: Schredl and Hofmann, Continuity between waking activities and dream activities, Consciousness and Cognition, 2003; Dement and Wolpert, Journal of Experimental Psychology, 1958.

Science and belief: Freud, Jung and faith traditions

In Freud's psychoanalysis. Through condensation, the dream joins several people or ideas in a single figure. The goblin, half child and half old man, mischievous and clever, is a good candidate for this kind of blend. Freud's method would be to separate the parts (the cap, the laugh, the size, the place in the house) and see what each recalls.

In Jung's psychology. Man and His Symbols observes that the modern world seems to have been "sanitized" of sorceresses, witches and goblins, but that the contents of the unconscious do not disappear when we stop believing in them. The book also shows the compensatory function with the caricature of an isolated lighthouse keeper, whose unconscious arranges an imaginary companion for him. In the Jungian key, the goblin can be that companion the mind creates.

In the Dictionary of Symbols. Chevalier and Gheerbrant describe elves, of Nordic origin, as tiny, capricious spirits who dance at night in the meadows; adolescents, more sensitive to the imaginary, would be able to see them in the mist. Gnomes, according to the Kabbalah, would live underground as owners of treasures of stones and metals. In a tale cited by the authors, the ugly gnome has a wife of extraordinary beauty: the couple would represent the ugly side and the beautiful side that live together in each person.

Putting the two readings together. Science explains where the figure comes from; folklore recalls that every goblin is ambiguous, helping and hindering. Asking which of the two it was doing already clarifies a lot.

Sources: Freud, Die Traumdeutung, 1900; Jung (ed.), Man and His Symbols; Chevalier and Gheerbrant, A Dictionary of Symbols.

Scenes that show up most in this dream

If the being in the dream was darker than mischievous, also read dreaming about a witch.

If the dream keeps coming back: when to seek help

Dreaming about a goblin is almost never a sign of a problem. If the figures appear every night, if you see shapes on waking without being able to move or you begin to fear sleep, talk to a health professional. Frequent nightmares and sleep paralysis have an explanation and treatment. See how to have fewer nightmares.

Source: Morgenthaler et al., Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine, 2018.

What dream dictionaries record

O Livro dos Sonhos (a Brazilian dream book), by L. P. Baçan, has no entry for goblin. The nearest is the dwarf, read as disappointments in life and the end of a relationship in love, a much heavier reading than the goblin's playful reputation.

Freud saw these books as "decoding" methods, which swap each image for another by a fixed code, without asking the dreamer anything. A goblin can come from a film watched with the children, a forgotten keychain or a colleague who is always playing pranks; the code has no way of knowing.

Sources: Freud, Die Traumdeutung, 1900; L. P. Baçan, O Livro dos Sonhos, 2014.

Popular readings about dreaming of a goblin

In popular reading, the goblin is a sign of mischief, unexpected luck or someone who deceives. The green goblin is usually associated with money and plenty, because of the Irish leprechaun and his pot of gold; the evil goblin, with heavy energies; and the goblin in a bottle recalls country legends of a little devil raised in a glass jar who gave wealth to his owner, at a price. They are cultural stories, to reflect on, and not predictions. See dream meanings between science and culture.