Dreaming of a hummingbird: indoors, on a flower or in your hand

What dreaming about a hummingbird usually points to

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

Dreaming about a hummingbird is no guarantee of good news, nor proof of a visit from someone who has passed away. The scene tends to appear in moments of lightness, expectation or longing: a fresh start, a small joy, the memory of a loved one who was fond of birds. When the hummingbird hovers in midair, the dream usually comes with attention and wonder; when it flies into the house, with a sense of being visited.

This article deals with the specific scene of the hummingbird. For birds in general, there is the main article on dreaming about birds. Nothing here is a prediction.

Read also: Dreaming about birds and Dreaming about flowers.

Why the hummingbird visits the dream

The continuity hypothesis, tested by Michael Schredl and Friedrich Hofmann in 2003, says that dreams reuse what occupies waking life. The hummingbird has easy ways in: the sugar-water feeder on the porch, grandma's garden, a photo someone posted, the tattoo on a friend's arm. In Brazil, home to dozens of species, it shows up even on apartment balconies.

There is also the emotional side. Many people grew up hearing from their families that a hummingbird is the soul of someone who died coming to visit. When that belief is present and the longing is still fresh, it is natural for the bird to appear in dreams during grief. Continuity explains the path; the meaning belongs to the person who dreamed.

Source: Schredl and Hofmann, Continuity between waking activities and dream activities, Consciousness and Cognition, 2003.

The hummingbird in each scene and what usually goes with it

If the dream took place in a garden, read dreaming about a garden. If you were flying alongside it, see dreams about flying. Another winged visitor common in dreams is the butterfly.

See also: Dreaming about a stork and Dreaming about shrimp.

When a hummingbird dream calls for care

A hummingbird dream rarely brings distress. It deserves attention when it comes with grief that does not ease: nights of poor sleep in a row, sadness that takes over the day, a wish to withdraw from everyone. In those cases, talking to a health professional helps, and in the US, you can call or text 988 (Suicide & Crisis Lifeline) at any hour. If the dream has become a frequent nightmare, for example with the bird hurt, see how to have fewer nightmares. For dreams about people who have passed away, read also dreaming about someone who died.

Source: Morgenthaler and colleagues, Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine, 2018.

The hummingbird in dream books

In O Livro dos Sonhos, a Brazilian dream book, L. P. Baçan lists the hummingbird under the name colibri: in life, ideas; in love, fickleness. The reading about love comes from the bird's reputation for flitting from flower to flower. It is tradition, not a rule.

Jung reminded us that a symbol does not fit in a list. The hummingbird of the grandmother who filled the feeder every day and the hummingbird from a poem read at school carry different meanings, and only the person who dreamed knows which one was there.

Sources: L. P. Baçan, O Livro dos Sonhos, 2014; Jung (ed.), Man and His Symbols.

Psychoanalysis, myths and faith on the hummingbird

In Freud's psychoanalysis. In The Interpretation of Dreams, Freud describes a woman's recurring dream in which children were playing in a field, grew wings and flew away. He linked the scene to something she had heard as a little girl, that children who die become little angels, and recalled that ancient peoples imagined the soul with butterfly wings. Freud does not talk about hummingbirds, but the reasoning fits: a winged creature can carry, in a dream, what a person has learned about loss and about the soul.

In Jung's psychology. In Man and His Symbols, Joseph Henderson, one of Jung's collaborators, points to the bird as one of the most fitting symbols of transcendence, that which carries a person beyond the point where they are. The hummingbird adds lightness and precision to this: it is the only bird that can hover in place and fly backward.

In symbols and faith. In A Dictionary of Symbols, Chevalier and Gheerbrant show that flight made birds, in many cultures, an image of the link between heaven and earth. The Aztecs worshipped Huitzilopochtli, a name usually translated as hummingbird of the south. In Spiritism, Allan Kardec describes sleep in The Spirits' Book as a moment when the spirit partly frees itself from the body and can meet other spirits, and it is along these lines that many families read the hummingbird as a visit from someone they love.

Bringing both readings together. Research explains how the feeder, the garden and longing bring the hummingbird into the dream. Traditions offer comfort and meaning, without anything being provable. The two readings can live side by side, as long as the longing is also cared for during the day.

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

The hummingbird in Brazilian folk tradition

In folk reading, a hummingbird in the house is a sign of a visit or of good news on the way. A green one speaks of hope; a blue one, of calm; a colorful one, of joy in the family. Many hummingbirds together mean an abundance of affection, and the bird perched on your hand, love returned. An injured hummingbird is read as a loved one who needs attention. These are readings from tradition, full of tenderness, and not predictions. See what dream meanings look like according to science and culture.