Dreaming about swimming: in the sea, a river or a pool

Dreaming about swimming: what the scene usually says

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 that you are swimming is not a warning of drowning, of illness or of danger in the water. The scene usually reflects how you are dealing with what you are living through: swimming with ease tends to go with phases when things flow; swimming against the current, with great effort for little progress; not reaching the shore, with tiredness and the fear of not coping.

The kind of water changes the tone. The open sea speaks of something vast and hard to measure; a river, of something that runs and carries you along; a pool, of a familiar space with edges. For water in general, see dreaming about water. When the dream turns into sinking, the scene changes subject and comes closer to dreaming about drowning.

Read also: Dreaming about a swimming pool and Dreaming about drowning.

Where the stroke in the dream comes from

According to the continuity hypothesis, tested by Michael Schredl and Friedrich Hofmann in 2003, dreams reuse what occupies waking life. People who train in swimming, do water aerobics, spent the weekend at the beach or are teaching their child to swim have the scene close at hand. So do people who are afraid of water: the worry becomes an image.

The body enters the story as well. In 1958, William Dement and Edward Wolpert showed in the lab that outside stimuli, such as drops of water sprayed on the skin of a sleeper, can show up in the plot of a dream. Heat and sweat on a stuffy night can help explain the choice of scene.

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

Freud, Jung and faith in the water

In Freud's psychoanalysis. In the section on typical dreams in The Interpretation of Dreams, Freud says that dreams of flying, falling and floating without support repeat the movement games of childhood, when an adult swung the child through the air or pretended to drop them. In these dreams, he writes, the hands that held us disappear. Freud does not talk about swimming in that passage, but the feeling of being held up by the water belongs to the same family, and his question would be: what memory does this water bring back?

In Jung's psychology. For Jung, water is one of the most frequent images of the unconscious. Swimming would mean moving inside it without sinking: being in touch with strong emotions without being swallowed by them. In this reading, the person who drowns in the dream is being overwhelmed; the person who swims is learning to get across. Man and His Symbols reminds us that this meaning always depends on the dreamer.

In symbols and faith. In A Dictionary of Symbols, Chevalier and Gheerbrant treat water as a source of life, a means of purification and a place of rebirth, which appears in baptism. In the Bible, the river that flows from the temple in Ezekiel 47 becomes so deep that it can only be crossed by swimming; in John 21, Peter throws himself into the sea to reach Jesus on the shore; and Isaiah 43:2 promises presence to whoever passes through the waters.

Bringing both readings together. Research explains how the pool, the beach and the heat of the bedroom reach the dream; traditions ask what waters you are crossing right now.

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

Sea, river or pool: the most common scenes

If the sea was rough, read also dreaming about the sea and giant waves and dreaming about a river.

See also: Dreaming about a desert and Dreaming about a fire.

When the dream in the water deserves attention

It is almost always a pleasant or neutral dream. It deserves attention when the scene of swimming without ever arriving becomes a recurring nightmare and your sleep gets worse; frequent nightmares can be treated. See how to have fewer nightmares.

Waking up gasping, with a feeling of shortness of breath, is often worth taking to a doctor, because it may have a physical cause, such as sleep apnea. And if the dream goes back to a drowning you lived through or witnessed and the memory gets in the way of your day, seek psychological support.

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

Swimming in the dream book

In O Livro dos Sonhos, a Brazilian dream book, L. P. Baçan gives the verb to swim a cheerful reading: in life, happiness close at hand; in love, desire. Drowning has a separate and much darker entry (in life, danger; in love, separation), which shows how the tradition distinguishes the person who gets across the water from the person who sinks in it.

Jung reminded readers, in Man and His Symbols, that a symbol does not fit into a list. Swimming in the dream of an athlete and in the dream of someone terrified of water are opposite experiences.

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

What folk reading says about swimming in a dream

In Brazilian folk reading, swimming in clean, calm water is a sign of a good phase and of inner peace; in murky water, of problems that call for attention. Swimming with fish speaks of plenty; with dolphins, of friendship and protection; near a shark, of caution with false friends. Reaching the shore after great effort means victory. As for colors, light blue water suggests calm; green, hope; dark water, a call for attention. These are traditional readings, for reflection, not predictions. See what dream meanings look like according to science and culture.