What Dreams Could Mean

The new Leonardo DiCaprio film, "Inception," has moviegoers and critics buzzing. And it's sparked a new interest in what our mind is doing when our body is asleep.

In the sci-fi thriller, DiCaprio and his team break into people's dreams to steal secrets.

Pictures: "Inception" Film Premiere
Pictures: Leonardo DiCaprio

But the rest of us, who don't have such control over the dream world, often wonder what those unsettling details that linger into morning really mean.

On "The Early Show," Lauren Lawrence, dreams columnist for the New York Daily News, gave a little insight into what we really desire based on what we often dream of.

According to Lawrence, dreams are a way we handle conflict resolution. They are important to our daily lives because whatever we may be anxious about or might be stressing us out, we work out in our dreams.

If you remember a specific dream more than others, Lawrence says it is more important to you. If you have dreams about specific things such as teeth, it has a meaning that you may not expect.

"Well, teeth are a very, very common symbol," explained Lawrence. "It means one thing for women, and would be [another] thing for men. For women, when teeth fall out, it means that there's a void in one's life that one needs to fill. Or there's a wish to be pregnant. And for men, it's just a sexual fantasy."

Lawrence delved into the many different categories of dreams that one may
have.

"There's the regular anxiety traumatic anxiety dream, and then this wish fulfillment dream, such as, 'I won the lottery or I just dated Brad Pitt," said Lawrence. "And then there's the self-affirmation dream, which is a really good dream and that is when you give yourself an attribute of what you don't normally have, like flying."

Other ones you may want to look out for include the examination dream, such as when you see yourself in your old school and everyone is taking a test and you may or may not feel prepared.

When it comes to dreaming you're naked somewhere, Lawrence explained, "It's the symbol of being naked when you show up in public and you're not wearing your clothes, it usually has to do with exposure. Clothes, usually has to do with exposure. It could be the wish to be exposed, that you want to tell someone something, or you want something to be exposed to you. It's also a dream of vulnerability."

Do you ever have control of your subconscious? The answer here is yes.

Lawrence describes the feeling of "lucid" dreaming as one where you may not be in a deep unconscious place, so you know what you are doing, and can lead yourself around in your dream.

Many people come to resolutions by overly thinking about a subject matter right before bed, which leads them into dreaming about it. This often helps people clear their minds, and hopefully helps them remember the next day what all the fuss was about.