Dreaming that you cannot move: what does it mean?

Some people often dream that they are unable to move. Does this experience mean anything?

We can dream about practically anything, but it is clear that some dreams are more distressing than others. One of the most distressing dreams we can have is the one in which we cannot move a single muscle.

Does it mean something to dream that you cannot move? It seems that some people say it does. Let's see what they believe.

Dreaming that you can't move

There are those who say that our dreams can be an important part of our reality.So much so that they could even tell us something. Those who consider themselves experts in dream interpretation and analysis believe that what we dream is a reflection of our actions or may even predict our future. Dreaming that you can't move may seem like a simple, uncomplicated dream, but dream analysts have drawn various meanings from it, as they do from all dreams.

Dream interpretation is a discipline that has traditionally been associated with psychology, although it has rather little to do with it. The cause (or rather the fault) we owe it to Sigmund Freud, who at the dawn of psychoanalysis defended the idea that what we dream, that what is presented to us in our dream world, can be related to our way of being in the waking state, our personal problems and concerns.

On the other hand, the interpretation of dreams is as reliable as astrology, the interpretation of magic runes or pulling the petals of a daisy to find out if that special person loves us or not. The meaning that you want to attribute to dreams is totally free, subjective and subjective.It has more to do with our daily experiences than with what we really are or what may happen to us.

Be that as it may, and whether you believe that our dreams are telling us something or if you have a little common sense, below we will see what it could mean to dream that you can not move, apart from the obvious and obvious meaning that you can not move.

Not being able to move in dreams and their meanings

There are several meanings that so-called experts in dream interpretation attribute to dreaming that we can't move. It may be just a desperate dream, simply the feeling of being paralyzed by whatever phenomenon occurred within our dream, but it may also have some deeper meanings.

1. You can't move because of helplessness

Proponents of dream interpretation argue that not being able to move in your sleep can signify frustration, helplessness and inability to adequately manage a lot of anxiety.

It can also relate to having the feeling that we are unable to resolve the conflicts that afflict our lives. Our frustration and helplessness towards what we would like to fix but simply see that we cannot overwhelm us so much that we become completely paralyzed.

2. Low self-esteem or inferiority

Another explanation given for dreaming that you can not move is low self-esteem, which is represented in the form of the total inability to move while in the dream world. It would be the manifestation of the feeling that one is inferior to the rest..

This makes that in a place as mysterious as dreams are and where we feel very helpless, low self-esteem makes us even less capable of knowing what to do there, making us completely paralyzed.

3. You cannot move out of frustration

To dream that you cannot move while you are dreaming means that you cannot vent your frustrations freely. You can't scream, you can't hit whoever you want, you can't do anything against what you feel hurts or distresses you. So this dream would be related to negativity and fearThe feeling that we do not have under control something very important in our lives.

4. Fear of saying or doing something harmful.

Some say that the dream in which you can not move is related to the fear of saying or doing something that you think may harm you. Although you could do what you would like to do, because it is your mind for a reason, you do not do it for fear of the consequences.. You incapacitate yourself as a defense and protection mechanism against unwanted consequences. You do not know what to do, because you think that what you would like to do may cause you problems.

5. To dream that you see paralyzed people

We may dream of people who cannot move, totally paralyzed by something they have seen or done. This is interpreted as if someone close to you is going through a bad situation, a situation that is so terrible that you feel as if you were afraid and not able to cope with that problem.

You may also feel a certain sense of guilt during this dream, not because you were necessarily responsible for it.not because you were necessarily responsible, but because you feel you have an obligation to help them and you are not yet doing so.

6. Dreaming that you can't move because you are tired.

Advocates of parapsychology see dreaming that you can't move because of fatigue as a sign of going through a period when routine and stagnation have taken over. Life has become very routine, which brings with it physical and mental exhaustion. We are so tired that this tiredness sometimes moves to our dream world, making us even in our rest we have a feeling of fatigue.Even in our rest we have dreams in which we cannot move because we are so tired.

Not being able to move because of sleep paralysis

And leaving aside the mystical meanings, we leave the magical world of dreams to talk about a more earthly problem: not being able to move due to sleep paralysis.. Sleep paralysis is a disorder that consists of not being able to move or speak when one passes from sleep to wakefulness, that is, when one is waking up and acquires a minimum degree of consciousness.

The person is somewhat awake, but unable to move, which can cause confusion, nervousness and fear, even if it is not the first time he/she suffers from it. This inability to move can last between one and three minutes, and during this time the person is unable to move a single Muscle despite being semiconscious.

During this episode, the person in this state could be said to be cognitively awake.. Despite this, he experiences a sensation of paralysis in almost all of his voluntary musculature, with the exception of the eyes and the respiratory diaphragm. The larynx is also paralyzed, which means that the person cannot say a word during the sleep paralysis episode.

A particularly disturbing phenomenon, a nightmare that has been transferred to the waking world, is that of hypnagogic hallucinations, which can be auditory as well as visual and tactile. That is, the patient suffers hallucinations because of being half awake, as if he were dreaming with his eyes open and perceiving the reality that surrounds him. He/she can see other people, have tingling sensations, hear voices and other symptoms that, although not indicative of a mental disorder or anything like that, are scary.

Causes of sleep paralysis

There are several causes behind an episode of sleep paralysis. Among them we have the possibility that there is another pathology, paralysis being one of its symptoms. One of them is narcolepsyone of them is narcolepsy, a disease in which there are difficulties in staying awake during the day. Sufferers often have attacks of cataplexy, i.e. paralysis of the musculature, together with sleep paralysis and hypnagogic hallucinations.

Another cause is severe sleep deprivation. The affected person may be having very irregular sleep patterns lately, so much so that even the quality of sleep is impaired. Instead of resting completely, he remains half awake, entering a state of semi-consciousness and suffering from the characteristic symptoms of sleep paralysis. It may also be that there are no recent sleep problems, but that it is simply due to family inheritance.

As a rule, sleep paralysis usually appears as an isolated symptom of little clinical concern and is not usually treated. Likewise, if it persists for more than three or four weeks in a row or the person begins to suffer a significant deterioration in quality of life and is unable to sleep adequately, he or she should see a specialist for treatment.