Dreams about flight: Jung, traditions and semiotics

This is not a dream dictionary. Each perspective below names where it comes from; traditions are shown side by side, not merged into one meaning.

Start with yourself

How did flying feel — effortless, effortful, frightening? Is there something in your waking life you would like to rise above, or see from higher up?

Jung · Compensation

Jung thought dreams often compensate for a one-sided waking attitude: they show the side we leave out. A flying dream can be read either way — lightness someone lacks, or a height they have climbed too fast.

In waking life lately, have you felt weighed down — or a little too high up?

C. G. Jung, “General Aspects of Dream Psychology”, Collected Works 8

Traditions, side by side

Early dream research Dream research

Ellis gave flying and falling dreams a whole chapter, “Aviation in Dreams”, and explained flying mainly through breathing sensations during sleep.

Havelock Ellis, The World of Dreams (1911), ch. VI

Classical Chinese medicine Historical medicine

The Lingshu says that when the upper body is in excess, “one dreams of flying”. This is a historical theory about the body, not medical advice and not a way to diagnose anything.

Huangdi Neijing, Lingshu ch. 43 “Yinxie Fameng”

Greek dream interpretation Classical text

Artemidorus discussed flying dreams in detail and insisted the same dream means different things for a slave, a rich man or a sick man — the dreamer’s circumstances come first.

Artemidorus, Oneirocritica (2nd c. CE), book II

Chinese poetry Literature

Li He dreams himself into the sky and looks down at China as “nine specks of smoke”: flight as a change of scale.

Li He, “Dreaming of Heaven”

Semiotics: how an image comes to mean

Following C. S. Peirce, an image can work as a sign in three ways:

Icon — by resemblance
Does the flight look like one you have actually seen? Could it simply be a copy of a memory?
Index — by connection
Could the flight point to an actual cause — a bodily sensation, a sound in the room, something that happened that day?
Symbol — by convention
Does the flight mean what it means by convention — an idiom, a saying, a family phrase? Would it still mean that in another language or culture?

C. S. Peirce, Collected Papers 2.247–249 (icon, index, symbol)
C. G. Jung, Psychological Types (1921), “Definitions: Symbol” — a sign stands for something known, a symbol for something not yet fully known
Ellis (1911), ch. II, on verbal links between dream images

Exploration notes, not a diagnosis, a prediction, or evidence of real events.

Recorded dreams with flight

A young man with wings over Asia and Europe Land of the Massagetae (Central Asia) · 530 BCE (as told)
A snake became an eagle and carried me off Asia Minor · c. 470 BCE
The soul roves over wide areas India · c. 4th c. BCE–4th c. CE (epic)
An ivory chariot flying through the clouds Lanka (setting) · c. 5th–4th c. BCE (epic)
The land of Huaxu Legendary China · legendary; text compiled c. 4th century CE
Zhuang Zhou dreams he is a butterfly State of Song, China · c. 4th–3rd century BCE
Soaring above the clouds the night before Rome, Italy · 15 March 44 BCE (eve)
Riding a green dragon up to heaven Jiuquan, Gansu, China · late 4th century (as told)
Two boats joined, rising to heaven Yangzi River, China · c. 400
Flying across Mirror Lake by moonlight Donglu (Shandong) → Zhejiang, China · c. 745
Looking down at nine wisps of smoke Tang China · c. 810
Riding the sky to the Southern Peak Yangzhou, China · c. 840
A Vetāla threw him into the sea India (story setting) · c. 1070 (compiled)
My dream-soul returned to the Lord of Heaven Southern Song China · c. 1130
Step in my tracks, up through the clouds Shores of Lake Huron · traditional (recorded c. 1820s–1850s)
Four nights of flying from a cliff Minnesota River · c. 1860s (told)
Floating on warm, transparent lakes Paris, France · c. 1900
The acrobat who never touched the floor England · before 1911