Dreams are more than random neural firings in your brain. They’re a language. The entity sending you nightly messages in this nonverbal, symbolic dream language is your own unconscious mind. All dreams, even the scary or disturbing ones, have your best interest at heart. They’re messages from you to you.

The “dreammaker” is you, your unconscious mind, which speaks in images. The intended recipient of the dream message is also you, your conscious mind, which uses words. Interpreting dreams, then, is mostly a matter of translation.

The more you work with your dreams, the easier interpretation gets. Yes, you have to learn the language of imagery in which your personal “dreammaker” speaks, and that takes effort. But over time, that language will sink in and become natural to you, the way someone studying French or Spanish eventually stops needing to look up every word or phrase. Eventually, they simply speak the language.

And, with practice interpreting your dreams, so will you.