What Does It Mean to Dream of a Rainbow?

What Does It Mean to Dream of a Rainbow?

It’s hard to feel bad when looking at a brightly colored rainbow, especially when you were not expecting it. Seeing a rainbow in your dream can be a similarly pleasant surprise.

Rainbow Dream Summary

Rainbow Dream Symbolism

Dreaming of a rainbow can symbolize that you are focused on the positive side of life. Even if things are difficult for you now, you may have hope that they will get better in the future. You might also see the best in yourself and in others.

The negative side of a rainbow dream, symbolically, could be optimism that is not founded in reality. Trying to escape your problems by pretending they do not exist may not work well for you.

Either way, rainbows are typically full of colors. Color dream symbolism may therefore be relevant to interpreting your rainbow dream, especially if the rainbow in your dream emphasizes or lacks a particular color.

Common Rainbow Dreams

  1. Dream of the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow
  2. Dream of an upside down rainbow
  3. Dream of a black rainbow
  4. Dream of a rainbow without rain

Rainbow Dream Symbolism

Rainbow Dream Symbolism

Hope

Rainbows usually appear after a period of heavy rain. As HowStuffWorks reports, this is because rainbows come from drops of rainwater bending and dispersing light. In other words, you have to put up with the challenge of rain to get the beautiful rainbow.

A dream of a rainbow could therefore symbolize hope that things will get better for you after you make it through a difficult time.

Promise

In a well-known Bible story, God displayed a rainbow after Noah and his family survived the great flood in their ark. The rainbow was meant to serve as God’s promise that there would never be a destructive flood of that magnitude again. (As noted in flood dream symbolism, many of the world’s cultures have similar stories of a great flood.)

Dreaming of a rainbow could therefore symbolize that you or another person in your life recently made a significant promise, perhaps in the aftermath of a relationship conflict.

Diversity

When American civil rights activist Jesse Jackson ran for president in 1984, he used the term “Rainbow Coalition” to describe his intention to fight for the rights of people of different races and ethnic backgrounds. Though Jackson was not elected president, his National Rainbow Coalition later merged with another organization to continue working for racial and economic justice, according to History.com.

Dreaming of a rainbow could similarly symbolize that it is important for you to come together with people who are different from you in some way.

Accepting Yourself

The rainbow is also associated with LGBT issues, as History.com reports that the rainbow flag was designed by Gilbert Baker in 1978. The original version had eight stripes, but the version most commonly used today has six stripes. Either way, the rainbow flag represents coming together to celebrate with pride and joy each person’s rights to live and find love in their own way.

Dreaming of a rainbow could therefore symbolize that you are working to accept some aspect of yourself that you feel shame about. Being different from others – whether or not your difference has anything to do with sexual orientation or gender identity – can be difficult, but you have a unique contribution to make to the world just the way you are.

Connection

The song “Rainbow Connection” by Kermit the Frog uses the imagery of rainbows to describe the connections between fellow lovers and dreamers. A rainbow dream could therefore symbolize this type of idealistic relationship.

It is also sometimes said in popular culture that, when a beloved pet dies, they go to the Rainbow Bridge to wait for their owner. When the owner dies, the pet and the owner then cross the Rainbow Bridge together into Heaven.

Dreaming of a rainbow could therefore symbolize connections more complex than those between people here on Earth.

Unrealistic Attitude

Sometimes it is said derisively that someone acts like things are “rainbows and unicorns.” If your rainbow dream has this kind of negative mood, it could symbolize that you or someone else in your life has an optimistic attitude that is not justified by the facts of the situation. The overly optimistic person may be ignoring real problems that they need to deal with.

Escapism

The famous song “Over the Rainbow” – originally from the movie The Wizard of Oz and later covered by others – talks about wanting to go somewhere far away from one’s troubles. In this sense, a dream of a rainbow could symbolize that you are tempted to just escape a situation that is not going to your liking rather than work out your problems. While fleeing can be your best option if you are dealing with a safety issue, it is important to know the difference between that and a situation where your legitimate responsibilities are merely unpleasant.

Auras and Chakras

Some people report that they are able to see energy fields known as auras around the human body. A Little Bit of Auras: An Introduction to Energy Fields by Cassandra Eason elaborates that auras have seven layers. The seven layers correspond to the seven colors of the rainbow, with red the innermost layer of the aura and violet the outermost.

Eason also states that the body has seven main invisible energy centers called chakras. These too share the seven colors of the rainbow, as each chakra works with the aura layer that shares its color. See also third eye dream symbolism, as the third eye is one of the chakras in this system.

Especially if you are familiar with this way of thinking about things, dreaming of a rainbow could be a comment on the health of your aura or chakras. If one color is more or less prominent than the others, that may refer to your own energy being correspondingly accentuated or deficient.

Common Rainbow Dreams

Dream of the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow

If you dream of hunting for the mythical pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, this could symbolize that you are engaged in a dramatic quest for some noble goal. You may not have an entirely realistic idea of what you are doing, though. You might also be so obsessed with achieving this out-of-reach goal that you overlook other possibilities that are actually more doable.

If you actually find the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow in your dream, though, this is probably a good omen. It could symbolize that you might succeed in some situation where that would generally not be expected.

Dream of an upside down rainbow

Dream of an upside down rainbow

EarthSky reports that arcs in the sky appearing to be upside down rainbows are known as circumzenithal arcs. They are caused by ice crystals in the upper atmosphere, more like halos around the sun or moon than like regular rainbows.

An upside down rainbow looks like a big smile, so the upside down rainbow dream meaning is probably a good omen. As it points up toward the sky, however, you may have to actively be open to receiving whatever blessings are coming to you.

Dream of a black rainbow

Dream of a black rainbow

The area between the two rainbows in a double rainbow can appear darker than the rest of the sky, and this is referred to as Alexander’s Dark Band. The dark band may even look black, so this is one way that a black rainbow could appear in your dream.

Black can symbolize shielding and protection, as noted in color dream symbolism. Your black rainbow dream meaning could therefore be that you need to be judicious about how you express your full, colorful self. You may have a lot going on inside you, but sharing with someone who is not equipped to appreciate you could do you more harm than good.

Dream of a rainbow without rain

Dream of a rainbow without rain

Dreaming of a rainbow without seeing any rain that obviously caused it can be mysterious. It might symbolize other inconsistencies related to cause and effect in your life.

One possibility this dream could refer to is a situation where you were blessed by good fortune without doing anything to deserve it. Feeling guilty about that doesn’t help anyone, but, if you are troubled by the imbalance, you could try to similarly bless others without regard to whether they deserve it.

Another possible interpretation for this dream, however, might be that it reflects a situation where you or someone else in your life expects to get good things without putting in the necessary work to achieve them.

Conclusion

In most cases, a rainbow dream is a good one. As long as you avoid the pitfall of wishing your way out of problems you really need to work to solve, dreaming of a rainbow can remind you of the positive side of life and show that you have reason to be hopeful.