Dreaming about
penguins

Penguins are birds that can't fly, look like they're dressed for dinner and walk as if their shoes are too tight, yet in the water they're fast and graceful. That gap between clumsy and brilliant is part of why people love them, and part of what penguin dreams are about. Dreaming about penguins usually points to belonging, where you fit in a group and whether you feel in or out of your element.

The setting decides a lot. Penguins on the ice in a big colony make a dream about community, family or a team, while a single penguin waddling through your living room is about something, maybe you, that feels out of place. How you felt about the penguins, amused, tender or uneasy, is the other half of the reading.

What dreaming about penguins means

What penguins do to survive gives you the readings, and most of it comes down to sticking together.

Belonging to a group

Emperor penguins get through the Antarctic winter by huddling in their thousands, and the birds take turns at the cold edge and the warm middle. A dream of being in a crowd of penguins is often about a group you belong to, family, work or friends, and how much warmth it gives you. Being stuck on the outside of the huddle is a lonelier version, and being in the middle a reassuring one.

Out of your element

On land, penguins waddle and fall over; in the water, they fly. If the penguin in your dream was struggling on dry ground, the dream may be about you in a setting that doesn't suit you, a new job, a party full of strangers, a role that doesn't use what you're good at. It's often a hint that you're better than you feel right now, somewhere else.

Patience and devotion

Emperor penguin fathers hold the single egg on their feet for about two months in the dark of winter, eating nothing until the mothers return from the sea. A penguin dream that dwells on eggs or chicks can be about a long, patient stretch of looking after something or someone, and whether you feel anyone notices.

Dreaming about a group of penguins

Penguins can find their own partner or chick among thousands by its call alone. A dream of a big colony is about community, but also about being recognized in a crowd. If you felt lost among them, think about a group where you feel anonymous. If one penguin came straight to you, it may be about a person who picks you out when nobody else does.

Dreaming about a baby penguin

A gray, fluffy chick is about care and dependence, someone you're feeding and protecting, or a new project that isn't ready to go into the water yet. If you were trying to keep the chick warm, the dream may reflect how much responsibility you're carrying for someone small, a child or a younger sibling, or a team that relies on you.

Dreaming about a penguin in your house

A penguin in your kitchen or your office is a comic dream, and comedy in dreams often hides discomfort. It's about something that doesn't fit where it is, a person who's struggling in your home, a feeling that doesn't suit the moment, or you, uneasy in your own life. A penguin overheating somewhere warm adds a sense of stress, of someone who needs cold water and is stuck on dry land.

Dreaming about swimming with penguins

In the water penguins are quick and sure, so swimming among them is about finding your element at last. It often comes when you've started something that suits you, a sport, a job or a new group of friends, and you feel at ease in a way you didn't before.

The penguin suit and the stolen stones

Penguins come with a couple of phrases and habits worth checking against your dream. A "penguin suit" is a dinner jacket, so a penguin can be about a formal event or having to look the part. In Adélie and gentoo colonies, males bring stones to build a nest, and neighbors steal them, which makes a penguin dream good for thinking about who helps you build and who helps themselves.

Dreaming about penguins according to Jung and Freud

Jung: the penguin in its dinner jacket

Jung's persona is the face you put on for a group, and clothes and uniforms are among its images.^[2] A penguin looks permanently dressed for a formal dinner, and a whole colony wears the same suit, so a penguin dream can be about the part of you that dresses and acts to fit a group, at work or in a family. Awkward on land and fluent in water, it would also show where the mask fits and where it doesn't. He didn't write about penguins, so this is his idea carried over.

Freud: the chick and the day before

Freud held that a dream borrows its images from the day before,^[3] so the first question about a penguin dream is what put penguins in front of you: a documentary, a zoo visit, a cartoon, a child's toy. His symbol list also has small animals standing for small children, often unwanted siblings, so a baby penguin may stand for a child, a younger sibling or you at that age, though that list was written about vermin and fits a fluffy chick only loosely.

Questions to ask about your penguin dream

Whether the penguin looked at home is the first thing to settle, because it usually says whether you do.

• Was the penguin alone or with others?
• Was it on ice, in water, or somewhere it didn't belong?
• Were you watching it, caring for it, or one of the group?
• Where in your life do you feel in or out of your element?

A nature documentary or a trip to the zoo can be enough to bring penguins into your dreams.^[1] Oniri asks about your day before it reads a dream, so it can tell a passing image from one that matters.