Dreaming about
money

Plenty of folk traditions promise that a dream about money means money is on its way, and plenty of people search for it hoping that's true. Dreaming about money is not a forecast of your bank balance. It's usually about value in a wider sense, like what you think you're worth, what you're owed, what you're afraid to lose, and how much power you have over your own life.

What happened to the money in the dream points to which of these it is. Finding money is a different dream from counting it, and being handed cash by a stranger is nothing like having your wallet stolen. Your actual finances matter too. A money dream in a month of overdue bills reads differently from one the week after a promotion, and only your own dream and your own life can settle which it is.

What dreaming about money means

Money is how we put a number on things, so dreams use it whenever the question is "how much is this worth?" That question can be about a job, a relationship or yourself. Four readings come up again and again.

Your sense of your own worth

Money in a dream is often a measure of self-esteem. Being underpaid, overcharged or short of cash at a till can mirror feeling undervalued at work or taken for granted at home. Finding money or being paid well can reflect a moment when you feel recognized. If the dream was about a salary or a price, ask whether it matched what you think you're worth, since that gap is often the point.

Security and worry

For many people money is the clearest picture of safety. Dreams pick up what fills our days and keeps us up at night,^[1] so if rent, debt or job security are on your mind, the dream may simply be that worry replayed. Money running through your fingers, a purse with holes or numbers that won't add up are all common anxiety dreams, and they say more about stress than about what's coming.

Power and control

Money is power, and dreams notice who holds it. If someone else controlled the money in your dream (a parent, a partner, a boss), the dream may be about dependence or being kept on a short leash. Holding all the money yourself can be about independence, or about the burden of being the one everyone relies on.

Giving and receiving

People talk about "owing" someone a favor, "paying back" kindness, being "in someone's debt". Money in a dream can stand for that kind of exchange. A dream where you're paying someone over and over can point to a relationship that feels one-sided. A dream where someone pays you back may be about a debt of feeling finally being settled.

Dreaming about finding money

Finding money is the most searched money dream, and usually one of the good ones. It tends to point to a discovery that has value for you. That might be a talent you didn't know you had, an opportunity that turned up by chance, or energy coming back after a hard stretch. Finding coins on the ground often stands for small wins and small pieces of luck, while a wad of notes is a bigger find. If you kept finding money everywhere, the dream may be about feeling that life is finally giving back. But if you felt guilty picking it up, ask whether you feel you deserve the good thing that has come your way.

Dreaming about winning money

Winning the lottery, a jackpot or a bet is a dream of sudden change without effort. It often comes when you're tired of working hard for slow results, or when you're hoping something outside your control will fix a problem. It isn't a prediction, sadly. And buying a ticket because of it won't change the odds. If you won by gambling, the dream may be about a risk you're taking or thinking of taking, in money or in life. Notice what you did with the winnings in the dream, because it often shows what you'd change if you felt free to.

Dreaming about someone giving you money

Being given money is about receiving support, recognition or permission. If you knew the person, the dream may be about what they've given you in real life (help, love, belief in you) or what you wish they would. A parent handing you money can be about wanting their approval, or about still depending on them. A stranger giving you money often stands for help from an unexpected place, or a part of yourself offering resources you haven't used. But if the gift came with strings, the dream may be pointing at a relationship where help always costs something.

Dreaming about lots of money

Seeing huge amounts of money in a dream (piles of bills, a bank vault, a suitcase of cash) usually reflects ambition, or a wish for freedom from worry. It can be a confident dream about potential and what you could build. But it can also be uneasy, especially if the money felt dirty, fake or dangerous to hold, which often points to doubts about how success is being earned, yours or someone else's. Compare it with dreams of gold, which lean more toward lasting value than spending power.

Dreaming about counting money

Counting money is about keeping track, of resources, time, effort or what people owe you. If the sum kept coming out wrong, the dream may reflect a sense that your efforts don't add up to what you expected. Counting the same notes over and over is a classic worry dream, the mind checking and rechecking whether there's enough. And if you counted calmly and the total was right, you may be taking stock of your life and feeling fairly good about it.

Dreaming about losing money

Losing money or a wallet is about fear of loss, and not always of money. It can point to losing status, a relationship, an opportunity or confidence. Where did you lose it? Money slipping out of a pocket on the way to work may be about your career, and money lost at home about family life. If you searched frantically, the dream shows how much you care about what's at risk. These dreams are common during money trouble, and in that case they're your worry at work, not a warning.

Dreaming about stealing money

Stealing money in a dream often stirs up guilt the next morning, even though you've done nothing. It usually points to taking something you feel you're not entitled to, like credit at work, someone's time or attention, or a pleasure you think you haven't earned. If someone stole from you, the dream is about feeling taken from, by a thief in your life who takes your time, energy or ideas. Being caught stealing is about fear of being found out, which is often impostor syndrome in disguise.

Dreaming about money according to Jung and Freud

Neither man gave money a famous entry of its own, so what follows applies their general ideas to it.

Jung: money, the persona and the shadow

Jung's word persona names the mask you wear in public, put together from clothes, titles and roles.^[5] Money is one more thing a person puts into it, so a dream where you're underpaid or can't cover the bill can be the mask and the person underneath disagreeing about what you're worth. Stealing is closer to his shadow, the disowned side of you that wants what the persona would never take, which is why a dream of taking money can leave you guilty the next morning when you've done nothing.

Freud: the bill from yesterday

Freud thought dreams borrow their scraps from the day before,^[6] and money is what most of us handled or worried over that day, a bill, a price, a pay slip. So with money the leftover is usually easy to find, and it's where he would start. Then comes the question of what the money stands in for. A dream of paying someone over and over is cash on the surface, which is his manifest content, and underneath it could be a debt of feeling, something you feel you owe a person and haven't repaid.

Other readings

Calvin Hall, an American psychologist who chaired a university psychology department for 20 years and collected over 50,000 dreams, counted what turns up in them with Robert Van de Castle, and in the norms they drew from about a thousand dreams of college students in the 1940s and 50s, money made up only 1% of the objects, for men and women alike.^[2] It's a snapshot of one group, but it suggests money dreams are less common than money worries.

The biblical and spiritual meaning of money in dreams

The Bible has one famous dream about plenty and one famous warning about money, and both ask what you put first.

Money in the Bible

The most famous dream about plenty in the Bible is Pharaoh's, with seven fat cows eaten by seven thin ones. Joseph reads it as seven years of abundance followed by seven of famine, and the lesson is to save in the good years.^[3] Paul's warning that "the love of money is the root of all evil" is the other passage people reach for.^[4] Neither tells you what your dream means, but both ask what money means to you.

Questions to ask about your money dream

A money dream is usually about value, so the questions are about what's being valued, and by whom.

• Did you find, win, earn, receive, lose or steal the money?
• How much was it, and did it feel like enough?
• Who else was involved, and who had control?
• How are your real finances right now?
• Where in your life do you feel under-valued, or in debt to someone?

Oniri asks you this kind of thing before it reads your dream, so the reading follows what money means in your own life.