66 symbols beginning with O. Each one is read four ways, and every source is named so you can check it.
- OasisAn oasis often pictures relief found in a hard stretch of life, a place of water and shade in a wide dry expanse, a sign of rest, hope, or sudden p...
- OatmealPorridge in a dream is reported as texture before taste, and the dreamer is usually being given it rather than choosing it.
- ObeliskAn obelisk is a monument that carries no image, only height and inscription, and dreams tend to use it for something a person or a place wants reme...
- ObsessionObsession in a dream shows up as repetition rather than as feeling: the same room, the same task, the same person, returned to whether or not the d...
- OceanThe ocean often pictures the scale of an emotion or the depths of the unconscious, calm when settled and stormy when overwhelming.
- OctoberThe month arrives in dreams as light and temperature rather than as a date, and dreamers usually know the season without checking.
- OctopusAn octopus often pictures a situation with many arms at once, something complex, entangling, or hard to hold all at the same time.
- OfficeAn office usually reflects work, duty, and your sense of competence, the part of life measured by tasks and standing.
- OilOil in a dream is reported for its refusal to mix, and dreamers often describe trying to clean it off.
- Old ManAn old man often stands for wisdom, guidance, or experience, or for your own inner counsel, rather than a literal person.
- Old WomanAn old woman often stands for wisdom, nurture, or the deep knowledge of experience, or for your own inner guide, rather than a literal person.
- OneOne often points to unity, the self, or a single focus, the sense of standing alone or being whole and undivided.
- OnionAn onion usually stands for hidden layers, things that bring tears, and what is revealed only by peeling back.
- OperaOpera in a dream is usually heard rather than watched, and dreamers frequently report understanding words they do not know.
- OperationSurgery dreams are reported as being watched rather than felt, and dreamers frequently say they were awake for it and did not mind.
- OracleAn oracle in a dream often pictures a wish for guidance, an inner knowing you half-trust, or a question about the future you long to have answered.
- Oral sexThis appears in dreams as often as any other sexual content, which is to say frequently, and it carries no meaning beyond itself unless the dream s...
- OrangeAn orange often points to vitality, freshness, and small sensory pleasure, the bright lift of a sweet fruit.
- Orange (Color)Orange often suggests warmth, energy, and sociability, a lively colour that can also feel restless or loud.
- OrbitAn orbit often stands for a fixed circling, a relationship or routine that keeps you bound on the same path around something.
- OrchidAn orchid often pictures rare beauty and refinement, an unusual flower long linked with elegance, allure, and careful tending.
- OrganThe instrument is reported as felt rather than heard, and dreamers frequently mention the floor moving.
- OrphanAn orphan in a dream often reflects a feeling of being unsupported or on your own, or a part of yourself that feels unparented, rather than a liter...
- OstrichAn ostrich often stands for avoidance, the wish to look away from a problem, or a grounded power that runs rather than flies.
- OtterAn otter often points to playfulness, ease in deep feeling, or a wish to move through life's currents without losing your sense of fun.
- Ouija BoardA ouija board in a dream often pictures a wish or fear about contacting the hidden, messages from outside your control, or a question you are afrai...
- OvenThe oven is reported for what was left in it, and dreamers frequently wake certain they had forgotten to turn something off.
- OwlAn owl often points to knowing something you have not said aloud: hidden insight, a quiet warning, or a truth seen in the dark.
- Oxygen maskThe mask is reported at the moment it drops, and dreamers frequently say they could not work out how to fasten it.
- OintmentSomething rubbed in rather than swallowed, which makes applying it an act one person usually performs on another.
- OliveA fruit that is inedible off the tree and requires weeks of curing, so every olive anybody has eaten was worked on first.
- OmeletteThe dish cooks are tested on, because it is made of almost nothing and every mistake shows.
- OrchardTrees planted in rows by somebody who knew they would not eat much of the fruit, since most take years to bear.
- OrchestraEighty people agreeing to be one thing, following a person who makes no sound at all.
- OverallsClothing worn over other clothing, which means putting them on is an announcement that the day is going to be dirty.
- OysterAn animal eaten alive, which almost nobody says out loud, and which was food for the poor before it was food for anybody else.
- OarA lever that works against water, and the reason a rower faces backwards and cannot see where they are going.
- Oil rigA small industrial town bolted to the seabed, where people work three weeks on and three weeks off and cannot leave in between.
- Oil tankerA ship so large it takes several miles to stop, which means every decision on the bridge is made long before it matters.
- Oil wellA hole that makes somebody rich and somebody else poor, usually not the person standing over it.
- Olive branchA gesture so old that offering one is still understood without explanation, and one of the very few symbols that has never been reversed.
- OrcaThe largest dolphin, called a killer whale by people who watched it kill whales, and an animal with distinct cultures rather than a single behaviour.
- OrgyA word that has drifted a long way from what it originally described, which was a religious rite rather than a party.
- OxA castrated bull trained to pull, which is a slower and stronger animal than a horse and was the engine of European farming for a thousand years.
- OathA promise given a witness, which is the whole of what separates it from an ordinary undertaking.
- Orange blossomA flower on a tree that fruits and flowers at once, which is why it was carried by brides for most of two centuries.
- OcarinaA closed clay vessel with holes, where the pitch depends on the total area open rather than on which holes are covered.
- ObsidianVolcanic glass, cooled too fast to form crystals, which is why it takes an edge finer than any metal and shatters as readily.
- OpalA stone that holds water inside it and can crack if it dries, so it is the one gem that has to be kept from becoming too dry.
- OnyxA banded stone with layers of different colour, carved so that cutting through one layer reveals the one beneath as the design.
- ObservatoryA building designed around not being able to see, requiring darkness, height and distance from anywhere with lights.
- OleanderAn ornamental shrub grown along roads and in gardens across the Mediterranean, in which every part is poisonous including the smoke.
- OkapiA forest animal with a giraffe's head and a zebra's legs, which outsiders refused to believe in until one was produced.
- OstlerThe one who takes the horse when a traveller arrives, and who knows more about a journey than the person who made it.
- OxbowA curved lake left behind when a river cuts across its own loop, so the water is the shape of a bend that no longer exists.
- ObligationA tie that binds you to do something, which can be entered voluntarily and then cannot be left the same way.
- OvercastA sky completely covered, with no sun and no shadow, so nothing in the landscape has a direction.
- OboeThe instrument an orchestra tunes to, because its pitch is the least willing to move and everybody else has to come to it.
- OreganoA herb whose name means joy of the mountain, and which is stronger dried than fresh, unlike almost everything else in a kitchen.
- OrielA window projecting from an upper wall on brackets, so a room is pushed out over the street without touching the ground.
- OrganzaA stiff sheer fabric that holds a shape rather than draping, so it is used where a garment needs to stand away from the body.
- OcelotA spotted cat hunted almost to nothing for its coat, and briefly fashionable to keep as a pet by people who should have known better.
- OspreyA fish hawk that dives feet first, with a reversible outer toe so it can carry a fish pointing forward.
- OrioleA brilliant yellow bird that is almost impossible to see, because a canopy in full sun is exactly that colour.
- OffertoryThe point in a service where money is collected, timed so that giving happens inside the ceremony rather than at the door.
- OssuaryA building or box for bones, used where graves had to be reused, so the dead were moved rather than left.