I have spent over two decades walking alongside the grieving, listening to stories steeped in sorrow, mystery, and meaning. Yet nothing quite pierces the veil—or mends it—like the dreams people have of their loved ones who have passed. These dreams aren’t like others. They arrive uninvited, vivid, urgent, and often life-altering. In fact, I have become more interested to identify if the dreams we have of our loved ones are actually transformational.
Grief is something few talk about openly: waking up from a dream where the deceased felt so real and vivid—not imagined, not symbolic, but as though they’d returned for just a moment to say something that couldn’t be said in waking life. It is as real as having your loved one back in the room with you in full objectivity.
These moments are more than dreams. They are thresholds of spiritual reality.
Recently, I embarked on a journey to explore this phenomenon more formally through a collaborative research project. The question we posed was deceptively simple:
What is the lived experience of individuals after awakening from a dream about a deceased loved one—and does that experience result in a lasting transformation?
The answers revealed something more profound than I expected. They were not simply recollections of the grieving mind, but lived experiences filled with emotional intensity, vivid presence, and unmistakable moments of personal awakening. For many, these dreams became turning points. For others, they prompted a deeply personal reckoning with grief. The myriad emotions ranged from joy to sadness and everything in between.
Dreams That Don’t Fade
In ordinary dreams, images scatter like leaves in the wind. But dreams involving the deceased linger. Participants in the study reported dreams that stayed with them for months, even years. These dreams carried emotional clarity, vivid presence, and, in many cases, healing.
One participant, dreamed of her father in a way that sharply contrasted how she remembered him in waking life. In the dream, he was peaceful, younger, and kind. The moment shifted her entire perception of their relationship. It helped her process years of difficult memories, not through conscious effort but through the dream’s symbolic rewriting of their bond.
Others experienced waves of unexpected emotion. Another participant described waking up in a state of deep joy, touched by a sense of reunion. In contrast, another awoke in tears, moved by unresolved grief that spilled over from the dream into waking reality. These emotions did not fade by morning. They lingered and reshaped the emotional landscape of the dreamers’ lives. When we dream of our loved ones, we are entering a space where we can be affected in our waking life.
Encounters That Transform the Living
One of the most powerful themes in our research was ‘transformation. Not all dreams brought resolution, but every participant reported some degree of inner change. For some, the dream was a spark that ignited a search for meaning, a spiritual reawakening, or a shift in belief systems. For others, the dream caused more discomfort.
As an example, one of our participants recognized that the dream had unearthed long-standing issues of abandonment. Rather than turning away, she faced those feelings and started profound changes in her life—without external therapy. This is not to suggest dreams replace counseling, but that they can be catalysts for deeply personal insight and growth. In short, do not discount these dreams, as they have hidden meanings.
Another one of our participants in the study, who had long doubted the continuation of life after death, described her dream as a turning point. Her experience nudged her into a belief she hadn’t previously allowed herself to hold. “Perhaps there is some sort of life after death,” she reflected. The dream had stirred something spiritual, personal, and irreversible. The experience of the dream had become the catalyst for a deep spiritual awakening.
Disconnection Within Connection
Interestingly, not all dreamers experienced harmony. Many shared moments of disconnection or a struggle to reach the loved one. Some participants described walking through room after room but never quite making contact. They recounted the sensation of not being able to speak, of words failing in the dream, and continually looking for a sense of connection. This recurring theme was evident with most of the participants at some point in the grief journey.
These fragments, far from diminishing the dream’s importance, served as mirrors. They revealed what still hurt. They highlighted what remained unresolved. And they, too, carried the seeds of transformation. Painful as they were, they acted as signposts toward healing work yet to be done.
Vividness Beyond Sleep
Lucid Vivid dreaming has been reported throughout history, and it’s only been recently that science has taken a great interest in trying to understand the phenomenon. Dreams often have no meaning and can be representations of wayward emotions and a replay of what is on your mind that day. However, lucid-type dreams can be entirely different and hold deep mystical meaning; they can also be experiential in terms of having discarnate contact in the dream state. The experiencer finds it difficult to identify if the dream is real because of its content and lucidity. It feels like you are alive in the dream state. Lucid and vivid dreaming were constant in the accounts. Participants often emphasized how the dreams felt more real than waking life. Details were rich—the color of clothing, the tone of voice, the setting. The emotional clarity was sharp, untouched by the usual fog of sleep.
This vividness led participants to believe these were not mere figments of imagination. They felt like visitations—moments where the veil between the living and the dead thinned just enough to allow presence. For those already open to spiritual experiences, this offered comfort and affirmation. For others, it opened doors to a reality they had not yet considered.
The Art of Meaning-Making
A crucial element of transformation is meaning-making. How do we find meaning in the experience, and how does that affect our waking life? Participants in the study did not simply wake, recall the dream, and move on? They reflected and asked questions. In their mind’s eye, they revisited the dream repeatedly to make sense of it.
One of our participants shared that reading about dreams of the deceased helped her realize she wasn’t alone. That realization grounded her experience in something shared and spiritual. Another individual interpreted her dream as a confrontation with unresolved emotional patterns. Nevertheless, in both cases, the dream opened a dialogue between the conscious self and the deeper, often spiritual layers of meaning.
Grief often leaves behind a sense of unfinished business. Dreams can offer a sacred space where that business is addressed. Whether closure is found or questions are raised, the process itself becomes transformative.
Why Grief Needs Dreams
In my mind, and actually from my experience, grief is a spiritual crisis. It cracks the psyche, shatters routine, and leaves us longing for connection. In that brokenness, dreams can offer healing not accessible in waking life. They are unfiltered, potent, and—often—divinely timed.
These dream experiences challenge the notion that grief must be linear or logical. They show us that grief is relational. The bonds of love don’t end with death. They change form. And through dreams, they sometimes speak.
While skeptics may dismiss such experiences as wishful thinking or neurological residue, the impact on the dreamer tells a different story. The dreamers’ wake changed. Their pain has shifted. Their lives take new direction. These are not the hallmarks of ordinary dreams.
One thing I would like to make clear, and this is from the many messages I receive throughout the world. Just because you do not remember your dream or do not have a lucid experience. This does not mean that your loved ones have abandoned you. Far from it, and it does not mean that you are not having any dream experiences. You may not remember your dream or you may be in such an emotional state that you are not in the space with which to dream. Just stay with it and train your mind. I have a gift for you all at the end of this article. Keep reading!
The Need for a New Framework
The research uncovered a need that exists to further the research into spiritual awakening from dream state connections. I believe this must be addressed in future research. Most dream studies are observational or psychological. They rely on anecdotal narratives and lack the empirical structure to explore whether actual contact with the deceased occurs.
As someone grounded in both transpersonal research and parapsychology, I propose that future research integrate these frameworks. We need methodologies that measure the impact of these dreams, not just emotionally, but potentially empirically. Are there shared characteristics that mark a true visitation? Can we trace patterns that point to something beyond psyche and into spirit?
Only two of the dreams in our study held the hallmarks of authentic after-death contact that in my mind, offered a level of evidential connection. Yet even those two were transformative enough to warrant deeper investigation. If parapsychological and spiritual approaches are taken seriously, we may find not just healing, but empirical evidence.
Final Reflections: Listening to the Sacred
We do not grieve alone. And sometimes, the ones we grieve find their way back to us—in the quiet, in the shadows, in sleep. These are not simply dreams. They are sacred invitations. They are messengers. They are moments of grace.
So the next time you wake with a loved one’s voice lingering in your ears, or their image vivid before you, take a moment. Don’t rush into the day. Sit with it. Feel it. Ask what it came to show you.
You may find that it didn’t just come to remind you of the past—it came to transform your future.
You are not alone. You never were.
You will find access to my free grief community below, and in that community is access to some personally recorded meditations that will train your mind to connect with the other side.
