TURTLE / TORTOISE

Sea turtles and tortoises suggest a cautious spiritual search or path, so dreams involving them underline the importance of patience and fortitude in waking life; remember the story of The Tortoise and the Hare, in which slow and steady progress won the race. In this sense, turtles certainly symbolize the benefits of determined, calculated and well-thought-out actions as opposed to hastiness.

Being a fertile egglayer that can live for many centuries, the turtle’s symbolism relates both to wisdom and fertility, so if you dreamed of watching a turtle on its back frantically trying to right itself, could your dream have reflected your waking sense that your reallife circumstances have turned upside down? Turtles also represent the ability to protect yourself and take life at your own pace. Since they enjoy both air and water, turtles represent the ability to think clearly and feel deeply at the same time.

If your dream turtle is wounded or has been kept in a container, this may suggest issues with your body image, and may also indicate that you do not feel safe and secure in your body.

We associate turtles and their shells with their reputation for slowness and their protective coverings. So turtles in a dream could represent one’s emotional shell or one’s need to protect something. Alternatively, they could be representing some experience in which things seem to be going too slowly. But dream turtles could also be alluding to the tortoise who won the race against the hare because caution wins over haste.

Hiding behind a character trait (according to Wilhelm Reich). Patience, wisdom; or hiding something essential.