Dreaming of Poop

What does it mean to dream about poop?

Poop in a dream speaks of a burden that needs to be left behind and, at the same time, of gain that comes through effort. Feces are what the body has finished with and releases, so in a dream they usually stand for a feeling, a habit or a situation that no longer serves you. Yet they are also manure that feeds the soil: inside an ending lies the material for new growth.

The dream may be unpleasant at first sight, but it is usually a dream of relief and cleansing. To read it, ask two things: how did you come across it, and how did you feel? Stepping in it or finding it points to something unexpected; having it on you, to a load you do not want; cleaning it up, to a wish to set a mess straight. Your feeling tells you whether the dream is about gain or about a burden.

Stepping in poop, getting it on you and other common dreams

Stepping in poop

Stepping in it while walking describes luck, or a situation, that turns up when you least expect it. Turkish folk reading takes this dream as unexpected money and gain. If you were annoyed, an unplanned matter is upsetting your plans; if you laughed it off, you are open to surprises.

Getting poop on you

Feces on your clothes or hands describe a shame, a rumour or someone else’s burden that you do not want to carry. Someone may have dragged you into a situation against your will. If you cleaned it off straight away, you know how to separate yourself from that load. Folk reading links feces on you to gain that comes with trouble.

Using the toilet

Going to the toilet with ease means you are releasing a burden in the right place, on your own terms. A job is finished, a worry has ended or an account has been settled. If the door would not lock or someone walked in, you feel the lack of a space and privacy of your own.

Pooping in public

Relieving yourself in a crowd or in the open describes a sense that your privacy is under pressure, or a fear that a personal matter will come out. If nobody turned to look, the exposure you fear is growing in your head; if you looked for somewhere to hide, you want to get away from a setting that leaves you exposed.

Soiling yourself

Losing control and soiling yourself describes a fear of losing your grip and of being seen to. An order, a secret or an anger you have kept a tight grip on is about to slip. The dream asks you to loosen your hold on what you are trying to control. If you sorted it out without anyone noticing, the exposure you fear is smaller than you think.

Bird droppings landing on you

Bird droppings landing on you are read as luck in dreams, just as in waking life. In folk belief this small mishap is a sign of unexpected good fortune. If you laughed, you take life’s little surprises lightly; if you were irritated, small upsets may be weighing more on you than they should.

Cleaning up poop

Cleaning up feces describes the job of tidying a mess and putting things in order after an event. If you were cleaning up after someone else, you feel left to deal with the chaos they made. Relief when the work was done means you are ready to close that chapter.

An overflowing toilet

A blocked, overflowing toilet means feelings held down for a long time have built up past the point of control. Unspoken words, postponed decisions and swallowed hurts are spilling over. If you stopped the overflow, you are finding a way to deal with the build-up.

Animal droppings

Dog, horse or cow dung describes a natural, unavoidable cycle: the crude but necessary side of effort and harvest. Like manure spread on a field, a task that looks unappealing now may bear fruit. Folk reading, too, links animal dung with plenty.

A large amount of poop

Feces covering everything around you point to one of two things: either the time has come to release a large build-up, or, as folk reading has it, abundance. Disgust in the dream points to the first; surprise and a smile, to the second.

The psychological and emotional meaning

In his 1908 essay “Character and Anal Erotism”, Sigmund Freud drew attention to the link the unconscious makes between feces and money, and traced it through folk belief, fairy tales and figures of speech. He also connected tendencies to hold on, such as orderliness, thrift and obstinacy, to the same link. Today the idea is understood more broadly: holding tight or being able to let go is part of how we relate both to money and to our feelings.

The feeling in the dream shows which face of the image you met. Relief means you have put a load down. Shame points to a side of yourself you find hard to accept, or a fear of being seen. Disgust signals a need to draw a line with a person, a setting or a habit.

Choose one thing this week that no longer serves you but that you are still holding on to: an old object, a habit, a thought. Take the smallest possible step toward letting it go.

Poop in folk tradition and myth

Turkish folk reading, against the first wave of disgust, takes feces as money, property and gain. Stepping in it means unexpected money, getting it on your hands or clothes gain that comes with effort, and a large amount plenty. The waking belief that bird droppings landing on you bring luck belongs to the same folk instinct.

The link is far from only Anatolian. Russian dream books also tie feces to money, and in France stepping in dog mess with your left foot is said to bring good luck. In ancient Egypt the scarab beetle, rolling its ball of dung, was the emblem of the god Khepri, who rolled the sun across the sky: the most worthless-looking thing became an image of rebirth.

An American dream dictionary of 1901 agreed: seeing manure “is a favorable omen”, and “farmers especially will feel a rise in fortune”.

Tarot and Katina cards linked to poop dreams

The Four of Pentacles is the card of holding on and being unable to let go. On the Rider–Waite–Smith card a seated figure balances a pentacle on his crown, clutches another to his chest and keeps two more under his feet, with a city stretching behind him. The card speaks of a need for security, and also of holding too tight and wanting control. After a dream of an overflowing toilet or of soiling yourself, the Four of Pentacles asks what you are gripping harder than you need to.

In Katina the Fish is abundance, but abundance that circulates rather than piles up. In a dream where you stepped in it and felt glad, or thought of the folk promise of gain, the Fish asks you to trust the flow of your resources.

Is your dream about gain or about a burden? Your answer also settles the feeling you mark in the Dreams section of the Larisa app: gain sits closer to Joy, a load to put down closer to Calm.