A client recently reported that they had dreamed that someone was trying to attack them. They were attending hypnotherapy regarding managing stress and conflict at work. I asked them if they could remember anything significant that had happened to them the day before the dream. They immediately recalled they had attended a heated and rather aggressive meeting in which several conflicting colleagues were trying to thrash out a resolution to a problem. My client's role in this meeting was to provide factual information and advice, however they remembered feeling very uncomfortable during the meeting, and recalled being glowered at by one of the more aggressive colleagues, when the factual information presented exposed holes in their argument. Expectation Fulfilment Theory shows that our dreams help us to process arousal which we were not able to process at the time. In a situation like the one above, where the client felt a series of emotions but had to temper and inhibit their reaction, our subconscious mind can help us to work through and find resolution to the situation in our dreams, by processing and resolving the situation for us while we are asleep, deactivating the arousal at a more appropriate time. The expectation fulfilment theory of dreaming summarised, by Joe Griffin Dreaming is the deepest trance state we go into and there are three essential principles to understand: Dreams are metaphorical translations of waking expectations. But only expectations that cause emotional arousals that are not acted upon during the day become dreams during sleep. Dreaming deactivates that emotional arousal by completing the expectation pattern metaphorically, freeing the brain to respond afresh to each new day