I Built an Open-Source Dataset of 985 Dream Symbols — Here's How You Can Use It

Jones William — Thu, 18 Jun 2026 06:29:35 +0000

If you work in NLP, psychology, or sleep research, you've probably noticed something: there's no clean, structured, open-source dataset of dream symbols with clinical interpretations.

The existing options are either tiny (50-200 entries annotated by a single researcher), locked behind paywalls, or folk dream dictionaries with no scientific grounding.

So I built one. 985 entries. Open-source. Psychology-grounded. Free.

The Data

Each entry looks like this:

{
  "slug": "teeth-crumbling-dream",
  "keyword": "Teeth Crumbling in Mouth",
  "icon": "🦷",
  "category": "body",
  "summary": "Gradual erosion of control or confidence. Unlike sudden tooth loss dreams, crumbling indicates slow, grinding stress rather than sudden shock.",
  "date": "2026-05-28",
  "url": "https://tool.heartyearning.com/dictionary/teeth-crumbling-dream/"
}

Six categories: life (259), body (202), spirit (148), animals (135), nature (114), people (105).

Where the Interpretations Come From

Not folk wisdom. Every entry is cross-referenced against:

NIH NINDS sleep research
Jung's analytical psychology (archetypes, shadow work)
Dr. Matthew Walker's work at UC Berkeley (Why We Sleep)
Nielsen & Levin's neurocognitive model (Sleep Medicine Reviews)

How to Get It

[Download on GitHub] (https://tool.heartyearning.com/dictionary/)

How to Cite

HeartYearning Dream Symbols Dataset (985 entries)
https://tool.heartyearning.com/dictionary/
Retrieved 2026.

I built this because the dream symbols people actually search for — body horror, existential terror, social anxiety dreams — are exactly the ones major health publishers won't cover for brand safety reasons. If you're researching dream content, this dataset fills a gap nothing else does.

DEV Community: Jones William

I Built an Open-Source Dataset of 985 Dream Symbols — Here's How You Can Use It

The Data

Where the Interpretations Come From

How to Get It

How to Cite