50 Nightmare Quotes To Live Your Dreams

By Clifton Sankofa | Published December 6, 2022

These nightmare quotes are an awesome way to see your dreams from a new perspective.

The average human will spend one-third of their life asleep.

With all of that time snoozing, we are bound to have a nightmare in our lives.

Tell us your scariest nightmare in the comment section below.

What are the benefits of reading these nightmare quotes?

For some people, nightmares can be traumatic as they sometimes relive difficult times from their past or dream about a current fear manifesting.

However, in a way, nightmares are good for us.

They allow the mind to experience certain types of energies and feelings without requiring them to manifest in physical reality.

In a nightmare, we can experience the fear of falling from a high distance or being chased by a monster in an alley.

And while these experiences can be jarring, in a way, it is our mind’s method of protecting us; by allowing us to know these experiences without actually having them occur in our waking state.

Here are a few interesting nightmare facts:

worry appears to be the strongest predictor of nightmares
people who sleep longer experience more nightmares (they spend more time in REM sleep)
1 in 20 people have nightmares each week

Short Nightmare quotes for Instagram

1. “As much as I dream, I have nightmares.” — Brian Ortega

2. “A dream is just a nightmare with lipstick.” — Toni Morrison

3. “The worst nightmare is to have no dreams.” — Thomas Amo

4. “There is an excitement about having nightmares.” — Betsey Johnson

5. “I never paint dreams or nightmares. I paint my own reality.” — Frida Kahlo

6. “I turned my nightmares into fireflies and caught them in a jar.” — Laini Taylor

7. “Just because you have a nightmare doesn’t mean you stop dreaming.” — Jill Scott

8. “A lot of dreams can turn to nightmares… if you don’t really work them.” — Dolly Parton

9. “Chase your dreams, and your nightmares will grow tired of chasing you.” — Matshona Dhliwayo

10. “Nightmares end. That’s how you know they’re nightmares.” — Kami Garcia, Beautiful Redemption

Thought-provoking nightmare quotes

11. “I don’t think nightmares are necessarily bad for you.” ― Brian Reitzell

12. “Having your worst nightmares kind of come true is truly liberating.” ― Eddie Alvarez

13. “My best dreams and worst nightmares have the same people in them.” ― Philippos Syrigos

14. “Pay attention to other people’s nightmares because they might be contagious.” ― George Packer

15. “Bad dreams are ghosts of our fears and worries, haunting us while we sleep.” ― Maria V. Snyder

16. “An optimist expects his dreams to come true; a pessimist expects his nightmares to.” ― Dr. Laurence J. Peter

17. “I want to keep my dreams, even bad ones, because without them, I might have nothing all night long.” ― Joseph Heller

18. “I have had dreams, and I have had nightmares, but I have conquered my nightmares because of my dreams.” ― Jonas Salk

19. “Of all the things you choose in life, you don’t get to choose what your nightmares are. You don’t pick them; they pick you.” ― John Irving

20. “Where hopes are unrealistic, fears often become exaggerated; where dreams alone are blueprints, nightmares result.” ― Anthony Daniels

What are nightmare quotes

21. “Nightmares are releases.” ― Sylvia Browne

22. “My dreams are of water. And my nightmares.” — Siouxsie Sioux

23. “Life is a nightmare that prevents one from sleeping.” — Oscar Wilde

24. “Welcome to the worst nightmare of all, reality!” — Clive Barker, Hellraiser: Hellseeker

25. “Who’s to say that dreams and nightmares aren’t as real as the here and now?” ― John Lennon

26. “Nightmares are seldom a foreshadowing of real events, but always a showing of real fears.” ― Criss Jami

27. “Post-traumatic stress disorder starts out with nightmares, flashbacks, and actually reliving the event.” ― Dale Archer

28. “They’ve promised that dreams can come true – but forgot to mention that nightmares are dreams, too.” ― Oscar Wilde

29. “It’s not clear whether the brain actually is designed to have nightmares or whether this is actually the process going awry.” ― Matthew Walker

30. “Nightmares are not dreams. A good dream does not leave the dreamer in darkness, confusion and terror. Start having dreams, not nightmares!” ― Michael Bassey Johnson

The cause of nightmares quotes

31. “I don’t lose sleep over what I have done or have nightmares about it.” ― Dennis Nilsen

32. “Monsters are real. Ghosts are real too. They live inside us, and sometimes, they win.” ― Stephen King, The Shining

33. “Many of our daydreams would darken into nightmares, were there a danger of their coming true!” ― Logan Pearsall Smith

34. “I loved ghost stories, creaky staircases, stormy nights. If it guaranteed nightmares, I read it by flashlight, after midnight.” ― Lisa Gardner

35. “Any situation where I feel like people are looking at me and I’ve got to speak is the kind of thing I have nightmares about.” ― Jane Fallon

36. “The figure of the witch was interesting to me because of the primal, archetypical witch nightmares I had, even as an adult.” ― Robert Eggers

37. “One need not be a chamber to be haunted. One need not be a house. The brain has corridors surpassing material place.” ― Emily Dickinson

38. “In sleep, things are simpler. No regret over the past. No worry for the future. Only the present. And as bad as a dream gets, at least you get to sleep through it.” — Jonathan Goldstein

39. “Most of my nightmares that jolt me awake either involve the cosmos or something completely out of human control. In reality, I worry more about nuclear war, or war in general.” ― Lorene Scafaria

40. “Ninety percent of people’s nightmares is standing in front of 1,000 people. Did you know that? And having to speak. You would have thought it would have been a madman tying you up and taking your eyes out.” ― Robbie Coltrane

Nightmare quotes that are lighter and funny

41. “I’ve had quite a few nightmares about being chased by walkers.” ― Laurie Holden

42. “You have to know who you are if you don’t, you have nightmares.” ― Stephen Rea

43. “I do sleep next to my makeup because I don’t want any makeup nightmares.” ― Bretman Rock

44. “Old age is when you are not bothered with bad dreams, but with bad reality.” ― Faina Ranevskaya

45. “To wake up from our own bad dreams and realize that really lovely things are happening all the time.” ― Shauna Niequist

46. “I told my therapist I was having nightmares about nuclear explosions. He said don’t worry; it’s not the end of the world.” ― Jay London

47. “Have you ever noticed there is never any third act to a nightmare? They bring you to a climax of terror and then leave you there.” ― Max Beerbohm

48. “I have nightmares that I’m going to wake up, and everyone’s driving a Prius and living in a condo, and we’re all getting health insurance.” ― Kid Rock

49. “Toddlers are couthless. Lord. They are so couth-deficient. They’ll tell you, ‘Those shoes look like my nightmares’ without a second thought because your feelings don’t matter to them.” ― Luvvie Ajayi

50. “I used to have nightmares when I was a little kid that I woke up prematurely and opened all the Christmas presents. And then I would be so relieved when I woke up, and I realized that I hadn’t done it.” ― Claire Danes