The best way to overcome a recurring dream that you no longer want to see is to figure out how it relates to your waking life. From this point on, you can take action to solve the problem in real life, and the dream should stop.

Given that a dream about being shot is usually associated with feelings of emotional trauma or victimization, Loewenberg advises paying attention to what you felt in the dream. Were you angry, scared, or unable to fight back? These emotions appear somewhere in your real life and were probably present the day before you had this dream.

“If you often dream of being shot or involved in a gunfight,” she adds, “you should take a hard look at how you’re being treated and why you’re allowing people to treat you that way.” She suggests revealing complex of a potential victim or at least ask yourself why you are constantly in emotional conflicts.

These are all questions you can ponder, or of course you can jot down your thoughts in a dream journal (which, according to Levenberg, is another effective way to improve the interpretation of your dreams).

Once you determine exactly which real-life scenario your dream is reflecting, you can work on changing that situation.