Are dreams relative to real life?

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Three or four nights ago I had a couple dreams that seemed to run back to back to each other. First I dreamt I was in an elevator, I wasn't by myself but I couldn't see who was with me. But all of a sudden the elevator was plumeting down the shaft. The dream ended before it hit the bottom. After that I dreamt I was with my parents in their SUV and we were rolling down a hill. Again, I can't remember much of it, like a lot of my dreams, but that's the main thing I remember. Then a couple nights ago I had a dream that my son and I were still living with my parents, but I was packing bags of all our belongings and sneaking them out to my car. For some reason I didn't want my mom to know, and I remember having in my mind that we were running away and we were going to be living out of my car. Does anyone know why we dream what we do? Does any part of our dreams relate to our real life, or maybe something that happened earlier in the day? Maybe it's not something obvious, because obviously I'm not going to run away (lol), but maybe something more metaphorical, something that isn't so obvious. But I guess the main thing I'm looking for that is concerning me is why I had two dreams, that seemed pretty much back to back, that had to do with my death and my dying. If anyone could shed some light on this subject, any input would be greatly appreciated! Thank you very much.