Topic: The Reality, Types, and Ruling of Dreams

1) Apart from the dreams of the prophets (peace be upon them), no one's dream is a hujjah (proof) in Shariah. This means no Islamic ruling can be established on the basis of a dream. It is also not necessary in Shariah to act on a dream or its interpretation, or to make any decision based on it.
Not every dream is true or meaningful. Dreams are of different types, explained below.
A) Whatever a person sees while awake, or thinks about during the day, appears to them in their dreams as images. These are called hadith al-nafs , meaning the mind's own thoughts.
B) Sometimes Shaytan places images and events of joy or sorrow in a person's mind. These are called "thoughts from Shaytan." Both of these types are meaningless, so no attention should be paid to them.
C) The third type are dreams that come from Allah. They are true and meaningful, and are called ilhamat (inspirations). This is the type the hadith describes as a part of prophethood. Hazrat Abu Hurairah (may Allah be pleased with him) narrated that the Messenger of Allah ﷺ said: "The dream of a believer is one of the forty-six parts of prophethood." (Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith: 6988) Even this type of dream is not a proof in Shariah.
Note: It stands proved from the Qur'an and Hadith, and from experience, that sinners, even disbelievers, could see dreams which are true. In the Surah Yusuf itself, mentioned there are the dreams of two prison mates of Sayyidna Yusuf (A.S) which were true, and similarly, the dream of the king of Egypt which was true - though, the three of them were not Muslims.
In short, true dreams, as made clear in Hadith, have no place in the lives of Muslims at large except that they can be either glad tidings, or warning, for them. They are no binding argument in any matter, neither for their own selves, nor for others. Some people, unaware of this truth, fall a victim to all sorts of scruples after having seen such dreams. Some of them would start taking these as a sign of having become a saint or something like that. Others would tend to give what they get out of these dreams the status of the injunctions of the Shari'ah. All these approaches are baseless. Specially so, when we already know that there is every likelihood that both kinds of imaginings, self-suggested or Satan-induced, can get profusely intermingled with true dreams.