Urs Truly was taught and trained in the axiom dreams mean something. Dr. Freud made mistakes – a few of the howlers – but he was spot-on the contents of dreams are able to tell us things of which we are not conscious. Some dreams, anyway. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar and sometimes what’s parading around in your pumpkin in the wee hours of night is just scramble. [1] Dream interpretation done in the Freudian way is reductive viz. taking all the vague and disguised contents and distilling them down to an unconscious wish. [2] Spo-fans know I am a Jungian. Jung took a different approach to dreams. He used them like springboards to expand into conscious exploration. Dreams sometimes are personal (the Personal Unconscious) but often archetypal, something he called The Collective Unconscious.[3] Both fellows tried to make sense of something mankind has always been fascinated with: why do we dream and what do they mean? All cultures took dreams seriously. The Old Testament has Joseph providing dream analysis to Pharaoh to guide him in his life choices.
Of course all this was so, prior to learning how the brain works. We still don’t know exactly why we dream – or why we need sleep for that matter – but the most recent science supports the brain needs sleep to clean out the crap and form connections and memories: it’s down time to repair and coalesce. As neuroscience advances, the contents of dreams become less important compared to the form. [4] Other than some booklets for sale at the grocery store check out line with titles like ‘What your dreams mean’, no one seems interested anymore in dream analysis. Rather, they obsess with getting enough sleep and ‘REM’ time.
Mind! There is little if any good supportive evidence the content of dreams means anything; this is based on countless cases throughout time of folks/analysands making great insights to their worker of dreams. It isn’t science.
The notion dreams are just neuronal firing at night as the brain trying to repair and cleanse itself is both a comfort and a disappointment. I’m glad we are focusing on getting enough sleep. All the same there is a loss of individual humanity to throwing out looking at dream contents. No one dreams the same way and no one’s dream’s contents mean the same thing. They are as individual as fingerprints. I find it sad not using this unique and potentially knowledge-bringing tool delegated to the bottom of the medical tool box. Patients do not come to me anymore to do dream analysis; they come it get meds.
When I first entered Jungian psychoanalysis the psycholgist asked me a few preliminary questions and then said ‘tell me your dreams’. He was trying in his way to get to know me as an individual. It felt intimate.
Although I practice good sleep hygiene and am careful to get enough sleep, I seldom remember my dreams and when I do they are as mish-mashed as my hummingbird brain, no surprise. Once in awhile I get a ‘proper dream’ that makes me sit up and think and expand and learn about something.
So long as some folks are curious to learn about themselves, dream analysis remains in the tool box, not the most important one anymore but still a good one.
[1] Medicines serotonin-based like antidepressants are notorious for causing dreaming side effects. The two adjectives I often hear about are ‘vivid’ and ‘weird’. I tell thems dreaming on duloxetine to pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.
[2] Nearly always about sex or death. It’s pretty predictable.
[3] Overall more interesting and more fun than reducing everything down to child-parent conflicts.
[4] For thems who poo-poo the notion ‘dreams mean something’: a common symptom in Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is recurring nightmares of the trauma or something similar to it. This is the wounded brain valiantly trying to work through the memory but unable to resolve the matter. Don’t tell folks with trauma-related dreams theirs don’t mean anything.
34 comments
September 17, 2022 at 8:42 AM
Brian Dean Powers
I’ve had dreams that are suggestive, but I don’t think I’ve ever received specific insights from a dream. What’s more interesting to me are those uncommon experiences where I’ve been walking along not thinking of anything specific…. when a full, clear sentence pops into my mind and tells me something I need to know. It’s like my unconscious mind has been working on a problem and produces an answer.
September 17, 2022 at 10:12 AM
Urspo
Aye sir, sudden thoughts and daydreams – and slips of the tongue – are/were means to explore the unconscious when dreams were not putting out.
September 17, 2022 at 9:05 AM
DwightW.
I think as I have gotten older my dreams are a reflection of the general mood in which my life is going. Good times good dreams , bad times bad dreams. I like sex dreams but they never come to a visual completion as opposed to some of them of another type ,which did, when I was a younger lad.
September 17, 2022 at 10:13 AM
Urspo
Dreams are making sense/solidifying or discarding ‘what’s on our mind’ in the day time; they often correlate with what’s happening.
September 17, 2022 at 9:14 AM
Moving with Mitchell
I don’t often remember my dreams. When I do, some are clear and reassuring; some are clear and upsetting; while others make no sense no matter how I think about them. Of course, then there are the dreams about desperately needing to find a place to pee only to wake up to realize I desperately need to pee.
September 17, 2022 at 10:15 AM
Urspo
That’s a nice summary of the common categories.
In Freud’s “the interpretation of dreams” (which by the way is a great read, he was a good writer) he starts with some dreams indeed reflect our body functions such as the need to urinate.
September 17, 2022 at 9:55 AM
Paul Brownsey
If we meditate on a dream, long enough and thoroughly enough, “something almost always comes out of bit,” you quote Jung as saying. Okay, but could you write something–maybe a second post on dreams–about *how* one is supposed to meditate on it? In particular, how can one tell that something “comes out of it”, as distinct from being projected onto it out of what we’ve picked up over the years about dreams? Example: suppose I dream I’m living in a lighthouse. Those with an acquaintance with one sort of tradition for understanding dreams may well gravitate towards a phallic interpretation. But how could one tell whether that’s *really* what “comes out of it”, as distinct from being projected onto it out of the sort of psychobabble that simmers in the culture?
September 17, 2022 at 10:21 AM
Urspo
Patience above! All very good questions that a pat answer would do justice. Sorting through the dream contents what is numinous and what is rubbish is difficult which is why doing so with someone with experience is a good move. Think of Pharaoh consulting Joseph or (in myth) why people consulted the seers. In your lighthouse example, one ponders what YOU associate with lighthouses – whether you do this on your own or with another. Avoid ‘this is a symbol for that” sort of tosh.
BTW I remember having a dream about a lighthouse that eventually became about The Sacred Feminine. So there.
An assurance is Truth comes out. The unconscious may not be good at delivering the goods in a simple direct route, but it will keep at it until you connect the dots.
September 17, 2022 at 10:25 AM
Debra She Who Seeks
My unconscious has almost never spoken to me through dreams. In fact, I rarely remember dreams. But my unconscious has often spoken to me via external symbols encountered in my life and environment or through the experience of “living out a myth.” Often, repeated and increasingly obvious symbols/experiences are necessary for my conscious mind to FINALLY understand the message. I’m sure my unconscious feels like it is dealing with an idiot at times.
September 17, 2022 at 10:42 AM
Urspo
Good for you! Rituals and what not are an excellent road to the unconscious esp. when dream road is closed. Jung would be quite pleased with your endeavors.
The Unconscious never judges, it teaches. If you are not listening though it will do a dirty until you do.
September 17, 2022 at 11:08 AM
David Godfrey
Most of the time I sleep well, free from things that make me think, I have to get up, 8 – 9 hours. 99% of the time through the night without getting up. Remembering dreams is rare, I had one recently about remodeling, new neighbors and discovering rooms in my house I never knew existed. Strange dream at the same time we were remodeling the kitchen.
September 17, 2022 at 11:51 AM
Urspo
the waking hours are reflected in our dream work has the brain/mind tries to solidify things into memory etc. sometimes however Psyche uses the materials at hand to bring ‘bigger issues’. It is quite opportunistic this way.
September 17, 2022 at 11:35 AM
RuralBeard
Thank you for your footnote on PTSD. You explained it to me for the first time, clearly. And for that, I’m so very grateful. You’ve changed my perspective.
September 17, 2022 at 11:52 AM
Urspo
I am glad of that. May this change of perspective lead you to new insight and better things.
September 17, 2022 at 11:52 AM
larrymuffin
Great post! Your new photo selfie makes you look so young 40 something.
September 17, 2022 at 12:46 PM
Urspo
thank you for both compliments.
September 17, 2022 at 12:04 PM
Glenda
the workings of the brain are fascinating. I don’t think we will ever be able to really understand the process, In a way it would be a shame if we ever could.
September 17, 2022 at 12:46 PM
Urspo
Not to be worrying; we are only really just starting to understand it there is tons to discover.
September 17, 2022 at 12:18 PM
Pat
While Mama Cass intoned Dream a little dream of me. I never had experienced one. Until my mid=fifties I would hit the pillow and wake up seconds before the alarm. Now that I go to bed earlier and I may have to wake up
at some point for bladder reasons, I realize that I do dream. Their contents vaporize by morning, so I can not give any details when I awake but in midst of those middle of the night plumbing visits, the melange of my mind is sometimes clearer. My dreams are like improv. They incorporate topics I talked about, thought about or heard about recently. Like madlibs they create a sequence of events that while featuring real people I know, real things and actual places are really not plausible. In her later years my mother had dementia.
Her waking hours were much like my dreams.
September 17, 2022 at 12:48 PM
Urspo
Indeed so. Most dreamwork is dribble and tidy-up and not remembered, nor needs be. Every once in a while for some they remember a ‘humdinger’. Often they are worth looking at , but not always.
September 17, 2022 at 12:56 PM
Linda Practical Parsimony
One time about 30 years ago, I dreamed I was on the commode, peeing. Well, I was not on the commode! That is the only time in my life that I have ever had to change my bed from the mattress out. And, I really needed sleep! But, I had to take a bath.
I could always tell friends why they dreamed what they dreamed. I did not interpret. They never recognized that their life experiences were reflected in their dreams. One woman broke her elbow in a fall and had to have an elbow replacement. From then on, all her dreams were of falling because she could not hold onto something. I had the same dreams after a hand injury, so I recognized the dream.
September 17, 2022 at 2:21 PM
Urspo
A testimony!
Most dreams with interpretable contents don’t need Freud to figure them out; most folks can do it themselves or have another help out. Good.
September 17, 2022 at 1:04 PM
Lori Hawkins
The most memorable dream I’ve had was in 2020 during a very stressful point of the pandemic. I was so sad in the dream and remember seeing the ocean a few blocks away. I walked towards it and got in swimming out very far. A whale came up beside me and grazed my check and said just float. I remind myself of that often.
September 17, 2022 at 2:22 PM
Urspo
A lot of ink has been spilled on the phenomenon during the 2020 pandemic there was a surge of dreaming. Fascinating.
September 17, 2022 at 1:06 PM
Steven
Ever since moving, I’ve been cursed with having 1-2 dreams a week about the old house. The first was that the new homeowners “walled in” the living room windows that face the street. Thankfully that was a short dream. The second one was that we hosted a company Christmas party at the house while the homeowners “were away”. Not sure where. But there was this urge that I had to get everyone out before the new homeowners got home. Well, the homeowners arrived before everyone left and then as people left, two people were driving their cars into the car that was parked in the garage. Then the new homeowners said, “Not to worry. You left behind an area rug whose colors are perfect for the holiday.” So weird. I wish it would stop.
September 17, 2022 at 2:23 PM
Urspo
Often a recurring dream holds something needing working through. I would have you use the house as a symbol of yourself and the party members as elements of your own psyche playing parts.
September 17, 2022 at 1:41 PM
Old Lurker
I have not remembered my dreams for a while now. Who needs dreams when you have meds? On the other hand you inspired me to keep a dream journal a while ago, and I kept up the practice for a few months. I was surprised that my dreams were so varied (quite unlike my conscious thoughts, which are depressingly repetitive).
September 17, 2022 at 2:24 PM
Urspo
A dream journal not only enhances the remembrance of dreams but helps one work through if they mean anything. Good for you!
September 17, 2022 at 5:09 PM
Robert
Current duloxetine induced dreams for me include friends and relatives who have passed. Last night a mid blue covered flip photo album and discussions about Co Op insurance kept me entertained for hours. They are often repetitive over the course of the plot unfolding.
September 17, 2022 at 7:04 PM
Urspo
Rx-induced dreams! “Vivid” and “weird” are the words I often hear from folks taking such meds. Sometimes it is a deal breaker on the dose.
September 17, 2022 at 6:04 PM
Pipistrello
I don’t really picture you in grey but that’s a very nice new pic of you … My university was a so-called Freudian School when I studied a couple of years of Psychology in the 80s, so a full year of Freud and his neuroses and psycho-sexual stages of development and whatnots was a proper endurance test in my book. I don’t think I ever believed that dreams could mean the sort of loopy stuff he proposed, nor anything “deep”, so the ones I can remember I tend to enjoy for their bizarreness and novelty-value and are often filled with the music and goings-on of the preceding day. That said, for several years after ceasing financial work, I continued to have “trading” dreams which were exhausting and stress-laden and were probably best called nightmares. I was quite surprised, too, when out of the blue I had another one about twenty years later. That’s a lot of processing for a day job!
September 17, 2022 at 7:06 PM
Urspo
lol the shirt is blue actually.
Most Freudian theory sounds pretty zany when someone tries to distill it to a simple explanation. Many of his theories sound zany even with the full explanation. I suspect this sort of thing isn’t even taught anymore in shrink school, other than a footnote in a history section.
September 18, 2022 at 8:22 AM
Dark Robzilla
I have a dream that I’ll never have to work full time again. Or is it a hope? Both?
September 19, 2022 at 6:57 AM
Urspo
Your “dream’ is a hope, one of the word’s more common definition. “I have a dream” that sort of thing.
I hope your dream comes true.