Dreams

“I believe it to be true that dreams are the true interpretations of our inclinations; but there is art required to sort and understand them.”

- Montaigne

Freud was probably the first modern mental health professional who emphasized the importance of dreams. He believed that dreams functioned to preserve the sleep state. Actually, more nearly the opposite is true, as an argument can be made that the purpose of sleep is to dream. This has been shown by many sleep research studies in which subjects were deprived of dream sleep, a.k.a. REM sleep. As a result, many subjects developed acute psychotic conditions.

Freud thought that dreams were the residuals of daily events, an idea which has been verified by some research on dreams. Hartman (1986) analyzed 88 dreams and found 463 bits of memories that Freud would refer to as “day residues.” Ninety-four percent of these memory bits were related to events that had occurred the day of the dream. Sixty-five percent of the 463 bits had occurred between the evening hours of six to nine p.m. the night of the dream.

This indicates clearly that what we put in our mind before we go to sleep is highly likely to end up in our dreams. Dreams are somewhat similar to the incubation stage that occurs during the creative thought process. During the incubation stage, the mind is not actively attempting to resolve a problem, but rather is idlely contemplating the involved components.

In other words, if you program your mind on a particular subject right before you fall asleep, that topic is more likely to pop up during a dream at night. More importantly, perhaps, the emotions that we have experienced during the day, certainly during the evening, are likely to be carried over into our dreams.

Most everyone has had dreams in which they were being chased by some fearful monster whom they could not see but could feel closing in on them. Such dreams seem to be the result of frustrated feelings that pile up during the day. Intense feelings of inadequacy or inferiority are probably surfacing in such scary dreams.

I believe that dreams have a cathartic effect. By that, I mean not only are creative, logical solutions to problems worked out in dreams, but also dreams serve to help dissipate intense painful emotions. Often when a long-term psychotherapy client begins reporting improved behavior and feelings of greater happiness, he/she will also report intensely emotional dreams revolving around the conflictual area. Sometimes, just telling the client that this is a natural part of the psychic healing process shortens the frequency and intensity of such dreams.

Freud believed that the Id caused dreaming to occur. During sleep, the psychic censor that kept unacceptable wishes from reaching the conscious level was weakened. Thus, repressed wishes or feelings were more likely to surface during sleep.

I believe that not only repressed thoughts and feelings come out at night, but any thought or feeling that is felt by the person to be a significant bit of “unfinished business” is likely to find expression in a dream.

I also agree with Freud’s idea of condensation. Condensation is his explanation for how one image in a dream often symbolizes a number of different related issues. Thus, a house may be a sanctuary, a mother figure, and an important financial investment, all in the same dream.

Finally, one more quotation to finish up this “dream work.” “Wise men dream at night. Fools dream day and night.” – Santa Cruz