DREAMS 2

Much can be learned from dreams. . .

Freud once wrote a book entitled The Interpretation of Dreams. Actually I've never read it but have stumbled on many of its principles through different encounters along the way. Our dream life is much like the vacation home of the mind. Some philosophers have pondered whether the reverse is true or not. If you've ever seen Ashton Kuchner in The Butter Fly Effect it becomes easier to entertain this idea. This movie I consider the horror version of Ground Hog Day.

In real life our dreams are believed to possibly serve the practical purpose of allowing us a place where we are allowed to be completely insane in a way that is unacceptable during the waking hours. Most of our repressed drives and suppressed thoughts are free to express themselves while we dream. It is really the emotion felt during the dream that has value and not so much the plot occurring, as many are tempted to become more enthralled by. One can dream of war and kill thousands then wake up and go to work as if nothing happened as that repressed aggressiveness returns to the abyss of forgotten memories. Having such a dream doesn't mean the person is a violent killer in the least. More likely it represents an opportunity to let off steam from repressed emotions of anger internally or from an external stimuli such as the unacceptable thought of wanting to punch the boss or other individual causing conflict in the persons life.

Everyone dreams whether the dreams are recalled or not. This has been pretty much proved through studying the rapid eye movement stage of sleep in research and clinical labs. In essence, many of the bad dreams are representative of taking out the garbage of the subconscious mind. Without the existence of dreaming we would probably act out those emotions in the waking world which would not be a good thing. If you don't accept that idea then try stressing out someone who has been sleep deprived for several days and see if that person isn't more likely to react in a more irritable and hostile manner than a person who has received their nightly eight hours of sleep. I work with many Post-traumatic Stress people who characteristically have nightmares to the point they sometimes resist or avoid going to sleep at night. It is my belief that if the patient can ever reach a point where they are willing to endure the fear and discomfort and challenge those dreams they can, in theory, conquer the dreams and realize the therapeutic value of purging their subconscious mind of these toxic emotions and fearful drives. This of course is a process that takes time and is best done while in psychotherapy. People in bereavement often have pleasantly euphoric dreams of the loved one being alive. In this case awakening is when the trauma is felt as they re-aclimate and realize the loved one is no longer a physical part of their life.

I have found that no dream can be considered too crazy. In fact, the crazier the dream the more creative the dreamer for dreams are not meant to have boundaries or make sense. I have had some repulsive and repugnant dreams but learn to throw them back just as a fisherman returning an undesirable catch to the water. Those bad dreams actually make us thankful to be finally awake. Like everything else in our reality dreaming relies on balance. If 100% of our dreams were good who would want to ever get out of bed and much productivity would be lost. So bad dreams may have value from an evolutionary standpoint just as certain positive envisionary dreams. Someone had to dream certain things for them to ever have been developed. The initial dreamers of the airplane, the telephone, and the television were likely looked at as being totally insane the first time they spoke of such ideas but had they not had the courage to dream of such things these luxuries would not be a part of our waking reality today.

This entry was inspired by an intense recurring dream that visited me last night involving being in a play. Drama played a major part of my younger life and helped me to develop and  explore many different characteristics within myself and among others. By nature, I'm introverted and tend to live inside my head majority of the time. But as most introverts are aware of we are more creative than our extroverted counterparts because they rely on having to hear themselves talk and participating in an active way to maintain their self esteem and productivity. We introverts tend to work on stuff inside our heads until a brilliant idea is born and it isn't until that idea is presented to others that we are given credit for having much intelligence. Okay, maybe that's an over simplification but I think the point was made. Without further digression, I dreamed this dream of being in a play at a whole 'nother level of chaos last night. The play had no name, the auditorium was unfamiliar, I knew no lines, knew none of the characters, the plot was not known, the setting continuously changed, I was always on stage at the wrong time, the cues were always off, retreating to the backstage area was useless because the drapes would always reveal me to the packed auditorium. Early in the dream I felt confident I could improvise and wing it. My unknown fellow actors would or could not respond and I continued to look increasingly like a complete idiot. This dream may have lasted ten minutes in reality but to me the perception was that it was going on for hour after hour. I tried so hard to awaken myself after entering that state of awareness of it being a dream. The inability to awaken myself seemed to intensify the helplessness and sense of embarrassment.

In such a dream, over time, I have developed the ability to try and influence the outcome, so I tried to see and interact with some of the people in the audience. I also made the curtains close so the act could be restarted. The restart was more chaotic than the initial take. I waited for the audience to start heckling and booing which surprisingly didn't happen, at least not before I finally awakened. I'm not going to make any interpretive attempts of this dream here but I wanted to document it before it vanishes from my memory. I know it will return at some later night as it has for years. I feel fear while experiencing the dream but I don't fear experiencing the dream because I recognize it has value in helping me sort out fears in my waking life. 

Comments

[Foxtrot1]

That was interesting.

[Truly Scrumptious]

Interesting blog. I've read quite a bit and then found this post on dreams. I've been interested in dreams for years and I especially like a book by Jung, called, Man and His Symbols. He has a lot to say about dreams.

I've had a recurring dream that is very pleasant and also is especially real. Basically it involves discovering that I have a whole lot more room in my house than I realized. There is frustration about the lack of space and then my husband reminds me about the basement downstairs! Hee hee hee! I am so joyous when I discover that it is the size of the entire house above. But I think what I really like about it isn't so much the extra space, as it is the feeling of having disappeared from the earth for awhile.