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Dreams are the subconscious mind's way of sending messages to one's
conscious mind, played out in a universal language that may or may not be
interpretable. The night visions and filmstrips that play out in our sleep have
been mused over since the beginning of human civilization. In the process of
looking at the roots of your dreams, many elements can be discovered about
yourself that have been restrained or simply unknown. In this way, dream
psychoanalysis can help one come to terms with and recognize thoughts that can
often lead to creative ideas and self-improvement.
In 1900 the idea of dream
psychoanalysis was unleashed with Sigmund Freud's The Interpretation of
Dreams. Dream psychoanalysis is the analytical study of the thoughts and
emotions of a person through the interpretation of his or her dreams. Freud, who
described dreams as the "royal road to the subconscious," argued that dreams are
an expression of repressed desires and our hidden inner selves. He believed they
are surfacing ideas and desires that might as well be conscious thoughts, but
have been suppressed and unnoticed. Usually the dreams dealt with concealed
sexuality, often the result from something that might have happened to the
patient as a young child. In Freud's interpretations, nothing is ever what it
seems to be and symbolism is everything.
Not long after,
psychologist Carl Jung followed up with his theory on the "collective
unconscious", the part of the psyche that holds traces of the primitive mind,
saying that dreams have the potential to help us become psychologically
balanced. Unlike Freud who believed dreams were expressions of something that
the mind was aware of but unwilling to realize, Jung saw dreams as partially
containing entirely new contents that were previously unknown to the
subconscious. He analyzed dreams as having two main roots: "conscious contents,"
reflections from the previous day, etc., and "constellated contents of the
unconscious," many thoughts from the unconscious as opposed to the conscious
mind, which have their source in both conscious contents and arise from a
creative process. He recognized many of the same symbols and subjects, which he
called "archetypes", which have arisen repeatedly in the dreams of different
cultures throughout time. He viewed dreams as the reflection of the dreamer's
personality, an interaction between one's conscious and subconscious mind.
Dreams clearly hold a significant part of both our mental and physical
health. The works of Freud, Jung and many others show that those who listen to
their dreams are more in-tune with themselves. There might not be a simple
answer to what dreams really are, but whatever the form of dream analysis, a
great deal can be learned about oneself in dreams, and they hold a strong
significance for our subconscious selves. A good way to start is to keep a dream
journal by your bed along with the motivation to write in it when you first wake
up. You just might find that just thinking of the subject can make you more
aware of your dreams, and you can start sorting out you problems
tonight.
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