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Dream work

Material taken from: Inner Work by Robert A. Johnson

Compiled and edited by Nancy Pfaff, MA

Example of a dream with dream work:

Dream: By a young professional woman leading a busy life.

"I am looking for my car keys. I realize my husband has them. Then I remember that my brother has borrowed my car and has not returned it. I see both of them and I call to them. They do not seem to hear me. Then a disheveled young man, like a "renegade," gets into my car and drives off. I feel extremely frustrated, helpless, and somewhat abandoned."

Principles:

The basic function of dreams is to express the unconscious.

The images of the dream should not be taken literally.

The images of the dream are symbols of parts of the dreamer and dynamics within the dreamer’s life.

Begin by making associations to the symbols/images in the dream.

The Dreamer’s Process:

  1. Spontaneous associations to her husband and brother.
  2. The dreamer feels that they represented the part of her that needed to be quiet, meditative, and centered within her. She saw that she was so busy, she had no time for family and the quiet time that kept her centered.
  3. The car represented to her over involvement, never saying no, always agreeing to join every project. That pattern felt like a "vehicle" that she entered and ran away with her.
  4. The disheveled young man, the renegade, she associated with the part of herself that always wanted to be in "high gear."
  5. The dreamer concluded that she felt torn between that which was represented by her husband and brother and that which was represented by the renegade.

The Dreamer’s Action to respond to the truth revealed through the Dream:

  1. The dreamer cut down her involvement in the world.
  2. The dreamer spent more time with her family.
  3. The dreamer set aside a time simply to be quiet and work on her inner life.

Results from making the changes recommended in the dream:

  1. Relief due to focusing on those things in her life that were most important to her.

Principles Illustrated:

  1. Even a short, seemingly insignificant dream tries to tell us something that we need to know.
  2. Dreams never waste our time.
  3. If we take the trouble to listen to the "little" dreams, we find that they carry important messages.
  4. The Dream helped the dreamer balance her life in a fuller, more abundant way of life.

Notes:

  1. The husband’s image represented something distinct from her literal, physical husband—something within her own inner being. In this case, his image represented a life-principle at work within her, a set of values, an inner sense of what way of life was most true to her essential character. This is important, because we reach our full potential this way—not the potential the culture thinks we should reach.
  2. The multiplicity of dream figures reflects the plurality and multidimensional structure of the inner self.
  3. The dreams show us, in symbolic form, all the different personalities that interact within us and make up our total self.
  4. Carl G. Jung, the famous Swiss analyst, observed that each of our psychological components is a distinct center of consciousness. We can think of them as structures within ourselves that make up our total psyche. We can see them as independent energy systems that combine in us, for they are autonomous: Each has its own consciousness, its own values, desires, and points of view.
  5. The inner self is not simply multidimensional. Jung found that the psyche manifests itself as an androgyny, containing both feminine and masculine energies. Figures of the opposite sex often appear in dreams to symbolize the energy systems that are farthest from the ego, from the conscious mind, deep in the unconscious of the dreamer.
  6. Some common patterns helpful to know:
    1. In the male, the feminine figure often represents a man’s emotional nature, his capacity for feeling, appreciating beauty, developing values, and relating through love. Their appearances reflect a need by the true self to increase attention to these areas of life.
    2. In the female, the masculine figure often represents thinking-logic, knowing by analyzing and differentiating, classifying, organizing, competing and wielding power. Their appearances reflect a need by the true self of increase attention to these areas of life.
    3. The Soul Image: This is the most important aspect of the psyche. In the dream, this is represented by an inner being whose primary function is to serve as the one who guides the ego to the inner world, who serves as mediator between the unconscious and the ego. One recognizes this image by its mythical quality, and its magical-divine aspect. Jung felt that this inner person corresponds to the traditional religious conception of the soul as an inner part of ourselves that connects us to the spiritual realm and leads us to God. This figure in the male would be the anima (feminine for soul); in the female it would be the animus (masculine for soul). If we don’t interact with these energies within, we project them into areas of our lives where they don’t belong. Projection works to cause us to complete ourselves through another human being, trying to live out the unconscious, unrealized parts of ourselves through the external person on whom we put the romantic projection.
  7. The Goal of Dreamwork:
    1. Something we can sense, feel, and describe intuitively even though we have not yet attained it—the sense of wholeness, of being completed. The wholeness of our total being, and our consciousness of the quality of wholeness, is expressed in an archetype Jung called "the self."
  8. The Self: When the "self" appears in a dream, it represents the totality of our being, also our potential capacity for the highest consciousness—the awareness of unity in ourselves and in the cosmos.
    1. Characteristic symbols for the self in dreams: the circle, the mandala (a circle divided into four parts, the square, the diamond, groups of four or the number 4 (symbolizes the wholeness of things, the completeness of things), the divine or royal couple, Yin and Yang.
  9. The Shadow: Part of the unconscious very close to the ego and usually appears as the same gender as the dreamer…a kind of alter ego.
    1. The shadow appears regularly in our dreams.
    2. The shadow contains qualities and traits, both negative and positive, that are a natural part of the ego-personality. The ego has either not assimilated these qualities or has repressed them outright. "It is not our darkness we fear but our gold."
      1. Traits that may be embarrassing or primitive to the ego.
      2. Tremendous positive strengths the ego won’t claim because it would shatter its self-image or mean too much responsibility.
      3. Examples:
        1. If a man’s attitude toward his shadow is one of interest and compassion, the shadow will appear as a helpful friend, "buddy", tribal brother, and teacher. If the man is trying to repress the shadow, it will usually appear as a hateful enemy, a brute or monster who attacks him in the dream.
        2. The same applies to the woman. The shadow could appear as a loving sister or a witch.
  10. A Four Step Approach
    1. Making associations—What do the images mean to me? Spontaneous.
    2. Connecting dream images to inner dynamics—What part of myself does this dream image represent?
    3. Interpreting: Guess at the dreams general meaning based on 1 & 2.
    4. Doing rituals to make the dream concrete—What do I need to do about my dream? Practical action and/or symbolic action.
    5. Note: For detailed information about the above, read Johnson’s book.

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Last modified: January 27, 2006