Where do you get your interpretation from!?!?

[jody]

right, this si something thats been nugging me whilst ive been studying dreams. i get intertpratation mostly from jung0s theories to be honest, and secondly from intuition, and then sometimes using dream dictionaries also, but where do you guys and gals get your knowledge to interprate dreams from? my main goal in studying dreams is being able to interprate them deeply and corectly, so i would just be interested in finding out about the sources available that i havent yet researched. thankyou x

[Burned up]

Fair question, Jody. In fact I'm much like you. I like Jung but I think intuition also plays a large part (and that's also arguably Jungian). I study my own feelings/emotions/reactions etc to a dream I've been reading and if anything arises I note it. Sometimes this might run against what the dreamer is saying and then I have to think - do I say "I think you still love him" or run with what the dreamer says "I'm over him", for example. Dream dictionaries are helpful but shouldn't be relied upon in my opinion. Some symbols may be more likely to have the same interpretation to more people than others but I doubt any symbol will always have the same meaning to everyone. Better to examine what each symbol means to us, in the context of the dream. Or, frankly, ignore the symbols completely and work with how the dream affects us. I think we can be more help in this forum by engaging in each others' dreams and encouraging the dreamer to feed back (this also shows commitment to the process on their part) than by offering a flat interpretation.

[jody]

you make sense, like a perfume factory funny thing was a forum thread that grabbed my eye, had you in it, doing this, and now me doing that, as this is how i think interpretation should be, if D is the dream described and L is the life that has it described then: D + L = good interpretation D - L = bad interpratation

[Philosopher8659]

From the principles of language itself. Or from your own real life experience with a dream image. From the principles of language, definition provides class mechanics, or what Plato called the similie in multis. As a definition determines class membership, then you can do the reverse, given a member, go to the class definition. The class definition will give you the idea, and you can determine all members of a class by using the definition for it is a standard. Example, from scripture, let us say that we talk about the lame, the deaf, the poor, the blind. Each of these are class members, the one being indicated is the one NOT listed. (scripture tests class mechanics, in all ways, even subtraction) The mind. So, you are given several members of a class, and you know which one is being targeted because it is the one of the set not listed. The class indicated in this example are environmental acquisition systems by which we live. This is actually the principles by which metaphor works, or what is called "dark speeches, or dark sentences" in scripture. It is an exercise in the principles of judgment. True use of metaphor simply works with the natural consequences of definition. Instead of going from a definition to determine class members, we are given class members to determine the definition. Thus those logicians, including Aristotle, who claim that Metaphor is not a principle of logic, err by their stupidity. Use the definition of the class to determine all class members. Class mechanics. As it is written that the scripture is sealed to man's understanding, so too are dreams. This is because there is no true understaning of judgment, i.e. language in general, until the mind processes information in accordance with these principles. There is no magic involved, no decoder ring bs, just the simple principles of judgment. If you are going to claim that man does not know judgment, you prove it by putting it right in his face.

[jody]

i only understand part of what you say john i dont understand how class mechanics has much to do with it the principles of language? shuold they be used to interpret dreams, i am talking about translating dream language into english, would you use the principles of english to translate maori into english? or the principles of maori? or both? my point is that dreams have their own language set aside from our standard waking language. i dont understand how metaphor can be logical, something that can change so much and is so subjective cannot follow a rule? understanding is based on wishful thinking and belief......so essentialy everything is sealed from human understanding? you have too many years of studying philosophy under your belt for me to understand all you say and especcially to discuss it but i try

[Philosopher8659]

The principles of logic apply to every logic, thus every grammar system. This is one of the reason why Plato said philosophy was over every endeavor of man, because to him, a philosopher had a real trade, dialectic, a knowledge of the principles of grammar--i.e. logic. Since the function of the human mind was to manipulate information about the environment, it is the foundation of psychology. Plato was the first, and so far, the most correct psycho-therapist in the history of man. Perhaps if you run through my Language and Experience on the internet archive you might start to see a unity in language, logic that Plato and a few others were working with, but became lost in history. There are ideas there you have never seen anywhere else--yet they all follow each other step by step from the very start of naming an abstraction.

[travellight27]

I began learning about dreams with a simple book, "Do You Dream?" by Tony Crisp. Later I read a more complicated one, "Watch Your Dreams" ...Anne Ree Colton. To me it's like learning a foreign language, once you learn the symbols and understand word play, numbers and other aspects you begin to learn to speak the language of dreams. I read each book more than once and now I don't refer to them because it is an automatic translation 99% of the time. If someone asks me now for a book to begin with I think Tanner's "The Mystical Magical Marvelous World of Dreams" has great definitions. I think it's good to read the books in the beginning of the learning process and then put them away and rely on one's intuition. TL

[Dreamcaster]

@Burned up Your views perfectly reflect what I do as well. I couldn't have said it better. @Philosopher8659 Your views are interesting, but you leave large gaps in your thought process. Not everyone is as well versed in philosophy as you seem to be. You need to fill in the blanks for the rest of us who aren't well versed in philosophy.