Thread: How I discover what my dreams are about

Originally Posted by C.G. Jung Page

Chapter 6

Dreams and their Interpretation

Much has been said about dreams in the previous chapters -- enough probably to show how important Jung regards them as a manifestation of psychic activity. A dream, he says, should 'be regarded with due seriousness as an actuality that has to be fitted into the conscious attitude as a codetermining factor', and his experience has shown him that 'if we meditate on a dream sufficiently long and thoroughly, if we carry it around with us and turn it over and over, something almost always comes of it'.

A dream is an involuntary and spontaneous psychic product, a voice of nature; and is usually obscure and difficult to understand because it expresses itself in symbols and pictures, like the most ancient writing, or the complicated letters which children sometimes enjoy producing with drawings replacing the important words. In attempting to understand the dream-language, Jung uses a method of amplification, which may be compared in some respects to the way in which inscriptions and writings in forgotten languages are deciphered by the philologist.

The first step in understanding a dream, he considers, is to establish its context. This means unraveling its network of relationships with the dreamer and his or her life, and discovering the significance of the various images it presents. For example, one's mother might appear in a dream: now, everyone has a concept of what mother implies, but for each person the image of a mother is different, and the significance of this image will even vary from time to time. The thought of mother may for one person be associated with love, care, and protection, and for another with power, anger, or frustration and so the meaning of a dream of mother can vary accordingly. As far as possible, each image or symbol must be taken in turn till its meaning for the dreamer is established as nearly as possible, and not until this has been carefully done is one in a position to understand what the dream may mean. It will be seen from this that Jung does not have a fixed method of dream interpretation (one cannot tot say, for instance, as the popular dream-books do, that to dream of black cats means good luck), for each dream is taken as a direct expression of the dreamer's unconscious, and only to be understood in this light.

This is an excerpt from a book called "Introduction to Jung's Psychology" which can be read online. Click here for the chapter on dreams. It has helped me a lot.

Thanks for replying.

this is quite interesting...but Im not sure if I could really use that to analyze the crazy dream I posted...but if you could, that would be awsome, and Im not being sarcastic.
http://www.dreamviews.com/community/...ad.php?t=58481

I tend to take a Jungian approach too. Thanks for the link.

Jung did talk about psychic activity a lot. Its not often mentioned as much as it could be.

I wouldn't say I entirely believe in jungian methods. But when I read his interpretations I think they tend to make sense. I have read interpretations by freud and just do not buy them. They just seem like total nonsense.

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Dreams deal with extremes. If you truly understood the meaning of your dream it may be quite negative. We are our own worst judge. We try to detect signals coming from other people. Do people feel we are not cool or incompetent? The dream mind is often very harsh and honest. It tells us things that we do not like to admit to ourselves. It tells us things that we fear. Its worries about how others are seeing us. It’s a big harsh dose of reality.
Yet the dream mind also heads in the other direction. It captures our fantasies and positive feelings. Sometimes you wake up in a positive mood and feel that you are going to tackle a task in a particular way. You are invigorated and positive. Dreams then help motivate us. But often if we go too far in one direction our dreams tell us to cool down and not get carried away. This makes sense really. The dream mind then explores feelings connected with our judgment. We need to motivate ourselves but we also need to be realistic.
Try these pages as they help you understand the process of dreaming
http://unclesirbobby.110mb.com/dreamessay.php
http://unclesirbobby.110mb.com/dreamessayhowto.php
http://unclesirbobby.110mb.com/dreamessayhowtopost.php
http://unclesirbobby.110mb.com/dreambookpolice.php
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http://www.scarboroughphotos.org.uk/...s/surfcity.php

Yeah, I'm not overly dogmatic about Jung, but his ideas just seem to be right most of the time. It interesting to note though that he didn't 'believe' in lucid dreaming. This is obviously one area where I would take issue with him. It's been awhile since I read the actual quote though, I forget what factors might have qualified that statement.