Anxiety Dreams: Sigmund Freud

Can anxiety dreams help reveal a person’s unconscious thoughts? According to the father of psychoanalysis, they can. For Sigmund Freud, dreams expressed repressed or unconscious wishes. He claimed that anxiety dreams are dreams in which painful feelings are experienced as a result of a repressed wish being expressed. The anxiety is caused by a conflict between what people know to be morally wrong and what they unconsciously wish. Analyzing anxiety dreams can give people insight of their unconscious worries or fears. Once people are consciously aware of those worries and fears, they are better equipped to address them and rid themselves of the anxiety.

Anxiety dreams can often reveal how people actually feel about those closest to them. Peter, my boyfriend of five years, had a dream in which I was unfaithful. In his dream I was supposed to meet him for lunch; he waited what he said “seemed forever.” Once it was late and past the time we had arranged to meet, Peter left the restaurant. He walked home, not worried if something had happened to me, only wondering if I had forgotten about our lunch date. On his way home, Peter passed Mcquoin Park, a park we visit often, where we exercise, have picnics, a park we consider “ours.” In his dream, Peter sees me sitting down on a bench with a man that he does not recognize. The stranger has his arm resting comfortably against my shoulder. The stranger and I are eating, kissing, laughing, having a good time. In reality, I have not been unfaithful to Peter, nor do I want to be. Peter says he has complete faith in my fidelity. Yet he dreamt I was disloyal to him and our relationship.

Peter and I have been together for five years and plan to move in together in the next few...

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...t nervous, but quickly replaced it with excitement. The feeling of being nervous was successfully replaced but definitely not forgotten. My nervousness went to my unconscious and was later revealed, allowing me to deal with the anxiety and walk into the interview more relaxed.

Anxiety dreams help reveal a person’s worries or fears in ways that they may need to examine to fully understand. While Freud’s theories cannot be taken as true in total, and dreams may serve more practical, evolutionary purposes, it is still useful to analyze dreams so that unconscious worries, fears, wishes, do not hold back people from getting what they consciously want or from becoming who they can.

Works Cited

Freud, Sigmund. "The Oedipus Complex." A World of Ideas: Essential Readings for College

Writers. Ed. Lee Jacobus. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2002. 475-84. Print.