Dreams and Their Interpretation

4239 Words9 Pages

“Dreams are the royal road to the unconscious.”

― Sigmund Freud, The Interpretation of Dreams

"My dream was grey and foggy. It started off at the beach with my 2 year old son and boyfriend. The beach was in a glass box. My son then had an identical twin and they were getting washed away by the water. I yelled for my boyfriend to help me but he refused to help. I finally was able to save my son and the twin from the waves. I Then take my son and walk out of the glass box. I no longer have my son and there is a black spiral staircase. I was walking down it with blackness around me. Then a little doll in a white nightgown was below me on the steps. I felt so afraid that I jumped over the railing and into The darkness."

If it happened while you were awake, you may have some serious problems, but, most likely this scenario, or one like it, would arise in a dream. So what do dreams mean? Well, that depends on who you ask. A Freudian analyst would tell you that the dream represents a subconscious wish. A Jungian analyst would most likely tell you that the characters in your dream represents archetypes. However, psychology is not the only field that studies dreams. You might talk to a proponent of the Activiation-synthesis model of dreaming, a recent biological approach, who would assure you that the dream was nothing more than random firings of neurons in the brain stem, and that it carries no significance at all. Of course, if you are religious you might want to speak to your spiritual leader. Whether you are a Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, Taoist or Jewish, to name a few, your faith may lead you to look deep into your dream for signs of communication from higher sources. For the more New Age thinker, there are many book...

... middle of paper ...

... slowly being accepted by even the last holdouts of the religious community.) This has not happened yet with dreams, though. Until it does (if it does at all) the public jury has the right to decide what it will believe. The diverse and stalwart nature of public opinion is a tremendous factor in pushing scientists to take their research further. So go, take a nap, and see what you think.

Bibliography

1. Lewis, James R. The Dream Encyclopedia. Detroit, MI, Second Edition, Print. 2009

2. Hartman, Earnest Sleep And Dreaming. Boston, Ma: Little Brown and Company, INC. 1970

3. Lewis, Naphtali The Interpretation of Dreams and Portents. Toronto, Ont: Samuel Stevens Hakkert and Company. 1976

4. Ferguson, Harvie The Lure Of Dreams. NY, NY Routledge Press. 1996

5. Welsh, Alexander Freud's Wishful Dream Book. Princeton NJ: Princeton University Press. 1994

Show More
Related

  • Stephen King Symbolic Language Of Dreams Analysis

    438 Words  | 1 Pages

    Stephen King’s perception in “The Symbolic Language of Dreams” gave me a new, profound insight on dreams. On the other hand, his interpretations also made me realize how little is known about them and their significance to our lives.

    Read More

  • Anatomy of a False Confession

    1643 Words  | 4 Pages

    In the adversarial justice system, when the offender admits to the criminal act, there is no further controversy and the case promptly proceeds to sentencing. Physical evidence and victim or witness statements may often be overlooked and not considered. The confession is considered unequivocal evidence of guilt and a conviction is ensured. Indeed, the interrogation process’ sole purpose is to obtain a confession. Zimbardo (1967) estimated that “of those criminal cases that are solved, more than 80% are solved by a confession.” (Conti, 1999) Without the confession, convictions may be reduced significantly. So why does a person falsely confess to a crime if the likelihood of a conviction is eminent? A false confession to any crime is self-destructive and counterintuitive.

    Read More

  • Comparing the Underworlds in Dante’s Inferno and The Odyssey

    2100 Words  | 5 Pages

    ...raits, nevertheless, the differences outweigh the similarities. Hell primarily focuses on punishing sinners; the House of Death does not. In fact, Odysseus meets many more people who are not being punished, than those who are. Both underworlds are chaotic, but Hell contains a very strict structure, which makes it organized; the House of Death does not have this element during Odysseus’ stay. Dante’s Inferno emphasizes the morality and reasons for sin when conversing with sinners in Hell, while The Odyssey emphasizes Odysseus’ reunion with old friends, as they discuss past events. The differences are at least partly a result of Homer’s and Dante’s differing religions, when they each wrote their own, and the culture in which each of them lived. The two works agree one element though. They each portray existing in the underworld as second to living on earth.

    Read More

  • Differences And Similarities In Dante's Odyssey And Inferno

    587 Words  | 2 Pages

    When going through the stories The Odyssey by Homer and Inferno by Dante, you get the feeling of how diverse, yet similar the two stories are. When reading The Odyssey, you find Ulysses trying to get home to his love, Penelope. He has been gone for twenty years, and through those years, he has struggled with good and evil, just like Dante in Inferno. Ulysses finds himself time after time fighting off gods and their children. Dante, struggling with good and evil, works his way through the nine levels of hell. He is struggling to find where his faithfulness lies. He also is trying to find his way to his love, Beatrice. When reading The Odyssey and Inferno, we find many similarities and differences, from the main characters characteristics, to the experiences within religion during Dante and Homer’s times.

    Read More

  • False Confessions Case Study

    585 Words  | 2 Pages

    For example, a desire to protect the real perpetrator is not necessarily always voluntary – the false confessor might be pressured by other people to ‘take the blame’. Kassin (1998) suggested a modification of the model by adding the source of coercion. Whether internal, custodial or non-custodial. This typology categorizes different types of false confessions (voluntary, coerced-compliant and coerced-internalized) and distinguishes between the source of coercion (internal, custodial and non-custodial). Gudjonsson (2006) suggested replacing the word coerced with the word pressure and not to use it when there is no sign of pressure. For example, the confession of a man who walks into a police station and confesses to a high profile murder which he did not commit would be classified as voluntary and internally

    Read More

  • Parasomnia

    1529 Words  | 4 Pages

    Cartwright, R.D. (1978) A primer on Sleep and Dreaming. Massachusetts : Addison - Wesley, Publishing, Company

    Read More

  • Artificial Intelligence

    1894 Words  | 4 Pages

    It is necessary to look at the development of artificial intelligence in order to put this idea into context. The concept of intelligent and aware constructs began to emerge in the 1950s and 60s as several scientists in many fields came together to discuss the possibilities of advanced computer research. The first major step was a scientific conference at Dartmouth College in 1956. Here, the general concepts and possible paths of research for a.i. were fleshed out. As described in Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach, this conference was “the birth of artificial intelligence.” This was mostly a theoretical stage yet attending experts predicted that with a huge investment, working technology could be available in a generation (16). After being officially established, a.i. research and discovery exploded. Computer programs, a brand new idea, were already conquering algebra problems and speech recognition. Some could even reproduce English (18). It was clear that artificial intelligence research was going to be at the fo...

    Read More

  • Theories About Dreams

    947 Words  | 2 Pages

    All over the world different people, scientists, and civilizations have different dream theories. For instance, the Senoi tribe in Malaysia has a fascinating tradition of dream telling. Every morning the people of the tribe begin their day by discussing and interpreting their dreams with each other. The children, as they grow older, actually learn to control their dreams by simply wishing bad dreams into positive ones. It is observed that, by paying tribute their dreams, the people of the Senoi tribe learn to have faith in themselves. Also, they have very few, if any, mental problems “could working constructively with dreams be part of the answer” to mental issues? (Peirce)

    Read More

  • The History Of Dreams: Informative Essay On Dreams

    708 Words  | 2 Pages

    Where do dreams come from? What actually are dreams? Do they mean something that is related in our real lives? All these questions can be answered by learning about the history of dreams in various cultures throughout time.

    Read More

  • The Psychology of Religion

    1536 Words  | 4 Pages

    William Benton. Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc., 1952. 767-806. Print Freud, Sigmund. “The Interpretation of Dreams.”

    Read More

  • Impacts of WTO on Trading Countries

    1293 Words  | 3 Pages

    International trading has had its delays and road blocks, which has created a number of problems for countries around the world. Countries, fighting with one another to get the better deal, create tariffs and taxes to maximize their profit. This fighting leads to bad relationships with competing countries, and the little producing countries get the short end of this stick. Regulations and organizations have been established to help everyone get the best deal, such as the World Trade Organization (WTO), but not everyone wants help, especially from an organization that seems to help only the big countries and those they want to trade with. This paper will be discussing international trading with emphasis on national sovereignty, the World Trade Organization, and how the WTO impacts trading countries.

    Read More

  • Sleeping and Dreaming

    4847 Words  | 10 Pages

    The Ancient Greeks had surprise dream encounters with their gods. Native Americans turned to their dreams for guidance in life. Shamans dreamed in order to gather information from the spirits. Sleep and dreams define eras, cultures, and individuals. Sigmund Freud’s interpretation of dreams revolutionized twentieth-century thought.

    Read More

  • The Reality of Dreams

    862 Words  | 2 Pages

    In the novel, Waiting for the Barbarians by J.M Coetzee, the magistrate’s progressive, non-linear dreams are a parallel to his growing involvement with the barbarians and his growing distaste for the empire. The great psychoanalyst, Sigmund Freud said, “The interpretation of dreams is the royal road to a knowledge of the unconscious.” In every dream there is a hidden meaning and when the reader starts analyzing the magistrate’s dreams he reveals that he is oddly attracted to the barbarians and knows he should not get involved and it will be a trial to get close to them.

    Read More

  • Unraveling the Intricacies of Dreams

    1163 Words  | 3 Pages

    Dreams are series of thoughts, images, and sensations occurring in a person’s mind during sleep. Dreams occur during a certain stage of sleep known as REM. Several different psychologists, including Freud and Hobson, have studied dreams. Psychologists have provided many theories as to what dreams are and the meanings behind them.

    Read More

  • Analysis Of Dreams From My Father

    1463 Words  | 3 Pages

    Obama’s quest for the meaning of his absent father’s role in his life becomes a search for his own identity in his autobiography Dreams From My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance. Serving as a haunting presence in Obama’s life, Obama desires to recover a lost father-son relationship. Stemming from the nostalgia Obama feels towards his father due to the lost connection between them Obama matures with two primary voids in his life. The subtitle of the autobiography sums up the two voids within Obama, which are his race and his inheritance. While the title of the autobiography presents Obama’s memories as dreams. Uncovering the meaning of both the title and the subtitle of the autobiography one can further understand Obama’s connection to

    Read More

More about Dreams and Their Interpretation

Open Document