Dream Journal

Journal of Psychology Research, 2015

This paper examines a diminished capacity for dreaming and communicating one's dreams in a psychoanalysis therapy. This diminished capacity is related to depression and to one of its possible causes-traumatic experiences. In order to give theoretical support to these ideas, Sigmund Freud's concepts on the interpretation of dreams are presented, together with contemporary review of his contributions. The discussion reveals that traumas can cause impoverishment of one's ability to construct mental representations of one's experiences and also produce a condition that appears as a depressive state, which includes therefore a diminished ability to dream, showing that the function of dreaming as elaboration of intense psychical excitation is paralysed. All this is addressed in a clinical vignette from a psychoanalytical treatment.

Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association, 1992

We present a brief review of sleep research which, when combined with psychoanalytic experience, has led to the hypothesis that REM sleep and dreaming serve the function of adaptation by the process of integration of information. We then report the results of a study of dreams, based on this hypothesis. We studied dreams and their relation to waking mental activity and found a correlation between problems in manifest dreams and those in preand postsleep waking life. Dreams can be understood on the basis of problems that appear in them. We also found evidence for a relation between the solution of problems in dreams and the fate of those problems the next day. We discuss these findings in relation to some of the controversies about dreaming, and then present suggestions for future research.

2004

Although a potentially helpful therapeutic tool, dream interpretation or dream work is only used occasionally in most forms of psychotherapy. Despite an interest from clinicians and clients alike in using dreams within therapy, many therapists feel unprepared to attend to their clients’ dreams. The main goals of this article are to make clinicians aware that integrating dreams into their clinical practice is both accessible and potentially valuable and to allow them to make an informed decision as to what role they want dream work to play in therapy. The paper begins with a brief overview of some of the more common approaches to dream work. The literature on the usefulness and effectiveness of the clinical use of dreams is then reviewed. Finally, based on the integration of the clinical and empirical literature, several guidelines for conducting dream work are presented. D 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Journal of Analytical Psychology, 2003

Abstract This study examines therapists’ dreams about their patients from the Jungian and the relational perspectives. Few clinical and empirical references to this subject are to be found in the literature. In the present study 31 dreams were collected from 22 therapists. Dreams were collected using anonymous self-report inventory. The research focused on three theoretical research questions: 1. What themes appear in the manifest content of therapists’ dreams about their patients? 2. What contributions are made by Jungian interpretation of therapists’ dreams about their patients? 3. To what extent are masochistic contents present in the manifest content of therapists’ dreams about their patients?The first question was addressed using categorical content analysis of a) themes common to different dreams and b) pre-determined themes for all dreams. The third research question was addressed using Beck's (1967)‘Masochistic Dream’ measure. Results: Among the themes common to different dreams were: therapist-patient role reversal; therapist and/or patient attends and remains in meeting, departs/doesn’t depart; cancellation of therapy session; sexuality between therapist and patient; aggression; presence vs. absence; non-verbal relationship and communication; time; driving vs. stopping. With regard to pre-determined themes it was found that in 20 of the 31 dreams, the therapist had a negative experience and was characterized as vulnerable. Likewise it was found that 26 out of 31 dreams took place in either a) a street, a road, a route, a corridor; b) en route to somewhere; c) a therapy room and/or building; d) a house. With regard to the contribution of Jungian interpretations of the dreams it was found that 17 of the dreams had diagnostic and prognostic elements, 4 of which were initial dreams, 9 of them were compensatory dreams and in 14 it was found that the patient represents the shadow of the therapist. With regard to the third question it was found that 18 of the 31 dreams met Beck's (1967) criteria for masochistic dreams. The theoretical discussion examines the findings from a Jungian perspective, with an emphasis on also understanding the dream in terms of its expression of relational aspects of the therapist-patient relationship. The findings affirm the presence of the ‘wounded healer’ archetypes in therapists’ dreams about their patients. The results of the study indicate that therapists’ dreams about their patients can be a valuable tool for deepening understanding of the therapeutic relationship and process.

Psychoanalytic …, 2008

Forty-seven psychoanalytic therapists completed a questionnaire about dream work. Overall, results indicated that therapists had very positive attitudes toward dreams, worked with their own dreams, sought out dream training, and felt competent working with dreams. Therapists estimated that they worked with dreams with about half of their clients about half of the time in psychotherapy. They were most willing to work with dreams when clients had recurrent or troubling dreams or nightmares, were psychologically minded, were seeking growth, were interested in dreams, and were willing to work with dreams.

International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 2010

introduced the panel by commending the fact that every IPA Congress contains presentations on dreams in the analytic session: which psychic creation contains more authenticity, more interconnections between desires and needs, and between life and death? Analysts are pleased by dreams that poetically open up to the patient all the aspects of his psychic apparatus. It happened that all the panellists chose to speak on how to approach the anxiety generated by dreams in the session; it was therefore on this difficult and highly topical aspect that the moderator focused the discussion.

International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 2002

The International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 2020

Using conversation analysis of audio recorded psychoanalytic sessions, this article investigates dream interpretation as conversational practice. We focus on the ways in which the "real world" meanings of objects or events in the dream are collaboratively created. Three routes for the meaning creation were found. (1) In plain assertions, either the analyst or the patient asserts the meaning of a dream element, for example stating that the cow in the dream means women. (2) In meaning creation through redescription, the analyst describes anew events belonging to the real world or the dream, which have been referred to in the earlier conversation. This redescription makes possible the subsequent assertion of explicit linkages between the dream and the real world. In the merging of referential worlds, the analyst extends the patient's real-world description with images that are recognisably from the dream: the world of the dream and the real world are thus momentarily merged. In discussion, we point out that in our audio recorded data, the dream interpretation does not primarily involve revealing repressed and unconscious ideas, but rather it involves reminding the patient of something that the patient already knows but is reluctant to think or talk about.

American Journal of Psychotherapy, 2006

A disturbed sleep pattern, nightmares, and anxiety-filled dreams form a cluster of symptoms belonging to the DSM-IV diagnosis of Post-traumatic Stress Disorder. A psychotherapeutic group approach aimed at reducing thes symptoms was undertaken in the form of a workshop. The workshop was not a regular part of the treatment program, but an experimental endeavor, offered to the patients during special occasions in the year (around holidays). The therapist was primarily interested in investigating possibilities for improving the quality of sleep and influencing the patterns of recurring anxiety-filled dreams and nightmares. The method has both structured and psychodynamic elements. The work carried out during the dream group was embedded in the total treatment program. This was crucial to allow personal themes to be continued in the regular treatment program.