In the dreamworld

A beautiful mind

How many times have you woken up from a dream terrified, confused, amused or elated?

How many times have you remembered your dream in parts and forgotten about it shortly thereafter or been fascinated enough to continue thinking about it the whole day?

Then there are extreme cases where a recurring dream starts to bother the dreamer and he or she has to consult an expert.

Dreams occur mainly during the rapid-eye movement (REM) stage of sleep when brain activity is high and resembles that of being awake. They can last for a few seconds or as long as 20 minutes. The average person has about three to five dreams per night and in a span of the full-eight hour sleep, two hours are spent dreaming.

Pulkit Sharma, Clinical Psychologist and Psychoanalytical Therapist at VIMHANS says, “Dreams are windows to the deepest recesses of human mind. Humans have an unconscious part of the mind which stores hidden wishes, desires, fears, hopes, traits and potentials that they find unacceptable real life.

These are pushed out of their waking awareness. While sleeping, though, the conscious mind also falls asleep and the contents from the unconscious mind become free to pervade the awareness.”

He cites the example of a 31-year-old unmarried woman who approached him with a recurring bad dream. She would see herself pushing her father into a large tumbler of hot boiling soup and wake up terrified and guilty of having dreamt such a thing.

During therapy, it was revealed that she had suffered indifference and isolation from her parents as the third girl child of the family. On growing up, she was forced to take up home science instead of engineering for further studies. It was concluded that the dream was a manifestation of her sad family experience, and she was healed to a large extent in the continuing therapy sessions.

Angelene Kaur, another clinical psychologist informs, “The images and symbols that we see in our dreams are significant in interpreting them. Carl Jung, student of Sigmund Freud- the founding father of psychoanalysis, put forth eight symbols and their meanings in dreams.

First is the ‘persona’- how we see ourself in public, second is the ‘shadow’ which represents repressed desires, third are the ‘masculine/feminine symbols’: every man has a feminine side to him and every woman has a masculine side to herself too. So, for example, if a woman grows a beard in her dream, it means that her masculine side may be repressed.”

“Then there is the ‘divine child.’ If one sees himself or herself as a playing child, it could mean that he or she feels the loss of childhood or playfulness in life. The ‘wise old man’ in a dream is the guide, the ‘great mother’ the nurturer and lastly, the ‘trickster’ embarrasses us by showing us dreams like standing in public without clothes.”

However, the ultimate meaning of a symbol rests with how the dreamer wants to see it, says Angelene. She gives the example of a married woman who had just passed through a time of marital strife but was now happy in her household.

She dreamt that her husband was getting her married to someone and was yet not scared of the dream. The reason she gave to Angelene was that she understood marriage to be a ‘new beginning’ and by this dream she felt that she and her husband were now making a new
beginning together.