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Essay about Anxiety Dreams: Sigmund Freud

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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 …show more content…

The dream may represent Peter’s wish to break up so that he does not have to take the next step in our relationship and deal with this uncertainty. He also does not feel like he can do the breaking up and so the dream allows his wish to be fulfilled without him having to do anything: I am the one who cheats, giving him a good excuse. According to Freud, a wish like Peter’s “can disguise itself behind the worry that has become active during the day” (483). So, since Peter constantly worries about moving in and knows things would be easier if they continued as they are, he dreams about getting his wish, not moving in, and also gets his wish of not having to act on his wish himself. The anxiety comes from the fact that Peter would consciously acknowledge both these desires as wrong. After talking with Peter about his dream and giving him this interpretation, he confirms that he may really want to wait to move in. Peter says that he loves me and really does want to move in; he’s only nervous about it. After discussing his worries and fears he says that he doesn’t want to let his fears hold us back as a couple. By analyzing this dream, Peter was forced to confront his unconscious wishes, things he consciously does not want, and deal with them. Things are much better between us and he says he feels more comfortable about taking the next step. Another example of how feelings that a person might try ignore or not even take note of can

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