Dreams By Ed Struzik: A Psychological Analysis

People forget ninety present of all dreams. Sleep can produce a state of unconsciousness were the mind and brain apparently turn off the functions. Some people even have premonition dreams where they dream about something is going to happen. Like when Abraham Lincoln dreamed of his assassination and many victims of nine eleven had dreams warning them. So it seems that dreams try to warn you and get you ready. Showing the dreams-for-survival theory explains why people have dreams and why they are important.

The average person spends more than one-third of their life sleeping, and over this period of time he or she can have as many as 1,825 dreams (Wicklinski). By definition, dreams are mental images, thoughts, or emotions that are experienced while sleeping. In the beginning, dreams were thought to be messages sent from the gods or spirit world. Researchers now have many theories explaining why people dream. Many of these theories believe that dreams can resemble an individual’s sensory experiences or even secret wishes. All people dream, but only forty-two percent can recall their dreams from the night before (“Dreams”). Dreaming is important because it can impact people’s health, provide insight into what they are feeling, and reveal

I wrote this paper to get a better understanding of Sigmund Freud’s method and theory of dream analysis. The purpose of the paper will be to show the principals of Freud’s dream related theory that focuses on the physiology, interpretation, and psychology of dreams and to explain concepts such as latent and manifest content of dreams, the part of unconscious process, and the nature of dreams role in the determination of dream content. I would like to explore Sigmund Freud’s explanations of psycho-analytic and psychological theory and method to reveal whether Freud’s continuous revising to sexually based conclusions are able to support his own arguments. One of his themes was the amount of activity that goes on in our brains without us even

To many people, dreams are the thoughts that occur while sleeping, having almost mystic qualities. For millennia the significance of dreams has escaped even the brightest of philosophers and intellectuals. Many people have speculated about why people dream and what meanings the dreams have but in recent times two theories have gained credibility in answering those questions. The first theory is Sigmund Freuds and the other is known as the cognitive theory of dreams also known as biological determinism.

Both Freud and Jung provided important and interesting theories on dreams; encompassing their functions, their roots, and their meanings. Freud looked at dreams as a result of repressed memories, particularly repressed sexual memories from our childhood. Jung however, believed that dreams delved beyond sexual repression during younger years, to other problems, be it trauma, anxiety etc. Jung also believed dreams changed predominately through middle adult years, while Freud believed the opposite. There is little empirical evidence to reinforce either Freud or Jung’s theories, however, their contributions to the study of dreams in psychology cannot be lessened or denied.

Freud also listed the following results from his studies, dreams can have multiple layers of meaning, nearly all dreams are wish-fulfilling, and all dreams have a unifying motive that accounts for all random images and events. Freud concluded that dreams are the way an individual 's unconscious mind tries to express itself and that dreams “may only have a chance of reaching our consciousness if they are somewhat disguised”. Which explains the sometimes absurd and bizarre dreams that someone can get. Sigmund Freud uses the following analogy to explain his theory, “a political writer may criticize a ruler, but in doing so may endanger himself. The writer therefore has to fear the ruler’s censorship, and in doing so “moderates and distorts the expression of his opinion”. The writer serves to represent the unconscious mind, while the ruler is the conscious mind that stops an individual from doing certain things. Dreams and daydreams are practically synonymous, except dreams occur when an individual sleeps, and daydreams are when the person is awake, but both allow for the mind to wander, so the theory can apply to both, but Freud mainly focuses on the aspects of dreams.

Dreams are primarily stories and images our mind build while we are asleep. Dreams can make you feel happy, sad or scared. They can be sometimes vivid or sometimes seems

     An individual’s unconscious mind combines bits and pieces of information and places them together. Dreams are almost always visual. “Forty to fifty percent of dreams have some form of communication present in them and a very small percentage of dreams give the dreamer the ability to use his or her five senses”(Encarta). Dreams allow one to take a closer look into their mind in a quest for self-discovery. In ancient Greece dreams were believed to be messages from the gods. Hippocrates and Aristotle believed that dreams contained physiological information that may be cause of future illnesses. Dreams can be used to solve a number of different types of problems. In The Interpretation of Dreams, by Sigmund Freud he states “As regards the dream, all the troubles of waking life are transferred by it to the sleeping

What are dreams? For different people this question will warrant a different answer. Some see them as a view into their own unconscious thoughts. Others may not dream at all, or they simply don’t remember having any. There have been many different theories developed on why we dream. They study what happens in your brain as you sleep as well as how your actions are influenced by the dreams. These dreams often have much deeper meanings that influence us in our daily lives

Dream analysis has undeniable benefits within the realm of therapy, but is by no means restricted to use in therapy. Details in dreams can represent larger ideas in a person’s life, details which can uncover the truth. A person’s dreams are knit very closely with that person’s thoughts, morals, and life. Therefore, dreams speak truth about a person; these truths can be the key that opens closed doors. Vital memories seemingly lost can be re-acquired through dream work which can improve everyday life.

Dreaming is said to be something that is very important to us as a human. Freud believe that dreams help us get into the unconscious material. When in the process of doing dream analysis the patient will talk about their manifest dreams which are the dreams the patient can remember. Once they have done this the therapist will find symbols that were said and then use those symbols to find meaning to

Sigmund Freud believed dreams to be the royal road to the unconscious and I’ve come to agree with this based on personal experience. Sigmund Freud saw the mind as an iceberg mostly submerged in water. The tip of this iceberg represented the conscious part of the ego and a small portion of the super-ego. While everything below the water was, unconscious including the Id and the rest of the super-ego. Freud believed that within the frozen core of this solitary iceberg were wishes so disgusting, horrifying and painful that they had to be repressed by the practical ego and pious superego for their own safety. However, these wishes were important to the id, our most primal and instinctive part of the psyche. These wishes while vile to the ego, are still necessary to be a whole person. However, the iceberg only allowed these vile wishes to ascend when the pressure was lowed from the higher functions. Freud saw that sleep as the moment of lowed pressure on the Id. This was due lowered ego defenses during times of rest. However, these defenses functioned enough to disguise the wishes somewhat though the process of

“Dreams are a series of images, ideas, emotions, and sensations occurring involuntarily in the mind during certain stages of sleep.” This is the true definition of what dreams are according to Free Dictionary.com. Although many people are unaware of how dreams actually work there are two psychologists that have been able to pinpoint the true meaning of dreams. These two men are Carl Jung and Sigmund Freud. There are many different perceptions on how people dream, what dreams mean, and why people dream.

According to an interview with Jessica Seth, who is a psychology teacher, defines dreams as, “an unaltered state of consciousness and are thoughts, images, and visuals that are occuring in your mind while you are sleeping.” Jessica Seth would have this perspective because she is a psychology teacher and in psychology they analyze why are dreams happen, what do the dreams we have mean, and how it has an impact on our own lives. The definition of the word dreams have shifted because we have aspirations, hopes, and goals and we can see these goals occuring in our dreams. Jessica Seth also says, “dreams have an affect on how we act, behave, and contemplate the world.” A lot of people nowadays take dreams that occur in our sleep as messages. If something positive happens in a dream, a majority of people may take that as if something exciting is going to happen in your

In his book, Modern Man In Search Of A Soul, C.G. Jung gives a layperson insight into his ideas on dream analysis. Jung's primary objective in this book is to educate the reader as to what a psychoanalyst does when analyzing a patient's dreams. The principal message in the section of the book centered on dream analysis is that dreams should never stand alone. Dreams are meaningless in a vacuum, but on the other hand when put against a strict set of rules, they are oftentimes misunderstood. The unconscious is a fluid entity and cannot be handled either in isolation or with a static set of guidelines. Dreams are reflections of the unconscious and can represent many different things inside of