YOU AND YOUR DREAMS: GUIDE TO UNDERSTANDING DREAMS

YOU AND YOUR DREAMS:

GUIDE TO UNDERSTANDING DREAMS.

Dreams represent one of the oldest mysteries of life and even today they are still mysteries to millions of people worldwide. The phenomenon of dreams was probably what convinced man thousands of years ago, of the duality of man, I e, that man possessed a counterpart called soul by which man was able to have the night experiences called dreams.

While many people consult so-called experts for assistance in interpreting their dreams and explaining the possible  consequences to them, many others believe that dreams are mere fantasies that people should not worry about. In reality, and in most cases, dreams reflect our deepest desires, plans, expectations, fears, and frustrations – what we could term our ‘inner or private face’ which emerges through our subconscious when we are asleep.

Lynn Picknett in the book, “Dreams: The Pathway to Your Dreams,” said that “In our waking state, we often try to adjust our behaviour to fit with others or with different situations that we find ourselves.” That is, we adapt our public face to suit various situations, although we may not always be aware that we are doing it. Adapting our public face to suit various situations, tends to be our second nature.” In the dream state, we cannot do that. We are face to

face with our conscience. Which face then – private or public – gives the true picture of what we are? Which face then reflects our true nature?

1. Definition: A dream is an imagery or scene experienced during sleep with visual, auditory, emotional, and other sensory characteristics. The dream may be vague, transitional or lucid, but it is an important and unconscious side of man’s psyche.
2. CHARACTERISTICS OF DREAMS.

Dreams are characterised by the following ideas:

• Dreams take place in ordinary physical settings. They are occasionally exotic or peculiar.
• Dreams are based on the individual’s life experiences.
• Dreams are egocentric.
• Dreams are sometimes characterised by sudden transitions.
• They are often accompanied by rapid eye movement (REM).

3. BASIC IDEAS ESSENTIAL TO UNDERSTANDING DREAMS.

Since dreams are important for man’s consideration, what are the basic ideas essential to understanding them? The idea that dreams are fantasies arose out of:

(1) Ignorance of the dream structure.

(2) A belief that nothing exists unless tangible to the physical senses.

Some basic ideas, knowledge of which assists in understanding dreams are

stated below:

        DREAM STRUCTURE:

The dream is more often than not, a drama of the night with three major characters, namely:

• The Dreamer: This is the person who dreams.
• The Message: The message is couched in symbols to form the imagery.
• The Director: This is the Subconscious Mind. He selected the appropriate symbols from the billions in the memory for the message. Every dreamer should make effort to understand his symbols and the dream.

         THINKING, SYMBOLS and EXPERIENCE.

Thinking. We naturally think and express ourselves in terms of symbols using our faculties of reasoning, memory recall and classification, etc. Most of our thoughts are made up of a combination of many simple ideas though we do not often realize this. A thought of somebody or place, for example, may consist of simple ideas of name, height, colour, sound, or a combination of some or all of these

Symbols. Symbols form the language of the dream. A symbol is a sign or device intended to represent one or more ideas. Symbols are a part of everyday life. Symbols express extensive ideas in a simple way. You cannot describe an

article as red or blue to a blind man because he would have no ideas from his memory, to correspond with such colours, never having experienced them visually. Similarly, you cannot describe certain musical notes to a man born

deaf because he would have no corresponding ideas to realise what is being described. As well known, and accepted, a picture is worth a thousand words. The pictures in dreams are symbols representing people, places, things, actions

and events which the subconscious mind uses to express the message to the dreamer.

Life Experiences. We conceive of incidents only in terms of our life experiences, i e, in terms of the facts, cultures, and symbols that we have stored in our memory from childhood up to the present. Our cultures are composed of stories, myths, and fairy tales which we learn from childhood up to adulthood. We also recall an incident from memory composed of these symbols in a sleep state while dreaming. The events, people, and objects of our experiences may become symbols that stand for and express our realizations, aspirations, reactions, and responses to various issues in life.

GENERAL BELIEF.

WRONG: The general belief that the images or symbols experienced during dreams mean the same thing for all people is wrong.

RIGHT: The correct position is that images or symbols experienced during sleep mean different things for different people. Also whatever images or symbols experienced in dreams may or may not mean the same thing seen with the physical eyes during wakefulness.

2. CONSCIOUSNES AND THE MENTAL PROCESSES.

4.1 Objective senses and objective consciousness. Through the five objective senses, I e, seeing, hearing, feeling, tasting, and smelling, we are aware of our environment when we are awake. When we are asleep our awareness of externality is mostly through symbols.

4.2 Subjective consciousness. During some short periods, we temporarily interchange our consciousness from the objective to the subjective state. During these short periods, we reason, recollect, imagine, etc., and carry out some of the processes involved with these acts.

4.3 Subconscious Mind and Subconsciousness. When we are fully asleep, we are in a perfect psychic and/or spiritual state; The psychic self or the Inner Self makes contacts, goes to places, and does some work such as repairing the damage done to the body, through bad habits, actions, or behaviour, and bad feeding etc, without one being objectively aware of all of these.

→These three processes – objective, subjective, and subconscious, come into play during the process of dreaming.

4.4 Place of occurrence of dreams.

A partial degree of wakefulness constitutes a borderline state. This state is the mental and psychic condition where the objective consciousness and the objective mental functioning merge with the subconscious. During those few seconds, there is exchange of impressions between the psychic consciousness and the outer objective consciousness. During the short period, one may dream a long story or have an experience. This level is of short duration, during which the Subconscious Mind may be passing a message to the objective mind (you), information concerning the body, about:

(1) The environment in which he is sleeping or living;

(2) The state of his health;

(3) His plans, desires, and any information that is relevant to him.

(4) Any relevant message from an outside source, whether pleasant or unpleasant.

N.B: In our next write-up, we will explain various types of dreams, the sources and the importance.

Akin Akinfe.