Dreams and relevant interpretation I suggest
To make it absolutely white again, I decide to immerse it in the sea water and, as the object belongs to me, I will also immerse myself into the sea to make sure that the operation is successful. I am quite decided to do so and I do not care at all of the other people’s opinion.
Anyone following a
psychotherapy is often asked by his/her relatives and friends: "Haven’t you
finished yet?", "You are becoming analyst-dependant", "Analysis is
like a drug to you", "You should make it alone", "You could spend that
money in a better way" and so on.
These criticisms are very dangerous as they feed doubts, uncertainties and, mainly, the
resistances that sooner or later patients feel emerging from their own inner part. It does
not change the situation the fact that almost always these criticisms are worded by
persons fearing the idea of facing an analysis. Patients do not know it and, unknowing it,
they are afraid of appearing incapable in the eyes of those who live around them.
Incapable as well as a "silly fool" that anyone can skin like a fowl.
The ensuing consequence is that interrupting
the ongoing analyis is a temptation staying always in ambush, waiting for the propitious
opportunity of changing into a true decision.
Luckily, the dream describes a completely different situation in this case: the patient
knows what she wants (absolute white) and she is ready to get it regardless of what her
friends say. She has already obtained some partial results but she wants something more
and, above all, she has understood that she cannot attain her scope unless she immerses
herself in the unconscious (sea), it is not sufficient to immerse the object only.
A shore borders on the sea therefore only a very small distance is to be covered to reach it. This allows to forecast that the "washing" operation will be successful.
Dream No.177 A furious altercation breaks out with a colleague of mine. I scream my rage in his face. He is bewildered and I am satisfied with this result. He has got on my nerves! When an analyst says that outing emotions is good, nearly always patients objects: "But should I mash my boss’ face in, hit my mother…set fire to the car of the lodger living on the flat above mine?".
No, this would make the situation worse, it wouldn’t solve it. Emotions can freely come up during our dreams as they did in this case, and in a much better way because during a dream we can freely skin live persons, pull their nails out or roast them on a slow fire and enjoy seeing them suffering. All this with not even the least harm to anybody. All this would be impossible in real life. All this with no prejudice to our relationship with anybody. On the contrary, the incredible result is that the satisfaction and vent thus obtained produce a remarkable improvement of our "real" relationship with the involved person. The trend of some psychology schools is to let patients act out their emotions aiming them at "substitutive" targets, such as pillows, towels, mattresses, etc.
In this regard I want to tell you a personal anecdote. Once I was attending a seminar, held in a hotel, with the scope of providing examples of the above mentioned methods, Well, at a certain point a waiter rushed in, he was very much startled by some woman’s screams he heard coming from the room where we were gathered: it was a woman that "was outing her emotions" that way.
It is out of my intention to question the real effectiveness of these methods, I just want to say that, as far as I am concerned, I prefer to use nutcrackers rather than an iron tup. To my taste, this is far too noisy.
Dream No.178 Published as received: I find your dream survey very interesting and, as I am extremely curious, I wonder whether you are willing or have some spare time to interpret a few dreams of mine. Until some time ago, when I had just awakened or even when I woke up during the night, I used to minute the dreams I had just had down on a piece of paper purposely placed on my bedside table, to avoid the risk that my dream evaporated by the time I found a piece of paper and a pencil.
As a result I have a collection of about twenty dreams, some of them are distressful, others exciting, others full of hopes, and others tied to my childhood.
Now I can’t go on minuting them down because I have no longer five-ten minutes to spare in the morning to quietly concentrate on recollecting my dream and write it.
I had the dream I am sending to you during the night of May 4th,
1998. I will much appreciate if you will kindly interpret this dream and include it in
your dreams showcase. In case you can’t, I wish anyhow to convey you my best
compliments for the most interesting and valuable work you are making.
Kind regards.
We try to cross the lines but trains do not show signs of slowing down and we are compelled to rush backwards to avoid being run down. So we decide to leave that place and climb up a slope in order to go round the lines and reach the street farther on. But the way is not an easy one, the slope being steep and covered with wet grass.
At a certain point we have to overcome a small torrent having a very strong stream: we cannot find a way to overcome it with no risks (note – it recalls me a recurrent dream I had when I was a boy: being in the countryside I got too near the edge of a large and deep ditch where I slowly slipped inside with no possibility of coming out again).
We stay there, without going further on. You feel you have to do something important. If not, you would give up this task and forget about it, on the contrary you make various attempts to succeed. Your passage to the subsequent stage of your growing process is most likely involved. You feel you have to reach the other side but you are blocked by the (alleged, not real) risk connected to the operation.
The lines in your dream represent the flowing lines of life. The tram-train is a metaphor for life itself: birth is the starting station, death is the arrival station, the intermediate stops are the partial targets we reach, people getting up and down the train are the persons we accidentally meet along our way, some of them stay with us for a short time, others up to the end.
A few elements should be noted:
-
A blade is placed in front of
EACH train, therefore you feel a continuous, systematic danger, not an occasional risk.
- This BLADE, however, is actually a safety platform for pedestrians. This drops the interpretation given at the beginning, namely a wicked and persecutory intent (a blade CUTS). Its scope is meant to be helpful rather than cruel! The situation is anyway dramatic but now it is framed in an opposite background versus the one that was imagined at the beginning.
- Compared with the recurrent dream you had at the time you were a boy, the situation is much better now: there, you fell down and were unable to get out, the situation was ineluctable; here, you have the "not to enter" option. Although not optimal, the situation has remarkably improved.
- The meaning of water in dreams is familiar to anybody who was patient enough to follow me so far.
- Only a regular work on dreams could allow the emotions frightening you so much and blocking your growing process to come up.
At last, your fright at the trains fitted with a blade in front can be easily understood but is it appropriate to be blocked by a SMALL torrent? However strong its stream is, it is always a SMALL torrent!
Dream No.179 John arrived… he handed a written piece of paper over to me saying that by now I had my diploma as well as my customers, then he added: "Now do your best".
I was annoyed because the sense of his speech was that now I owned everything I needed, either the diploma and, another essential element, the customers. So the time had come for me to work without losing time or fishing for excuses. The patient that had this dream is facing some difficulties in tearing himself away from his "mother’s apron-strings" (analyst) to start walking on his own legs. He feels that his analysis is about to come to the end but he beats about the bush, he tries to extend it longer in order to benefit from the analyst’s support. His unconscious, however, knows the exact situation, it knows that now the patient owns all that he needs to go on by himself, therefore it urges him to "do his best", come out of the cocoon and face life without beating about the bush!
You too may have heard of the following criticism to psychotherapy: "In the end one becomes analyst-dependant". Here it is, this dreams belies this much widespread prejudice in an inequivocal way.
It is true, on one side the patient would like to keep leaning on the crutch represented by the analyst but, on the other side, the opposite trend appears (John) urging him to byke since now he owns a byke. There is no need to specify which trend a skilful and honest analyst will promote.A few years ago, the Italian television broadcast a series of TV
interviews to famous persons that had followed a psychotherapy. Amongst the others the
actress Adriana Asti was interviewed and, after specifying that her analyst was the
renowed Cesare Musatti, she added: "Anybody going to an analyst thinks nothing, does
nothing without him, one is fully dependant, and this is a most beautiful thing".
I can quote her words because I have kept the recorded cassette. Well, in my opinion it
would be quite difficult to better describe what a psychotherapy IS NOT and SHOULD NOT BE!
Don’t ask me why Adriana Asti spoke those words. I do not know, nor it is my
intention to dare making assumptions.
Dream No.180 I am in a tropical country, in front of the sea. The place is fenced, it seems a harbour. I am on the shore with my cousin G… who invites me to bathe and swim. In my dream he gives me the impression of a good swimmer inviting me to do something I am afraid of and that I can’t do very well. Then, after a more careful thought I realize that I can do it. I imagine myself bathing in deep water and rolling in it.
..........…
During this same episode, I sudden flash comes to my mind, a picture opens up. I see a large board where a bare woman laying on her belly and crawling up to a hill is portrayed. I am behind the woman and in front of her I am holding a small butterfly fastened to a rod through a long string.
The woman shows a sense of pain and fatigue. On the contrary, I have a kidding attitude.
The first part of the dream shows both the blockage of an action as a consequence of a fear caused by a feeling of incapability, and the subsequent overcoming this blockage after gaining awareness of one’s own capability.The second part shows the revenge that the involved patient takes on women in general. The need of a revenge ensues from the way this man considers women in real life, namely powerful figures from which protection and care can be obtained.
He considers them mighty but he also envies them because of their power. And he hates them because they force him to feel the sting of frustration and impotence. He takes revenge of all this by humiliating the woman, imaginating her crawling and fatiguing, bare naked. And, on top of this, he kids her.
Dream No.181 I am in love with a man but he loves another woman and I accept this situation taking it for granted, as if he were married to that woman. One evening we go to theatre together and after the performance he tells me that it is all over with the other woman. I am happy because now I have another chance.
A great, very sweet, very beautiful, filial tenderness is felt throughout the dream. I caress his hand. And somebody denies that the Oedipus complex exists!
Dream No.182 Published as received: First of all, I like your site, it is essential, quick and helpful.
I am P… and this year I enrolled myself at the course of Psychology at the University of Cagliari, Sardinia.
Tonight I had a dream which is puzzling me. I have my personal interpretation hereof but I prefer not to tell you to avoid influencing your opinion. I thank you in advance.
I was by the sea, at
the Poetto beach (Cagliari beach), and in my hand I was holding a bomb that was more
similar to a maverik with its fins and a red-colored face. The bomb was brown.
At first I let the bomb move freely in the water and since it was approaching some
children I rushed to take it back. Then everything became dark and I was swimming holding
the bomb in my arms, a stone in my hands and a string to fasten the bomb to the stone and
make it drown.
I was struck by the absolute blackness wrapping me around but I was not scared.
While the bomb was going down to the bottom of the sea, I saw some approaching lights on
my right. It was a bus taking a curve at high speed and passing under the "Sella del
Diavolo" (Devil’s saddle) (a promontory in Cagliari). At this point I came out
of the water and I woke up feeling that I had made a mistake.
You are in the water, in the sea, so this aggressiveness is still at unconscious level and seems to aim at children (competition amongst brothers?) since it moves towards them when you let it free. At that point you worry and take it back, that is you take it back inside yourself and try to bury it even deeper in your unconscious.
This, however, is not the appropriate solution if we wish a bomb to become harmless!
The only way to achieve this result, in fact, is to look for bomb-disposal experts as they are the ones that know how to DEFUSE a bomb without causing harm. Hiding it is of no use.
This may be the mistake that, when you wake up, you feel you have made.
I am not going to tell you which are the bomb-disposal experts that can set you free from your bomb…
P.S. – I do know the Poetto area and its rose-colored sand. I spent one year living in the barracks at Calamosca. Maybe they are no longer there now.
Dream No.183 Published as received: Hi Romano,
I hope you don’t dislike my thouing you, I am doing so because I noticed that in your exchange of messages with other persons you do not care about formalism and prefer a straight, colloquial approach.
I am…, aged…, I am a civil servant and am quite satisfied with my work.
I came across your site through Yahoo!. My compliments for the clear and straight style you use to set forth your theses that can be easily understood also by anybody that although extremely interested in the oneiric world and the meanders of psychoanalysis approaches these with no proper skill, like me. I spent a couple of hours "meddling in other people’s business", sticking my nose into other people’s dreams. Needless to say, in the dreams of other people it is possible to find elements that one can connect to one’s own dreams, so I fancied telling you some of my recurrent dreams and I would welcome your suggestions. In the other people’s dreams I could detect some elements similar to mine along with the relevant interpretation you suggested, and this allowed me to dare making some personal assumptions.
The first dream recurred during my childhood. Let’s say that it started when I was a child and lasted until I became a teen-ager. As a matter of fact, I think it kept recurring until I was 12-13 years old. It had rather an overrunning nature (perhaps the adjective is not appropriate but it is apt to explain that it broke out in dreams having a completely different nature, even pleasant dreams, and I was quite terrified, remember that I was a child).
I hope I haven’t bored you too much, thank you for the interesting site you have set up and, if I am not asking too much, please let me know if you are going to consider what I have told you.
Kind regards. I was in the main square of my town, not far from my house (about 4-500 m) but it was full night, and the straight-forward way I had to cover to reach my house was very, very dark. I set out leaving the square and was terrified by the sight of the dark way.
In the meantime a bus arrived and stopped at a short distance, I was struck by the remarkable contrast between the darkness around me and the inside of the bus that was flood-lit with a very bright light.
In dismay I noticed that the bus was empty (not even the driver) and my distress increased.
(In real life, at about mid-way there is an arcade and some shops. At that time, the arcade was not lit during the night. Please note that in my dream buildings and streets stuck to real life).
From the darkness of that arcade a sinister presence came out and started running after me along the way left before I could get at home, sometimes playing dirty tricks to me in the sense that, although apparently it was no longer running after me, I perfectly knew that actually it was in ambush round some corners still separating me from my house. Although in full distress, I always managed to get through. I never saw the "thing" running after me. More than once it chased me until I reached my house and went so far as to ring the bell and imitate the voice of my relatives to make me open the door, but I never saw what it was.
As I told you, these nightmares stopped when I was about 12-13 years old.
My idea is that the bus is somehow connected to the loss of my father (who died when I was 4). I was very fascinated by the bus that he used to take to go to work.
Without this association that you spontaneously made I wouldn’t have been able to find the meaning of your dream and I would have given you only an interpretation on broad terms.When we are unable to let our drives come up to consciousness level because we feel them too "evil", very often we try to get rid of them by projecting-moving them to the outer world where they undergo a sort of "U"-turn and as final result we perceive them as if they aimed at us.
This defence mechanism is very archaic, hence very much used, but usually it leaves rather skeptical anybody having little practice with the operations that our psyche can perform.
It is to be said however that we project "good objects" too, not only "evil" ones, but your dream refers to the first case. With regard to the nature of your "evil" drive, I can say nothing. I could make a few assumptions but they would not be helpful here. On the contrary, in my opinion the arrival of the bus represents a desire you had at that time of feeling protected by your father that you still felt VERY MUCH PRESENT (the bus was "flood-lit with a very bright light") BUT HE WASN’T THERE ANY LONGER (the bus was empty and with no driver). This made your distress grow higher because the desired protection was lacking and you felt to be completely at the mercy of the sinister presence.
One of the roles played by the figure of the father during childhood is: to provide a protection to his baby against his own threatening drives that otherwise would run the risk of crushing him.
For this reason it is necessary to be careful not to change the figure of the father into a puppet deprived of authority as, in this case, for his baby he would no longer represent the stout dam he needs to feel safe and protected. Unfortunately, the justifiable frenzy of destroying the "father-master" often led to destroy also the father, simply so.
In any such a case, a baby keeps a certain resentment against his father because he feels that his father left him alone to cope with his own drives: the father "WAS THERE BUT WASN’T THERE".
The positive side of the dream is that you managed to be always successful. So much so that here you are to tell us!
Dream No.184 Another dream, that in my opinion is quite clear, consists of seeing myself on a beach while I sight a huge wave growing above the horizon and approaching in an increasingly threatening manner, casting shadow over the beach and in the end sweeping everyone away, while I cling to a jut and with difficulty I manage to stay up. A few lines earlier I spoke of the fact that a baby feels the need of being protected against his "evil" and threatening drives that might otherwise crush him. This dream provides an eloquent picture of how a baby can perceive these drives. Luckily, here again you get through and save yourself.
Dream No.185 In the third dream I find myself in a garden (not necessarily the same every time) and while digging the earth I see a large quantity of coins...first two, three, then more and more until my hands and pockets are filled with them. A garden symbolizes childhood. The earth could be the unconscious or the mother and the coins the relevant valuable content but, maybe, this dream simply expresses the fulfilment of an elementary desire of owning, be in possession of valuable things.
Dream No.186 Also the last dream I want to submit to you, the only one I still have sometimes, shares some elements with other dreams I have already read. It consists of coming back home, being about to open the door and having the clear perception that thieves are inside but, instead of calling the police or doing other things as reason was, I feel that I "must" enter into the house even if I am scared. While I am going to inspect the rooms, I notice that thieves are escaping from the door that I left open behind my shoulders. I am still worried because I am afraid that not all of them might have gone away and I keep wandering around the house (please note that in my dream the house is always the same place where I have been living until I was 27, before getting married). I pretend to chase possible thieves that might still be there while I actually hope not to find them as I am afraid. I get off cheaply here. In fact the dream is a variation on the theme already considered earlier, that is the one dealing with a "sinister presence".
I could make a show off of interpretation skilness with regard to the "thief" symbol but this would take us astray and would only cause confusion.
Dream No.187 I had a big suit-case filled with chiffon night gowns of every color and nuance. I experienced a wonderful feeling. This patient had refused the frivolous side of her femininity throughout her life. She had been coming to her sittings for quite some time now, but I never saw her wearing a skirt, she wore jeans almost all the time, she did not bother about her outlook and the way she moved was not very graceful.
Now she was starting to discover also this side of being a woman and she was getting a beautiful feeling from this.
The following dream (always by the same woman) proves that this change process is deeply rooted, it is not a fleeting flash.
Dream No.188 (by a woman) I was a taxi driver. One morning I went out to go to work as usual but once I was on the side-walk I realized that I had no make-up on. I stopped for a moment in doubt whether to turn back and make up or to go on. If I turned back, in fact, I would be late at work. In the end I decided that I did not care about being late and I went back home. Every day we can check that taxi driving is not a wide-spread female job inasmuch as, rightly or wrongly, it is regarded as a typically male job. As such, it can be interpreted as a confirmation of the denial of the frivolous side of femininity as I stated earlier. This refusal, however, starts to crumble and leave way to the opposite trend, she prefers to make up, even at the cost of being late at work.
I know the objection: "So, in your opinion, being a woman means to be a merry goose non-stop admiring herself in front of a mirror!".
Do you think this is exactly what I said? The decision is up to you.
Dream No.189 Published as received: I am sending you a dream that I had a few months ago and that still upsets me. I was in an unknown mountain site. Everything was iced around me. There was a bridge, I had to cross it with my car, and a river was running below. I was terrified.
Suddenly, my parents appear and, with a derisory face, they tell me that I must go on. I obey but my car keeps skidding all the time. Farther on I meet other persons that shout at me: "Stop, do not go on, otherwise you will kill yourself".
I woke up, I was upset. I was going through a depression period when I had this dream and I had not seen my psychotherapist yet.
I am 28 years old.
First of all, I suggest that
you tell your dream to your psychotherapist. After this, I can only add that your dream
seems to refer to the kind of relationship you have with your parents and that does not
seem to be one of the best ones.
Ice symbolizes either dangerousness (skidding) and cold (no love).
You feel you have to face a test (crossing the bridge) – representing the passage
from one condition to the other (the two river banks) – but you fail to do it because
you feel that it is very dangerous.
On top of this, you also feel that your parents, besides not helping you in this crucial
situation, do not care about your fear, they are scornful and even cruel because they
order you to go on towards a certain death.
Only with your psychotherapist you will be able to discover the real meaning of the symbols embodied in this dream.
I wish you to have a good job!…
Dream No.190 I had moved to a new, very beautiful penthouse full of light and fitted with lacquered furniture but I found myself wandering around the empty and ruined rooms of the old house. I was surprised to notice that I was feeling regret and nostalgia for those places. It might seem odd, but during a psychotherapy this nostalgia for the old personality (the house where she formely lived) appears almost always at the beginning of the positive change (the new, very beautiful penthouse).
We keep being tied to our old way of living in spite of the much pain it caused us to suffer. At a closer consideration, the reason can be easily understood: disregarding the secondary advantages that our neurosis offered us, it is a good part of our life we part from. This too is a loss, a mourning necessitating to be elaborated. To better understand this state of mind, let’s recall those persons (and there are many of them) keeping, as a souvenir, the plaster that compelled them not to move for many months. This plaster is certainly associated to unpleasant feelings, such as armour stiffness, impossibility of moving and scratching oneself where it itched, etc., but that plaster bears also the signature of our friends that thoughtfully came to keep us company. That plaster brings back to our mind a period when those who love us took special care of us paying us a special attention. Once the plaster is removed, we re-join the great lot of people having to "trek" and having no reflectors’ light focused on them. For somebody, it is not even a matter of "re-joining" the lot but joining it for the first time (see Dream No. 179).
As if the usual "resistances" were not enough, this element too contributes to extend the length of a psychotherapy.
Dream No.191 …. in that building I met a person that had formely been a Communist. I noticed that now he was tractable, available and I ascribed this to the fact that he might have followed a psychotherapy or that might do it in the future. We exchanged information. There was this sense of novelty, a new softening and a higher mutual availability both due to a psychotherapy. As long as no contact is established with our "evil" parts, we live in the belief that EVIL is confined to the outer world and we unload all our condemnation-disapproval thereon. Thus we get the rewarding feeling of being Clever, Good, Noble, Right.
As long as this occurs dreams are filled with the symbols of conflicting pairs, the two poles having a clearly marked characterization: Policeman-Criminal, Our Lady-Prostitute, Fascist-Communist (for the right wing), Communist-Fascist (for the left wing), etc.
In these cases, reasoning is made by stereotypes, intolerance prevails, and often there is a trend to fanatism and violent solutions. The world is seen black and white. Sometimes even those who state that they are in favour of pacifism and nonviolence may belong to this group of persons. You can identify them through the "evil" they use to support their nonviolence. A trifle is sufficient to make their basic aggressiveness jump out of the thin coat that was hiding it.On the contrary, psychotherapy allows to approach the two opposite poles and at that point it is possible to discover what this patient dreamt: the ex-enemy has become TRACTABLE-AVAILABLE-SOFTENED-INFORMATION IS EXCHANGED WITH HIM. In other words, a transition occurs from an inside conflict between the parties to their mutual cooperation, from a waste of energy to a combination of energies.
Dream No.192 I am in a ship and I have to look for my bag as I have lost it. I go downstairs to reach the lower part of the ship but I meet a policeman that tells me to go upstairs. This patient wondered why and asked me many times why she lacked any sex desire of any kind. Her dream provides an answer to this question.
The bag is the symbol of her feminine sexuality. In fact, a bag opens and closes, it contains, an object can the put in and taken out. I think this is sufficient to understand the analogy.
She has lost her sexuality and she wants to get it back. For this reeason she goes to her unconscious to find it (she goes downstairs) but her Super-Ego (the policeman) stops her.
Why the inside authoriy prevents her from satisfying her wish? This dream doesn’t say it but other dreams did: she associated her sexuality to something dirt, prohibited, shameful. All this being originated by the way she experienced masturbation, some incestuous desires and even some homosexual fancy.
In these circumstances, is it surprising that she can’t feel any sex desire?
The usual question: "Now she knows it, and which is the change?". The situation where she was before had changed, now she knows the cause of her disorder so she can start working to modify it. Now she no longer belongs to that class of women that tend to ascribe their problem to their not being in love enough, consequently they spend all their life waiting for a prince charming that never arrives, just as sex pleasure.
Dream No.193 Squeamish people should not read this dream: I kept a bier under my bed with my father’s corpse inside and every time I was hungry I cut a piece of him and ate it. It is rather a "strong" dream. Considering that her father died 20 years before, it is easy to understand how strong and conditioning was her pathological relationship with the figure of her father. An equally strong work was needed before she could be able to search and find food of different nature, that is other men.
To avoid possible misunderstandings, it is better to clarify that in this case "eating" does not refer to "men’s eaters" but to a "symbolic nourishing".
Dream No.194 Antony R. had undergone a trial. Now something had to be buried to put an end to that trial. There was a problem, however, because burying in that very point would cause other archaelogical finds that were not to be found to be discovered. The meaning here is not completely clear, the various elements of the dream cannot be connected in a consistent whole. There are however several important hints that are worthy of recording like dowels that might be useful later, when additional material becomes available. This dream is reported to give an idea of the way of proceeding when trying to "draw" the meaning out of a dream: it is not as easy as taking out the content of a box, the meaning is not there, ready to be used, often it is to be built with difficulty, assemblying the various pieces coming out of different dreams, even after a while. It is not by chance that S. Freud was very fond of archaelogy and his room was filled with archaelogical finds. So, let’s see.
- There has been a trial, that is a proceeding
evoking various ideas: indictee, judge, defender, guilt, evidences, sentence, penalty,
acquittal.
Incidentally, let’s us say that these ideas make a psychotherapy different from a medical therapy. The "organic" sick do not feel that they are undergoing a "trial". For this reason many people prefer to think that their disorders are due to something that has become wrong in their BODY. This way of thinking allows them to avoid the unpleasant feeling of being UNDER TRIAL, no senses of guilt are allowed to arouse.
It is as if we thought: "If my body becomes sick I cannot be blamed. If my mind becomes sick, instead, the responsibility-guilt is mine". - The operation being made is exactly the opposite of what should be done during a psychotherapy, something is being BURIED, i.e. removed from sight rather than brought to light. All this is meant to PUT AN END to a problem that is to forget about it,
- Burying should be made in a certain point, but from that very point other elements could be brought to light that on the contrary are to remain hidden (being impeached?).
In the dreamer’s perception this trial is not DESERVED but UNJUST, in fact it is UNDERGONE.
Dream No.195 I am going on a road flanked on fields, it is the ancient Prenestina street (where the dreamer lived as a child). I notice that is has a particular feature: the road goes continuously up and down, sometimes nothing happens to be seen ahead but then, suddenly (that is when the top is reached) a beautiful landscape can be seen. This occurs many times. At first there is a pain caused by the failure to see ahead, then there is a pleasant view. This is the typical way of proceeding of a psychotherapy, up and down, enthousiasm and discouragement, hope and pessimism. The important thing is not to let the moments when everything seems to be useless and ineffective to dishearten oneself. Persistence brings reward.
Dream No.196 Some workers have performed a work for a condominium and I pay them with a cheque. I also draw up other post-dated cheques for other reasons. I think I have the money but afterwards I start worrying because I realize that owing to some other previously issued cheques I am in difficulties, I am just about able to cover the amount or I may even be wanting something. Now I am annoyed by having to continuously rush to cover my cheques, I am frightened, I do not like it and I think I have to make a change as I understand that this behaviour of mine puts me at risk. The dreamer was brought up in a family that considered natural to spend money that was not available, that is to run into debts, even for unnecessary things.
As a result of this "pedagogy", for many years he lived having thoughtless resort to debts in order to get what he wanted. The immediate pleasure of having the desired things available gained an advantage over the awareness that debts are however to be paid, sooner or later. Here are two additional effects of this style of life: 1) He had to have frequent resort to common tricks such as frequently changing his bank, tracing uncovered cheques, etc. 2) Now almost all that he gained was spent to pay former debts.
His dreams marks a turning point in his life. Now, at last, he understands which way of living he had adopted so far and he is afraid of it, he no longer likes it, he wants to make a change.
If we take into consideration also the symbolic meaning of money (inner energy), we understand that the dreamer is gaining an increased capacity for running his own inner resources.
Also in the real life of this patient a change occurred. Now he is much more shrewd in spending his money, he is more responsible in taking his decisions, his awareness of his role as a father is increased and so on.
And the whole lot is "seasoned" by a great satisfaction originating from his "liking himself more" This is the reward I mentioned in the previous dream.
Dream No.197 Published as received: Thank you. Your web pages are very interesting.
I must have some problems but I have read almost all dreams and dream interpretations.
I too had come to understand some symbologies and what I read helped me to clarify some points.
My name is P… and I am 23 years old.
Under a quiet surface I have always felt that something wrong was inside me and this could explain my shyness and other problems.
For the last three years I have been writing the dreams I could better remember but only recently I started reading something about psychoanalysis, etc.
With the help of a friend of mine who has some acquaintance with S. Freud I have started analyzing my dreams and digging deep inside.
I want to discover the truth about myself but I understand that this implies putting every aspect of myself under discussion (with all connected doubts and difficulties). I need someone to lead me and at the same time I am afraid. Fear of discoverying that you own resources that you could not use so far because you ignored them?
Fear of getting free from the thwarting that prevents you from running?
New things always produce curiosity and excitement matched by a pinch of fear. If you allow the last one to gain the advantage, you can forget about discoverying new things!
Read Dream No. 62 again. It deals with this kind of problems. I am sending you the dream I have had in these days. I had it after I started excavating inside myself. I have made an attempt to self-interpret it (although I am not fully satisfied with it), anyway I would much appreciate having your comments both as regards my dream and my relevant interpretation.
I have come back to spend a
few days at home. I light a fire at the top of the road. The day after I want to finish
burning what was left out. I know it is dangerous, nevertheless I light fire under a tree
which is inside my aunt’s condominium (my unmarried paternal aunt that caused many
problems to the family).
Something like two large bales are burning, then fire extends to the whole tree and I can
clearly see its foliage burning. I think: "Oh! What have I done? And I call the Fire
Brigade.
Everything is dark. I have no problem in ringing but they ask for my data and this annoys
me…
I will be very thankful for your reply (in the shortest delay, if possible).
You have exactly focused the basic meaning of the dream. Two things can be added:- Fire can represent either very strong emotions (we say that a passion "bursts into flames") and a purifying action. Combining the two of them, we obtain purifying emotions. In your case, they could be for example, a long nursed grudge and rage that were repressed because they might possibly produce a reaction of the kind: "Oh! What did I do-feel?".
- A tree represents virility as well as the mother. If this was the correct meaning, it could be inferred that you fear that an operation that was started as a common and harmless cleaning (firing the two bales) might increase in size and change into a destruction of the figure of your mother.
I do hope that your annoyance in communicating your data does not lead you to …hang up!
Dream No.198 Hi Romano,
Please do not feel forced to interpret my dream, there are many other persons needing your help (how beautiful are the dream interpretations on your site, every time I discover that I would like to have the time to read them all - much can be learned even this way). So, put my dream at the bottom of the list.
It is a smoky dream, one of those very long dreams.
Foreword: Last night I met a new couple of girls, in a much hateful cafe with a much hateful music, I was very tense and in practice I kept my mouth shut all the time.
Here is the dream:
I am sitting at a very long wooden table together with many other people. I cannot see the ends of the table but this does not trouble me. It is all dark and smoky, the atmosphere smells old and dirty but I do not worry because there are very many persons around me who do not seem to notice it, so it must be quite natural. I was invited to join this table. I cannot reckon the size of the place where I am; I am at one end of the table, five-six persons before the head of the table. There is an opening through which a yellow smoky light similar to a winter sun penetrates. The door is open and all this seems to be natural for me, also the place seems to be familiar to be.I am also aware that all the people I have met throughout my life are around this table. I seem to catch a glimpse of some of my school-mates and some girls I know. Even if there is a great number of persons, the atmosphere is very cosy. I know, but I cannot see him, that my friend G... is near me and maybe also my girl-friend A… but I am not interested.
A girl (the same I actually met the night before) gets up and offers herself as a prostitute.
I cannot remember her words, but they must have been quite vulgar and explicit: in practice, we, the boys, could follow her one after the other into a small room she had pointed to. It was a sort of small cavern closed by a curtain. There were five of six of them, all equal, one aside the other.
An unidentified mate of mine follows the girl behind the curtain without hesitation. At that point I become suddenly aware that inside that small room as well as inside the other rooms erotic games and sex actions are being performed.One first, and another one afterwards, gets in to enjoy the pleasures of the flesh. Everyone does so as a natural thing.
When my turn arrives I have to decide whether to go or not to go. Guessing the catholic reasoning of G…, I refuse to go. Then M… (another friend) appears and, fully self-confident and bold, he tells me: "I am going", finding the nerve for doing something that, as he very well knows, is very important for his life. Now envy, anger as well as disappointment grow inside me, and I am tempted to go, me too (these are the feelings I had many times while I was watching some of M…’s attitudes that I disliked but that nevertheless I wished to imitate).
I turn round and I see an old school mate of mine, S… and from her eyes I understand that she doesn’t want me to go. The scene changes. Now I am walking with S…, I try to hug her, holding her side tight to mine and hugging it. I am very proud, I never experienced such a feeling in my life, that is embracing a girl (how can tactile feelings, that were never experienced before, be experienced in dreams?). I hold her hand and I notice that mine is sweating but I attach no importance to this.
While we are walking, from a well-known cafe on the left a fellow
that I met at the university (I do not like him at all) comes out and gives a kick to
S… When I realize it, I turn back and I affront him, I threaten him never to touch
S.. again.
We go on. Now we walk in a town, it recalls me an alley I saw in Paris, there is the same
yellow and smoky light that was penetrating from the open door of the former place. We are
talking, we are saying sweet things each other and get on very well together. She is glad
of my decision as well as of the fact that we left that table. I notice that now we are on
our way back and soon we will have to return to that cafe.
This is what I can remember of my dream. Very smoky but some details, like my anger with M… or hugging S...’s side are very neat and clear.
S... is the only high-school person I really miss. We were very close friends, nearly in love of each other. Now she has gone abroad to attend a very famous American university and I haven’t seen her since last December.
She is the most clever person I ever met and in the States she is winning every competition, beating (in the field of philosophy, maths, scientific research and nuclear physics) the most fine-brained persons coming to that university from every part of the world to start a Nobel-prize carrier. I am very proud of this friendship of mine as well as the fact that I am one of the few persons she liked best. This dream is so rich with details that we run the risk of getting lost in a labyrinth of alleys if we attempted to follow all of them. Now, paying attention not to be taken off the tracks by details we will try to focus the "gist" of the speech developed by this dream.
In the first part, before the scene changes, the figure of a woman-prostitute appears.
In the second part, instead, a figure of a woman-angel appears.
The dreamer clearly indicates which one of the two figures he prefers but he feels that life "condemns" him to return to the kind of woman he despises and that he considers a vulgar prostitute. This is the "gist" of the dream. After clarifying the key meaning, we can take into consideration also the other secondary aspects without running the risk of getting lost. For example:
- Before considering the woman-prostitute versus woman-angle contraposition, we could take into consideration the more general flesh-sensuality versus cleverness-spirituality contraposition. Along this route it is possible to write hundred volumes of learned phylosophical, religious, hystorical, mythological, cosmological considerations but do not worry…it will not happen...:-)
- To understand to which extent this dreamer despises this sort of sexuality, it is sufficient to think over the word he uses to indicate the place where the prostitute offers her perfomances, he calls it a CAVERN!
- A common girl he met the night before not a woman practising prostitution regularly originates the dreamer’s feeling with regard to the first kind of worman. This means that he is disgusted by sex itself not by hired sex. Or better, sex seems to be always hired sex to him.
- He feels he differs from all the others: "everybody does it as if it was a natural thing" but he doesn’t.
- "Guessing the catholic reasoning of
G…," he refuses to go. A conditioning deriving from his religious education
seems to block him but, maybe, this is not the point in this case, rather it might be an
alibi he is using to disguise the real reason, namely a fear and despise with regard to
sexual intercourses with women.
Why do I say "alibi"? Because if this was the true reason he would feel it as "his own reasoning" with no need of projecting it on his catholic friend G. - His temptation to go with that woman is not originated by a true sex desire, rather by his envy for his friend M… and by his wish to imitate his "self-confidence and boldness".
- At last, his friend S… appears and gets
him out of his awkward position and he understands that she does not want him to go and
soil with the pleasure of the flesh. As a matter of fact she is an "all-brain"
woman, a woman cultivating knowledge only.
The dreamer feels at ease with her because she does not push him "down" where lust reigns and where he is demanded to prove his virility.
The physical contact with this
girl-friend is absolutely chaste, it consists only of being side to side and clasping her
waist in his arm. The energy of sex desire is replaced by the energy shown by the brave
hero rising to defend his lady that was assaulted by a coward accustomed to get angry with
weaker persons. The quiver of orgasm is replaced by the quiver produced by boldness.
Conclusion: difficulty in handling one’s own sexuality and trend to sublime it in Cleverness-Knowledge.
Dream No.199 …. I was on the shore and deep grottoes with water inside were in front of me. A monstrously shaped fish appeared asking me for help. To do so, I had to go inside the grottoes where water was. I was a little bit scared but I decided to go. Grottoes and water = the unconscious, emotions.
A fish, living in the water = the content of the unconscious.
Monstrousness of shapes is due to the fact that the content of the unconscious is away from consciuosness, consequently it looks unusual, different, averse as well as worrying and dangerous.
The content of the unconscious asks consciuosness, rationality,
for help. This is quite unusual to happen. Almost always consciuosness is felt as the part
needing help inasmuch as it runs the risk of being swept away, overwhelmed. Anyway,
that’s what occurred in this case and we have to take good notice of it (since a long
time I am no longer surprised at anything coming up from the unconscious).
The dreamer is "a little bit scared" but this does not stop him, it doesn’t
prevent him from going ahead. Clearly he has overcome the initial stage when fear leads to
escape or palsy.
Favourable prognosis... :-)
Dream No.200 I am flying about in the air, waving here and there. My lowering is slowed by some hindrances I crush into. I am holding my daughter and my friend’s son in my hands. I am afraid the children may be hurt but, strangely, they suffer no harm. The three of us seem to bounce on the objects we come across while we lower down. At last we are on land and the son of my friend runs towards his grandmother. But, as everyone knows, children are restless. As a matter of fact, his grandmother gets angry and she starts hiting her grandson’s head on a table. I rush to help the child and I fling myself with anger upon his grandmother. The child has two deep marks on his forehead. What shall I tell his mother who left him with me? So, stirred by a strong anger, I start to treat the grandmother cruelly. At this point the grandmother’s attitude changes and she begs me, in tears, not to tell anything to her daughter-in-law. I feel a deep hatred to this woman because she conceals a monster behind her pretended submission.
Again I am holding my daughter and the child in my hands and we continue our lowering always waving in the air. The patient called her dream: Lowering.
Associations given by her: " I always tend to keep my head in the clouds living in a world of my own, instead of keeping my foot on the ground".
Sometimes we are inclined to keep our head in the clouds because unpleasant "things" that we do not want to contact are on the ground (the reality of emotions). This is exactly what this patient has been doing for many years but now she is slowly coming back to real life (lowering to ground). Many hints – coming also from other sources – lead to think that she is escaping from her own aggressiveness to children. In her dream, this aggressiveness is projected to the grandmother in order to get rid of it and feel "good".
The dreamer’s mother could be hiding behind the figure of the grandmother as in the dreamer’s opinion her mother used to behave just as the old lady does in her dream: apparently submissive, but actually capable of doing extremely wicked actions. Maybe there is a very close connection between the hatred she feels for this lady and the hatred starting to come up during the sittings held in the same period she had this deam and aiming at her mother.