Dream interpretation is not an idle pastime or a mysterious performance.
Carried out in accordance with certain scientific rules based on common
sense and not on mere theory, it has a positive value in health as well as
in sickness.
A nightmare whose meaning has been interpreted rightly ceases to be a
nightmare. It disappears, or rather, is replaced by an obvious
wish-fulfilment dream of the same import, which does not disturb sleep.
The same modification is observable in recurrent dreams which, while not
burdened with anxiety, may have puzzled us and created a certain
apprehension.
Insight into our own dreams enables us to release more completely the
unconscious cravings which it is the mission of sleep to free from the
repressions of waking life.
The technique of dream interpretation is unfortunately, like every detail
of the psychoanalytic technique, very slow and at times discouraging. The
layman trained by quack literature to expect quick results, is apt to
appear scornful when a conscientious analyst, asked to interpret offhand
an apparently simple dream, refuses to perform that task and confesses
that he does not know the meaning of it.
When little Anna Freud dreamt that she was feasting on all sorts of
dainties, no elaborate technique was needed to ferret out the enigma of
such a vision. When Ferenczi's patient, however, saw herself strangling a
white dog, the wish-fulfilment formula, applied indiscriminately, would
have given poor results.
_To the patient_, the white dog symbolized a snarling woman with a very
pale face.
Dream interpretation must never be attempted without the dreamer's
assistance.
Snakes are _almost always_ sexual symbols, but if on the day preceding the
dream the subject was frightened by a snake or killed one or played with
one, we should require a good deal of other evidence before we could
safely assert that a snake dream on that night indicated fear, desire or
repression of sexual cravings.
A tooth pulling dream related by a subject who expects to go through the
ordeal of dental extraction should not be hastily admitted to be a
symbolical dream.
Even apparently obvious dreams may assume an entirely different complexion
when we inquire into the associations which every detail of them conjures
up from the subject's unconscious.
A year ago or so a Chicago woman sued her husband for divorce because he
had been, while talking in his sleep, saying endearing things to his
stenographer. That woman was both right and wrong.
The fact that her husband dreamt of his stenographer was evidence that the
girl was "on his mind," consciously or unconsciously. But we could not,
without examining the husband's unconscious reactions decide to what
extent the stenographer herself, as a distinct personality, obsessed him.
Every man is more or less of a fetichist, irresistibly attracted by
certain details of the feminine body, for ever seeking those
characteristics and appreciating them above all others wherever found.
When only one such characteristic and no other attracts a man, the man is
known as a perverse fetichist.
When the various fetiches which attract a man are found in one woman, let
us say red hair, dark eyes and a slender build, we have the foundation for
a passionate and durable love.
When only one of those characteristics is found in a woman, that
characteristic is bound to attract the man's attention regardless of the
interest or lack of interest the woman may present for him. A red haired
woman, while otherwise totally unattractive, might, to a red hair
fetichist, symbolize the beauty he seeks and intrude into his dream
pictures, _although she personally could not attract him sexually in his
waking state_.
Every one has had the experience of embracing in dreams some person who in
the waking state would not inspire the dreamer with any desire. If we
analyse carefully the appearance of the "ghostly love" we will in every
case notice that he or she is endowed with a certain characteristic which
is one of the constituting elements of our "love image."
The Chicago woman should have taken her troubles to an analyst, not to a
judge.
I have dwelt at length on that example to show a few of the pitfalls which
threaten the careless interpreter of dreams.
The second rule I would formulate is this: Do not try to interpret one
dream. Wait until you have collected a large number of dreams, let us say,
twenty or thirty of them.
Then classify them according to their character as follows:
Pleasant and unpleasant dreams. Healthy and morbid. Masochistic and
sadistic. Childish or adult. Regressive, static or progressive. Positive
or negative. Varied or recurrent. Personal or typical. Hypnogogic and
hypnapagogic visions, etc.
Care must be taken then to note all the words and thoughts which appear
most frequently in many dreams and which are likely to refer to important
complexes.
Whenever possible two versions of each dream should be studied.
The subject should write down his dreams as soon as he wakes up, either in
the morning or right after an anxiety dream which may have disturbed him
in the course of the night.
The version of almost any important dream which the subject tells the
analyst will be found quite at variance with the version written
immediately after awakening.
Here is a dream reported orally to me by a patient.
"I saw you through a restaurant window, having lunch with your wife."
Here is the same dream as I found it in the patient notes:
"You were to deliver a lecture in a park. There was a number of good
looking girls there. One especially attracted my attention. As there was
quite a little mud in the park she wore rubber boots. You were late in
appearing and I went to look for you. I saw you sitting at a table in a
restaurant with your wife, waving to some acquaintance on the side walk."
The discrepancy between the two versions is quite amusing.
After that preparatory work of classification and comparison, the actual
work of interpretation can begin.
Hebbel once wrote: "If a man could make up his mind TO WRITE DOWN ALL HIS
DREAMS, WITHOUT ANY EXCEPTIONS OR RESERVATIONS, TRUTHFULLY AND WITHOUT
OMITTING ANY DETAILS, TOGETHER WITH A RUNNING COMMENTARY CONTAINING ALL
THE EXPLANATIONS OF HIS DREAMS WHICH HE COULD DERIVE FROM HIS LIFE
MEMORIES AND FROM HIS READING, he would make to mankind a present of
inestimable value. But as long as mankind is what it is, no one is likely
to do that."
The technique of dream interpretation could not have been described more
accurately nor more aptly.
The person whose dreams are to be analysed should relax completely,
stretched out on a couch in a quiet room, listening for a while to some
monotonous noise such as the buzzing of a fan or of an inductor, his mind
concentrated on the story of the dream.
Then he should tell in a rambling way, without trying to edit the things
that rise to his consciousness, all the associations of ideas connected
with every word of the dream. While we can interpret our own dreams and
jot down our own ideas, the assistance of some sympathetic, discreet
person makes the process much simpler. Jotting down notes detracts one's
attention from the images rising to consciousness.
The assistant, however, should confine himself to mentioning the next word
or the next part of the dream as soon as the subject seems to have
exhausted the associations brought forth by one part of it.
The most surprising results are often obtained in that simple way. Facts
which the subject had entirely forgotten, connections he had never been
aware of, will suddenly jump into consciousness; the dream will gradually
assume a meaning and its interpretation may at times reach an unexpected
length. A dream of one line may suggest associations covering five or six
pages.
It may happen that in spite of the subject's efforts to remember his
dreams and of devices such as being awakened in the course of the night,
etc., the only memories preserved of the night's visions will be scraps
such as "going somewhere," "talking to somebody," "something unpleasant,"
etc.
In such cases, the subject should be allowed to sink into what Boris Sidis
calls "hypnoidal sleep" by being made to listen to some continuous noise
in a partly darkened room, all the while thinking of the "dream scrap."
"While in this hypnoidal state," Sidis writes, "the patient hovers between
the conscious and the subconscious, somewhat in the same way as in the
drowsy condition, one hovers between wakefulness and sleep. The patient
keeps on fluctuating from moment to moment, now falling more deeply into a
subconscious condition in which outlived experiences are easily aroused,
and again rising to the level of the waking state. Experiences long
submerged and forgotten rise to the full height of consciousness. They
come in bits, in chips, in fragments, which may gradually coalesce and
form a connected series of interrelated systems of experiences apparently
long dead and buried. The resurrected experiences then stand out clear and
distinct in the patient's mind. The recognition is fresh, vivid, and
instinct with life, as if the experiences had occurred the day before."
Through this procedure, patients are often enabled to recollect forgotten
dreams and nightmares.
Certain patients do not forget their dreams but refuse to report them. In
such cases the simplest procedure consists in asking the patient to make
up a dream while in the analyst's office, that is to put himself in the
hypnoidal state described above and to tell the images and thoughts that
come to his mind. Or if the analyst suspects the existence of a certain
complex, he may ask the patient to build up a dream on a topic so selected
that it will touch that complex.
A question which audiences have asked me hundreds of times is: "Cannot the
patient make up something that will deceive you entirely and throw you on
the wrong trail?"
My answer to such a question is emphatically negative.
A study of the literary and artistic productions of all races has shown
that in every "story" and in every work of art, the writer or artist was
solely bringing to consciousness his own preoccupations, in a form which
may have deceived him but which does not deceive the psychologist slightly
familiar with the author's biography.
Brill tells somewhere how his attention was first drawn to the value of
artificial dreams and of so called "fake dreams."
In 1908, he was treating an out of town physician, suffering from severe
anxiety hysteria. The patient was very sceptical, did not co-operate with
Brill, never talked freely and pretended he never had dreams. One morning,
however, he came for his appointment bringing at last one dream. "He had
given birth to a child and felt severe labour pains. X., a gynecologist
who assisted him, was unusually rough and stuck the forceps into him more
like a butcher than a physician."
It was a homosexual fancy. Asked who X. was, the patient said he was a
friend with whom he had had some unpleasantness.
Then he interrupted the conversation, saying: "There is no use fooling you
any longer. What I told you was not a dream. I just made it up to show you
how ridiculous your dream theories are."
Further examination, however, proved that the patient was homosexual and
that his anxiety states were due to the cessation of his perverse
relations with X. The lie he had made up was simply a distorted wish
closely connected with the cause of his neurosis.
As Brill states very justly, "everything which necessitates lying must be
of importance to the individual concerned."
Personally, I have found that, with certain patients, the artificial dream
method is productive of better results than the free association method.
With the docile patient who has much insight and a positive desire to rid
himself of his troubles, the association method reveals quickly the
darkest corners of the unconscious. The patient who, on the other hand,
constantly answers: "I cannot think of anything," and is always on his
guard, the association method wastes much valuable time and is very
discouraging to patient and analyst.
It is not always advisable for the analyst to reveal to his subjects the
import of their dreams. It is especially when the meaning of their dreams
is frankly sexual that discretion and tact are necessary. In cases of a
severe repression of sexual cravings extending over many years, when, for
instance, one has to deal with a woman, no longer young and whose attitude
to life has been rather puritanical, a good deal of educational work has
to be undertaken before the subject can be enlightened.
She must be gradually led to consider sex as a "natural" phenomenon before
she can be made to accept the sexual components revealed by her dreams as
a part of her personality.
Repressed homosexualism is perhaps even harder to reveal to the subject.
I have found my task infinitely simpler when the subject had done a good
deal of reading along psychoanalytic lines or had attended many lectures
on the subject. In fact it is my conviction that when psychoanalytic books
are read by a larger proportion of the population, thousands of "sex"
cases will disappear, together with the absurd fears based on ignorance
which are responsible for many a mental upset.
Interpreting a subject's dreams is the best known means of probing and
sounding his unconscious, but in the majority of cases it only helps
indirectly in treating the case. When we deal with nightmares, however,
the results are more direct and more rapidly attained. A nightmare
interpreted rightly will never recur, or if it does, WILL NOT FRIGHTEN OR
AWAKEN THE SUBJECT.
Insight will develop which, even in the sleeping state, will enable the
subject to recognize that his dream is only a dream and to sleep on
undisturbed. A patient who was often terrorized by a dream in which some
man stabbed him in the back, gradually came to recognize his unconscious
homosexual leanings and analysed the nightmare in his sleep when it
occurred again with excellent results. It did not frighten him and
gradually disappeared, being replaced by grosser dreams devoid of anxiety.
A patient was bothered by dreams in which he was repelling onslaughts of
large beasts with a walking stick or an umbrella which invariably broke
and which he was always trying to tip with iron rods or tacks.
He finally gained insight into his unconscious fear of impotence which was
dispelled by a visit at a specialist's office.
Not only did that nightmare disappear but very soon after, his dreams
changed to visions of successful sex-gratification.
Dream insight based upon the personality of the analyst should not be
considered as real insight. When a patient reports, "I dreamt that I was a
baby but remembered that Mr. Tridon would call that a regression dream and
I awoke," or, "I felt that Mr. Tridon would characterize the whole thing
as a masochistic performance and awoke," much work remains to be done.
The dreamer must _know_ that his nightmare is a symbol and not merely know
that his analyst would call it a symbol.
When the dreamer has acquired the technical skill which enables him, after
a little concentration and meditation, to interpret his own sleep visions,
he is no longer at the mercy of the annoyance called nightmare. When he
can see at a glance where the repression seems unbearable, he may devise
ways and means to satisfy his cravings more completely if they are
justifiable and lawful; if they are unjustifiable or socially taboo, he
may seek substitutes for them and, especially as I have explained in
another book, free them from the parasitic cravings which make them unduly
obsessive.
He who can read the indications of his own dreams, has at his disposal an
instrument of great precision which indicates to him the slightest
fluctuations of his personality and, besides, points out various solutions
for the problems of adaptation which the normal, progressive human being
must solve every day of his life.
Oneiromancy is the algebra which enables us to perform rapidly complicated
calculations in the mathematics of psychology.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
ABRAHAMSON, I.--Mental disturbances in lethargic encephalitis. _Journal of
Nervous and Mental Disease._ September 1920.
A study of the sleeping sickness based mainly upon cases observed at
Mt. Sinai Hospital.
ABRAHAM, K.--Dreams and Myths. _Nervous and Mental Disease Monograph
Series._ No. 28.
A monograph proving that legends and myths are in reality the day
dreams of the human race.
ADLER, A.--Traum and Traumdeutung. _Zentralblatt f. Ps. A. III_, p. 574.
A short essay on dream interpretation from the point of view of the
ego urge.
ASCHAFFENBURG, G.--Der Schlaf in Kindesalter und seine Störungen.
Bergmann, Wiesbaden.
Observations on the disturbances of the sleep of children.
BRUCE, H. A.--Sleep and Sleeplessness. Little Brown.
A popular exposé of the problem of sleeplessness from a modern point
of view.
CORIAT, I.--The Meaning of Dreams. Little Brown.
A small book containing the analyses of many dreams according to the
Freudian technique.
CORIAT, I.--The Nature of Sleep. _Journal of Abnormal Psycho._ VI. No. 5.
CORIAT, I.--The Evolution of Sleep and Hypnosis.
Ibidem, VII. No. 2.
DELAGE, Y.--La nature des images hypnagogiques. _Bulletin de l' Inst. Gen.
Psycho._ 1903, p. 235.
DU PREL, CARL.--Künstliche Träume. _Sphinx_, July 1889.
A study of artificial dreams.
FREUD, S.--The Interpretation of Dreams. Macmillan.
FREUD, S.--Dream Psychology, with an introduction by André Tridon. McCann.
The most important books on Dream Interpretation.
FRÖMNER, E.--Das Problem des Schlafs.
Bergmann, Wiesbaden.
HENNING, H.--Der Traum ein assoziativer Kurzschluss.
Bergmann, Wiesbaden.
MAURY, A.--Le Sommeil et les Rêves. Paris 1878.
The first attempt at a methodical study of dreams and at correlating
them to physical stimuli.
MAEDER, A. E.--The Dream Problem. _Nervous and Mental Disease monograph
series._ No. 22.
A presentation of the subject from the point of view of the Swiss
School.
HALL, B.--The Psychology of sleep. Moffat Yard.
A review of the various sleep theories from the academic point of
view.
KAPLAN, L.--Ueber wiederkehrende Traumsymbole. _Zentrablatt f. Ps. A._ IV,
p. 284.
An essay on dream symbolism.
MANACÉINE, M. DE.--Sleep, its physiology, pathology, hygiene and
psychology. Scribner.
The most complete study of sleep from every possible point of view,
placing the emphasis, however, on the physical aspects of sleep.
SACHS, H.--Traumdeutung und Menschenkenntniss. _Jahrb. d. Ps. A._ III, p.
121.
SCHROTTER, K.--Experimentelle Träume. _Zentralblatt f. Psy. A._ II, p.
638.
A record of very interesting experiments in the production of
artificial dreams through hypnotism.
SILBERER, H.--Der Traum Enke. Stuttgart.
A very clear primer in dream study, epitomizing the latest hypotheses
in interpretation.
SILBERER, H.--Ueber die Symbolbildung. _Jahrbuch d. Psy-A._ III, p. 661.
SILBERER, H.--Zur Symbolbildung. _Jahrbuch d. Psy-A._ IV, p. 607.
SILBERER, H.--Bericht über eine methode Hallucinationserscheinungen
herbeizurefen. _Jahrbuch d. Psy.-A._ I, p. 513.
STEKEL, W.--Die Sprache des Traumes. Wiesbaden, 1911.
STEKEL, W.--Die Traüme der Dichter. Wiesbaden, 1912.
STEKEL, W.--Fortschritte in der Traumdeutung. _Zentralblatt f. Psy-A._
III, pp. 154, 426.
STEKEL, W.--Individuelle Traumsymbole. _Zentralblatt f. Psy-A._ IV, p.
289.
Stekel is essentially a Freudian but his books contain hundreds of
illustrations and case histories, making his books more understandable
to laymen than Freud's writings.
"Die Sprache des Traumes" is the most useful text book of Symbol
Study.
TRIDON, A.--Psychoanalysis, Its History, Theory and Practice. Huebsch.
See Chapter V: Symbols, the language of the dreams, and Chapter VI:
The dreams of the human race.
TRIDON, A.--Psychoanalysis and Behaviour. Knopf.
See part IV, chapter II: Self-knowledge through dream study.
TRIDON, A.--Introduction to Freud's "Dream Psychology." McCann.
VOLD, J. M.--Ueber den Traum. Leipzig 1910-1912.
Void holds that every dream is caused by a physical stimulus.
VASCHIDE, N.--Le Sommeil et les Rêves. Paris, 1911.
A physical explanation of sleep and dreams.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Readers unfamiliar with my previous works might accuse me of placing
undue emphasis upon "mental" causes and ignoring the influence of bacilli,
toxins, etc., in disease. I refer them to the chapter: Mind and Body, an
indivisible unit, in my book, "Psychoanalysis and Behaviour." It is a
truism that in tuberculosis for instance the prognosis depends greatly
from the "mental" condition of the patient and on his will to live. We are
protected against disease germs by the various secretions of the mouth,
stomach, intestine, etc. Whenever a "mental" cause, such as fear, intense
sorrow, etc., translates itself into an action of the sympathetic system
which stops the flow of saliva and gastric juice and the intestinal
peristalsis, we can see how the organism is then predisposed to an
invasion of pathogenic bacteria. The depressed, the stupid and the
ignorant are the first victims in any epidemic, the depressed because
their protective vagotonism is too low, the stupid and the ignorant
because they are more frequently than the intelligent and well informed a
prey to fear.
[2] The orthodox Freudian would of course interpret such a vision as a
symbol of an attempted regression to the fetal condition, return to the
mother's womb, etc. As a matter of fact, sleep is to a certain extent a
return to the period of the fetus' almost complete omnipotence of thought.
I have noticed, however, that I never dream of swimming except on days
when I have been prevented from indulging in my favourite sport at the
shore or in the swimming pool.
This is to my mind a perfectly obvious dream needing no far fetched
interpretation, symbolical only in so far as it expresses my attitude to
sleep (See chapter on Attitudes reflected in dreams).
[3] Dr. Percy Fridenberg has shown the exaggerated shock reactions felt by
the organism after the eye suffers an injury or is operated on, and
recalls Crile's saying that our activation patterns come from sight.
[4] The duration of a dream is not as short as some of Maury's experiments
would lead us to believe. Some of the experimental dreams timed by
Schroetter lasted almost as long as it takes to relate them.
[5] Insanity is simply a day dream from which we cannot awake at will.
[6] All the dreams cited in this book are reported in the patient's own
words.