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Dream Power
Dream Power has already helped over half a million readers recognize the importance of their dreams, as well as learn how to use the information they reveal to enrich their lives.
320 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1972
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
December 28, 2019
"Never impose a meaning on a dream but ... allow it at all times to 'speak for itself'" (p. 158). In all cases, the dreamer's own associations are vital for interpretation (p. 215). ... The dream is the property of the dreamer, a unique production arising out of his own vast network of memories and associations, and, in the end of the day, is meaningful in whatever way he him selves finds most useful. (291)
Much of man's unhappiness is caused, first, by self-ignorance and, second, by self-concealment. (18)
It is likely that the subjective experience we call dreaming is merely a byproduct of an essentially physiological process somehow connected with learning and remembering (35).
In forming a bridge between body and mind, dreams may be used as a springboard from which man can leap to new realms of experience and enlarge his vision not only of himself, but also of the universe in which he lives. (35)
The apparent widespread differences in dreaming activity must be variations in the memory of dreams rather than differences of dream frequency. (50)
Habitual non-recallers normally need a stronger stimulus to wake them up than non-recallers. ... The difference between recallers and non-recallers is more a matter of the psychological characteristics of their personalities rather than their depth of sleep or the way they wake themselves up.... Non-recallers are decidedly reluctant to remember their dreams, just as they tend to avoid or deny unpleasant experiences and anxieties in everyday life. ... Non-recallers have been shown by means of psychological tests to be more inhibited, more conformist, and more self-controlled on the whole than recoilers, who tend to be more overtly anxious about life and more willing to admit common emotional disturbances, such as anxiety and insecurity. [This quality of self-awareness] is probably the crucial differences between recallers and non-recallers. (51-52)
Freud had originally destroyed his own dream diary: his reason - "The stuff simply enveloped me as the sand does the Sphinx." (57)
Such experiences as psychotherapy, participation in dream experiments, and even listening to lectures or reading books on the subject, all stimulate dream recall by combating the natural physiological processes which seem inevitably to lead to dream forgetting. (63)
Dreams tend to become more dramatic and bizarre and contain more childhood material as the night progresses. (83)
Dreams are complex psychological products inevitably influenced by the conditions under which they are dreamed and reported. (84)
"The fool sees not the same tree as the wise man sees." - William Blake (88)
A dream is a personal document, a letter to oneself. - Calvin Hall (129)
The Gestalt Prayer:
I do my thing, and you do your thing.
I am not in this world to live up to your expectations
And you are not in this world to live up to mine.
You are you and I am I,
And if by chance we find each other, it's beautiful.
If not, it can't be helped. (p. 143)
"Emotions are not a nuisance to be discharged. The emotions are the most important motors of our behavior: emotion in the widest sense - whatever you feel - the waiting, the joy, the hunger ... Emotional excitement mobilizes the muscles ... You can't imagine anger without muscular movement. You can't imagine joy, which is more or less identical with dancing, without muscular movement. In grief there is sobbing and crying, and in sex there are also certain movements, as you all know. And these muscles are used to move about, to touch the world, to be in contact, to be in touch." - Perls (149)
"I believe we are living in an insane society, and that you only have the choice either to participate in this collective psychosis or to take risks and become healthy ... If you are centered in yourself, then you don't adjust any more." Fritz Perls (p. 184-185) ... the need to adjust is a neurotic symptom to be overcome
"As I cannot change what is outside me, let me try instead to change what is within." - German philosopher Fichte (224)
One simple test to discover some of the disowned aspects of ourselves is to ask what we hate most of all in other people, for we are almost very sure to find the very same thing simmering away in ourselves below the level of conscious awareness, just waiting for an opportunity to express itself. (225-226)
The way to health is not through puritanical denial of instinct or through reaction in the opposite direction, but through greater consciousness and a rational acceptance of the need for free expression on some occasions and restraint on others. (239)
The rewards of sitting in the seat of the scornful are just not worth the wasteful expenditure of energy required to keep the conflict going. (253)
As Oscar Wild says, "children begin by loving their parents. After a time they judge them. Rarely, if ever, do they forgive them. ... Perls says that forgiving and releasing our parents is quite the most difficult part of therapy. (257)
Much of the frenzied activity of everyday life is merely an escape from facing up to personal problems. (270)
"Don't push the river," wrote Perls, of life generally and one's own effort in particular; "it flows by itself." (292)
Respect your brother's dreams. (292)
Anxiety is the enemy of creativity, and until this is removed, our minds will not be free to deal creatively with all the material that enters it during waking life. (294)
_____
Facts about REM sleep:
* Like the eye movements that gave the name to REM sleep, there are corresponding movements of the inner ear during sleep that could correspond to the audio content of dreams. (25)
* External stimuli are incorporated into a REM dream on about half the occasions they are presented. (27)
* REM sleep is important for learning and remembering (33)
* After the brain is chemically injured by drugs, REM sleep is more important than non-REM sleep (33)
* REM dreams commonly include more than one episode (up to 6!), and seem to last much longer than non REM dreams (42-43)
_____
Facts about Non-REM sleep:
* Growth hormone releases into the bloodstream during non-REM sleep (32)
* The mind remains in closer contact with reality than in non REM dreams (45)
* Dreams of reading words that float around are usually during non REM sleep (46)
_____
Approaches to Dream Analysis According to Different Schools of Thought: (p. 145)
- Freud: patient on couch, therapist behind him; this can prevent therapist from picking up on hidden cues not realized by patient; also he was a sexist cocaine addict so
- Jung: Therapist and patient sit facing each other, allowing therapist to observe facial expression and body language that might give clues to meaning in dream; compensatory dreams (having a bad day followed by good dreams) (p. 154)
- Adler dreams can be rehearsals of worries (p. 164)
- Bonime urges therapists to encourage clients to use the language they usually use with friends etc (289-290)
- Hall (Through the Looking Glass)
a. If people you know and who are currently in your life appear in your dreams they probably represent themselves rather than something else; ask "What does the dream tell me about my present feelings or thoughts about this person?" (p. 190)
b. If people you used to know appear, they may represent themselves or a fragment of the personality of the dreamer that was "taken over" by the person in the past. (p. 193, 197), if you dream of a friend you are no longer in contact with it's probably about a current situation which evokes a similar response as something to do with that person in the past (p. 195); it could also represent a principle or concept relating to current personal events of the dreamer (196)
c. dreams about friends and colleagues are likely to tell us how we feel about that person, however, they may be standing in for another person
d. Celebrities, historical figures, fictional characters: examine by means of association to see if they say something about real people in the dreamer's life, about situations, principles, institutions, or parts of the dreamer's personality, always ask why the dreamer has chosen this particular symbol rather than another. (197-198), in dreams of royalty, investigate the possibility that this symbolizes a fragmented part of the personality (in which part of the personality does the dreamer perceive themselves to be royal?) (p. 201).
e. anonymous children can represent undeveloped parts of the personality or parts that remained stuck in childhood (p. 205)
f. Most dream animals are symbolic, unless the dreamer is consumed with a specific animal concern in real life (p. 206); they may represent sexual impulses and the way the dreamer views sexual impulses could be manifested through the type of animal (p. 208), they may also symbolize situations, principles, or institutions (p. 209)
g. dream houses often say something about our lives & relationships, unless this is a current preoccupation in the dreamer's waking life (p. 210); a house may offer a good dream picture of a marriage or family relationship (p. 212); dreams of childhood houses may indicate something in the dreamer's current situation reminds him of an earlier situation (p. 214)
h. vehicles may represent a lifestyle, or an actual vehicle if this is a current preoccupation in the dreamer's waking life, or the direction in which a relationship is going (p. 216-217); crossroads are a common theme for decision making (217); dreaming of missing a bus may represent straightforward fears of missing out on something in life (218); a vehicle may represent an institution (219);
i. dreams in which you take the role of some other type of protagonist than yourself may show you how you have been seeing yourself in some situation, perhaps without realizing it (p. 222)
j. whenever dream themes or characters recur, they reflect deeper problems underlying specific events or situations, in these dreams, all of the aspects of the dreams may represents aspects of the dreamer's self (223)
k. anyone who is locked up or banished is likely to be an alienated part of the personality which must be reclaimed (263)
Gestalt / Fritz Perls
- The dream is "an added bonus in the form of an existential message which tells us exactly where we are in relation to ourselves and to the world at the present time" (144).
gestalt therapy allows the whole group to see the above; place an empty chair across from the person talking about their dreams so they can move from chair to chair to act out different aspects of the dream (moving breaks bodily postures associated with one role and help client see/feel a different perspective). Dream elements are seen as aspects of the dreamer's personality -> this approach may be most valuable in recurring dreams. Perls found it unnecessary to to work with every element or event in a dream as long as the dreamer can receive at least one existential message from the dream (p. 150); the more fragmented the personality the more likely the person is to have nightmares (152)
Topdog & Underdog - the two clowns of the personality in Gestalt therapy according to Perls, they act out this struggle at a subconscious level (149);
"Topdog" - the part of the personality that is righteous and authoritarian. Top dog says "you should," "you must never," "You ought" and so on. Top dogs works with threats of catastrophe (149, 226)
"Underdog" - The recipient of the top dog's criticism is the underdog, she protests against the nagging but never seems to be convinced she is not all the things top dog calls her, usually apologetic, defensive, wheedling, manipulative, and has no power. (149) the nature of underdog gives a clue about a hole in the personality that is being avoided in waking life and must be consciously confronted in order to be whole (228)
- Types of "verbiage production" (p. 209)
1. "chickenshit" = small talk (e.g. "how are you, how is the weather")
2. "bullshit" = rationalization & excuses (e.g. "I can't love anybody because my mother didn't love me as a child.")
3. elephantshit = philisophizing & intellectualizing about meanings and theories without experiencing them
* Gestalt techniques do not tell you about the dream itself (source, nature, purpose) but they tell you a great deal about the dreamer. These techniques may not work for those who have trouble connecting with their inner sense of fantasy (in which case use Hall's method)
_____
Questions to ask about dreams:
1. Looking Outward: Does it contain any objective, factual truth? (p. 157) Has real information about actual events or facts about the world been understood on a subconscious level? If there is factual content the dream may still contain insights at deeper levels (160); Reminder dreams (p. 161-164); Warning dreams (p. 164-166); Clairvoyant dreams (p. 166-171); "Seeing through" people (p. 171-174); precognitive dreams (p. 174-181)
2. Perls: If a person rarely recalls whole dreams, Perls suggests that we ask, "dreams, why do you always come to me in bits and pieces?" (153) (Perls suggests that forgetting dreams is a ruse to avoid dealing with unpleasantness and these people feel they have come to terms with their lives (154)
3. Perls: With nightmares, ask,"Dreams, why are you trying to frighten me?" (153)
4. Why did the dreamer choose the symbol mentioned over another symbol?
5. If a dream has many different characters or images and the dreamer isn't sure where to start, begin by letting the most obvious characters speak for themselves and encounter each other until two come into conflict. (226) this conflict tells you about the message underlying the dream; make underdog speak up to top dog and state his needs (228)
_____
Three Types of Insight that can be Obtained from Dreams (p. 157-158)
a. objective truths about the outside world that have been subconsciously understood but not brought to a conscious level (looking outward)
b. How we see ourselves and the world, A picture of the dreamer's unique inner life (Hall's "Looking at a Picture" method / Through the Looking Glass)
c. Why our perspectives on ourselves and the world have formed the way they have; Looking inward: the dreamer's deeper inner self (Perl & Jung's techniques best for this level of insight)
_____
Faraday offers several "dream experiments" for the reader to conduct on themselves:
Experiment 1: p. 47-48
Experiment 2: p. 49
Experiment 3: p. 62
_____
When a child has nightmares, ask them why they are telling themselves such scary stories while they are sleeping? (272)
_____
Dreams and personality factors (p. 85)
Freud's dream disguises - condensation, displacement, (p.98-110)
4 Basic Rules to Dream Analysis according to Calvin Hall (p. 132-140)
on Gestalt therapy (p. 142)
Freud and sexism (p
Much of man's unhappiness is caused, first, by self-ignorance and, second, by self-concealment. (18)
It is likely that the subjective experience we call dreaming is merely a byproduct of an essentially physiological process somehow connected with learning and remembering (35).
In forming a bridge between body and mind, dreams may be used as a springboard from which man can leap to new realms of experience and enlarge his vision not only of himself, but also of the universe in which he lives. (35)
The apparent widespread differences in dreaming activity must be variations in the memory of dreams rather than differences of dream frequency. (50)
Habitual non-recallers normally need a stronger stimulus to wake them up than non-recallers. ... The difference between recallers and non-recallers is more a matter of the psychological characteristics of their personalities rather than their depth of sleep or the way they wake themselves up.... Non-recallers are decidedly reluctant to remember their dreams, just as they tend to avoid or deny unpleasant experiences and anxieties in everyday life. ... Non-recallers have been shown by means of psychological tests to be more inhibited, more conformist, and more self-controlled on the whole than recoilers, who tend to be more overtly anxious about life and more willing to admit common emotional disturbances, such as anxiety and insecurity. [This quality of self-awareness] is probably the crucial differences between recallers and non-recallers. (51-52)
Freud had originally destroyed his own dream diary: his reason - "The stuff simply enveloped me as the sand does the Sphinx." (57)
Such experiences as psychotherapy, participation in dream experiments, and even listening to lectures or reading books on the subject, all stimulate dream recall by combating the natural physiological processes which seem inevitably to lead to dream forgetting. (63)
Dreams tend to become more dramatic and bizarre and contain more childhood material as the night progresses. (83)
Dreams are complex psychological products inevitably influenced by the conditions under which they are dreamed and reported. (84)
"The fool sees not the same tree as the wise man sees." - William Blake (88)
A dream is a personal document, a letter to oneself. - Calvin Hall (129)
The Gestalt Prayer:
I do my thing, and you do your thing.
I am not in this world to live up to your expectations
And you are not in this world to live up to mine.
You are you and I am I,
And if by chance we find each other, it's beautiful.
If not, it can't be helped. (p. 143)
"Emotions are not a nuisance to be discharged. The emotions are the most important motors of our behavior: emotion in the widest sense - whatever you feel - the waiting, the joy, the hunger ... Emotional excitement mobilizes the muscles ... You can't imagine anger without muscular movement. You can't imagine joy, which is more or less identical with dancing, without muscular movement. In grief there is sobbing and crying, and in sex there are also certain movements, as you all know. And these muscles are used to move about, to touch the world, to be in contact, to be in touch." - Perls (149)
"I believe we are living in an insane society, and that you only have the choice either to participate in this collective psychosis or to take risks and become healthy ... If you are centered in yourself, then you don't adjust any more." Fritz Perls (p. 184-185) ... the need to adjust is a neurotic symptom to be overcome
"As I cannot change what is outside me, let me try instead to change what is within." - German philosopher Fichte (224)
One simple test to discover some of the disowned aspects of ourselves is to ask what we hate most of all in other people, for we are almost very sure to find the very same thing simmering away in ourselves below the level of conscious awareness, just waiting for an opportunity to express itself. (225-226)
The way to health is not through puritanical denial of instinct or through reaction in the opposite direction, but through greater consciousness and a rational acceptance of the need for free expression on some occasions and restraint on others. (239)
The rewards of sitting in the seat of the scornful are just not worth the wasteful expenditure of energy required to keep the conflict going. (253)
As Oscar Wild says, "children begin by loving their parents. After a time they judge them. Rarely, if ever, do they forgive them. ... Perls says that forgiving and releasing our parents is quite the most difficult part of therapy. (257)
Much of the frenzied activity of everyday life is merely an escape from facing up to personal problems. (270)
"Don't push the river," wrote Perls, of life generally and one's own effort in particular; "it flows by itself." (292)
Respect your brother's dreams. (292)
Anxiety is the enemy of creativity, and until this is removed, our minds will not be free to deal creatively with all the material that enters it during waking life. (294)
_____
Facts about REM sleep:
* Like the eye movements that gave the name to REM sleep, there are corresponding movements of the inner ear during sleep that could correspond to the audio content of dreams. (25)
* External stimuli are incorporated into a REM dream on about half the occasions they are presented. (27)
* REM sleep is important for learning and remembering (33)
* After the brain is chemically injured by drugs, REM sleep is more important than non-REM sleep (33)
* REM dreams commonly include more than one episode (up to 6!), and seem to last much longer than non REM dreams (42-43)
_____
Facts about Non-REM sleep:
* Growth hormone releases into the bloodstream during non-REM sleep (32)
* The mind remains in closer contact with reality than in non REM dreams (45)
* Dreams of reading words that float around are usually during non REM sleep (46)
_____
Approaches to Dream Analysis According to Different Schools of Thought: (p. 145)
- Freud: patient on couch, therapist behind him; this can prevent therapist from picking up on hidden cues not realized by patient; also he was a sexist cocaine addict so
- Jung: Therapist and patient sit facing each other, allowing therapist to observe facial expression and body language that might give clues to meaning in dream; compensatory dreams (having a bad day followed by good dreams) (p. 154)
- Adler dreams can be rehearsals of worries (p. 164)
- Bonime urges therapists to encourage clients to use the language they usually use with friends etc (289-290)
- Hall (Through the Looking Glass)
a. If people you know and who are currently in your life appear in your dreams they probably represent themselves rather than something else; ask "What does the dream tell me about my present feelings or thoughts about this person?" (p. 190)
b. If people you used to know appear, they may represent themselves or a fragment of the personality of the dreamer that was "taken over" by the person in the past. (p. 193, 197), if you dream of a friend you are no longer in contact with it's probably about a current situation which evokes a similar response as something to do with that person in the past (p. 195); it could also represent a principle or concept relating to current personal events of the dreamer (196)
c. dreams about friends and colleagues are likely to tell us how we feel about that person, however, they may be standing in for another person
d. Celebrities, historical figures, fictional characters: examine by means of association to see if they say something about real people in the dreamer's life, about situations, principles, institutions, or parts of the dreamer's personality, always ask why the dreamer has chosen this particular symbol rather than another. (197-198), in dreams of royalty, investigate the possibility that this symbolizes a fragmented part of the personality (in which part of the personality does the dreamer perceive themselves to be royal?) (p. 201).
e. anonymous children can represent undeveloped parts of the personality or parts that remained stuck in childhood (p. 205)
f. Most dream animals are symbolic, unless the dreamer is consumed with a specific animal concern in real life (p. 206); they may represent sexual impulses and the way the dreamer views sexual impulses could be manifested through the type of animal (p. 208), they may also symbolize situations, principles, or institutions (p. 209)
g. dream houses often say something about our lives & relationships, unless this is a current preoccupation in the dreamer's waking life (p. 210); a house may offer a good dream picture of a marriage or family relationship (p. 212); dreams of childhood houses may indicate something in the dreamer's current situation reminds him of an earlier situation (p. 214)
h. vehicles may represent a lifestyle, or an actual vehicle if this is a current preoccupation in the dreamer's waking life, or the direction in which a relationship is going (p. 216-217); crossroads are a common theme for decision making (217); dreaming of missing a bus may represent straightforward fears of missing out on something in life (218); a vehicle may represent an institution (219);
i. dreams in which you take the role of some other type of protagonist than yourself may show you how you have been seeing yourself in some situation, perhaps without realizing it (p. 222)
j. whenever dream themes or characters recur, they reflect deeper problems underlying specific events or situations, in these dreams, all of the aspects of the dreams may represents aspects of the dreamer's self (223)
k. anyone who is locked up or banished is likely to be an alienated part of the personality which must be reclaimed (263)
Gestalt / Fritz Perls
- The dream is "an added bonus in the form of an existential message which tells us exactly where we are in relation to ourselves and to the world at the present time" (144).
gestalt therapy allows the whole group to see the above; place an empty chair across from the person talking about their dreams so they can move from chair to chair to act out different aspects of the dream (moving breaks bodily postures associated with one role and help client see/feel a different perspective). Dream elements are seen as aspects of the dreamer's personality -> this approach may be most valuable in recurring dreams. Perls found it unnecessary to to work with every element or event in a dream as long as the dreamer can receive at least one existential message from the dream (p. 150); the more fragmented the personality the more likely the person is to have nightmares (152)
Topdog & Underdog - the two clowns of the personality in Gestalt therapy according to Perls, they act out this struggle at a subconscious level (149);
"Topdog" - the part of the personality that is righteous and authoritarian. Top dog says "you should," "you must never," "You ought" and so on. Top dogs works with threats of catastrophe (149, 226)
"Underdog" - The recipient of the top dog's criticism is the underdog, she protests against the nagging but never seems to be convinced she is not all the things top dog calls her, usually apologetic, defensive, wheedling, manipulative, and has no power. (149) the nature of underdog gives a clue about a hole in the personality that is being avoided in waking life and must be consciously confronted in order to be whole (228)
- Types of "verbiage production" (p. 209)
1. "chickenshit" = small talk (e.g. "how are you, how is the weather")
2. "bullshit" = rationalization & excuses (e.g. "I can't love anybody because my mother didn't love me as a child.")
3. elephantshit = philisophizing & intellectualizing about meanings and theories without experiencing them
* Gestalt techniques do not tell you about the dream itself (source, nature, purpose) but they tell you a great deal about the dreamer. These techniques may not work for those who have trouble connecting with their inner sense of fantasy (in which case use Hall's method)
_____
Questions to ask about dreams:
1. Looking Outward: Does it contain any objective, factual truth? (p. 157) Has real information about actual events or facts about the world been understood on a subconscious level? If there is factual content the dream may still contain insights at deeper levels (160); Reminder dreams (p. 161-164); Warning dreams (p. 164-166); Clairvoyant dreams (p. 166-171); "Seeing through" people (p. 171-174); precognitive dreams (p. 174-181)
2. Perls: If a person rarely recalls whole dreams, Perls suggests that we ask, "dreams, why do you always come to me in bits and pieces?" (153) (Perls suggests that forgetting dreams is a ruse to avoid dealing with unpleasantness and these people feel they have come to terms with their lives (154)
3. Perls: With nightmares, ask,"Dreams, why are you trying to frighten me?" (153)
4. Why did the dreamer choose the symbol mentioned over another symbol?
5. If a dream has many different characters or images and the dreamer isn't sure where to start, begin by letting the most obvious characters speak for themselves and encounter each other until two come into conflict. (226) this conflict tells you about the message underlying the dream; make underdog speak up to top dog and state his needs (228)
_____
Three Types of Insight that can be Obtained from Dreams (p. 157-158)
a. objective truths about the outside world that have been subconsciously understood but not brought to a conscious level (looking outward)
b. How we see ourselves and the world, A picture of the dreamer's unique inner life (Hall's "Looking at a Picture" method / Through the Looking Glass)
c. Why our perspectives on ourselves and the world have formed the way they have; Looking inward: the dreamer's deeper inner self (Perl & Jung's techniques best for this level of insight)
_____
Faraday offers several "dream experiments" for the reader to conduct on themselves:
Experiment 1: p. 47-48
Experiment 2: p. 49
Experiment 3: p. 62
_____
When a child has nightmares, ask them why they are telling themselves such scary stories while they are sleeping? (272)
_____
Dreams and personality factors (p. 85)
Freud's dream disguises - condensation, displacement, (p.98-110)
4 Basic Rules to Dream Analysis according to Calvin Hall (p. 132-140)
on Gestalt therapy (p. 142)
Freud and sexism (p
November 1, 2008
There were some interesting tidbits in this book. I was particularly fascinated by the differences of REM versus non-REM dreaming and examples of subjects who upon waking and being questioned didn't even believe they had been asleep.
However, overall, I was bothered by how pretentious Faraday sounded. She discounts a lot of Freudian dream theory that imposed specific (usually sexual) symbolism on dreams, but then she turns around and imposes a lot of her own preconceived notions on other people's dreams.
She also puts a lot of emphasis on improvisational playacting to get to the "real" meaning of a dream. In the process, examples she gave became so built up in extra information which she "discovered" while improvising speeches for the various characters in the dream that you have to wonder if her conclusions have anything to do with the original dream itself.
I was particularly disturbed at her suggestions that people should be encouraged to share their dreams with others. While she notes that couples often have "dream duets" she fails to even acknowledge the possibility that some of these (what I came to think of more as dream "duels") might be deliberately manipulative in nature. That is, for example, a husband has a dream which he relates to his wife and proceeds to interpret that the dream means some action of hers has upset his subconscious (with the implication that she needs to change). The next night, the wife has a dream which she tells the husband and interprets it to mean something else, etc, and the cycle continues. Faraday seemed to think these dream "duets" were a wonderful process in which a couple works out what is really going on in their relationship. I had the disturbing feeling that I was watching passive aggression turned into a new art form.
In the end, Faraday literally suggests that coworkers and students in school should be telling each other their dreams as part of the work and school environment. The entire world would be a better place if everyone learned to harness their dream power. I couldn't quite believe the naivete of this. I suppose Faraday just has a much more optimistic view of the human race than I do. Whereas she envisions such personal exchanges as helping people understand each other better, all I can imagine are the psychological mind games (and perhaps a few sexual harassment suits) that would come out of a typical office sharing dreams over donuts in a weekly dream meeting.
However, overall, I was bothered by how pretentious Faraday sounded. She discounts a lot of Freudian dream theory that imposed specific (usually sexual) symbolism on dreams, but then she turns around and imposes a lot of her own preconceived notions on other people's dreams.
She also puts a lot of emphasis on improvisational playacting to get to the "real" meaning of a dream. In the process, examples she gave became so built up in extra information which she "discovered" while improvising speeches for the various characters in the dream that you have to wonder if her conclusions have anything to do with the original dream itself.
I was particularly disturbed at her suggestions that people should be encouraged to share their dreams with others. While she notes that couples often have "dream duets" she fails to even acknowledge the possibility that some of these (what I came to think of more as dream "duels") might be deliberately manipulative in nature. That is, for example, a husband has a dream which he relates to his wife and proceeds to interpret that the dream means some action of hers has upset his subconscious (with the implication that she needs to change). The next night, the wife has a dream which she tells the husband and interprets it to mean something else, etc, and the cycle continues. Faraday seemed to think these dream "duets" were a wonderful process in which a couple works out what is really going on in their relationship. I had the disturbing feeling that I was watching passive aggression turned into a new art form.
In the end, Faraday literally suggests that coworkers and students in school should be telling each other their dreams as part of the work and school environment. The entire world would be a better place if everyone learned to harness their dream power. I couldn't quite believe the naivete of this. I suppose Faraday just has a much more optimistic view of the human race than I do. Whereas she envisions such personal exchanges as helping people understand each other better, all I can imagine are the psychological mind games (and perhaps a few sexual harassment suits) that would come out of a typical office sharing dreams over donuts in a weekly dream meeting.
September 22, 2023
This book is a very fascinating and mostly scientific look at dreams. There is a lot of useful information about dream interpretation. It is old, and I wonder if there isn’t a more up to date alternative that may be better.
June 3, 2025
Author's attempt to analyze history of dream theories (Freud, Jung, other cultures). Chapters on definitions, lab experiments (D-state, etc.), as well as interesting interpretations, the future use of dreams in society, as creative inspiration et. Okay for the history parts but lots of author's opinions too which seem somewhat dated.
July 6, 2018
Such a good book on the psychology behind our dreams which overviews the methods we can adopt to interpret and understand our dreams!
Absolutely loved it! Highly recommend it to people who remember their dreams and want to understand themselves.
Absolutely loved it! Highly recommend it to people who remember their dreams and want to understand themselves.
January 2, 2023
interesting book, but I'm giving up on it. I think it's my problem. It's single spaced and hundreds of pages long. It is my reading level but it is so incredibly dense I just can't even
February 28, 2025
This book, which I read a long time ago, did provide some useful advice on dream interpretation, most importantly that dreams may reflect relatively mundane events that occurred the previous day or two and not always major life events or motifs. But what I found most useful was that, while I was reading the book, I remembered many more dreams than I usually do, and recorded quite a number of them.
January 3, 2010
Nice introduction to dreams - common sensical and well written.
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