“Birds singing in the sycamore tree, dream a little dream of me”
– Kahn / Schwandt / Andre
What do the studies of Freud, Jung, and the Dalai Lama have in common?
Their studies found the importance of dreams in understanding human behavior.
Dream theories are abundant, each trying to explain the mysterious and often surreal nature of our nighttime experiences. Perhaps you’re working out emotional dilemmas by acting out different realities in your dreams. Maybe your brain is simply sifting through the huge amount of sensory stimuli you accumulate each day to keep the important stuff and discard the unimportant stuff, like a type of mental housecleaning. Or maybe all that neuron firing is totally random.
Freud saw dreams as “guardians of sleep,” keeping internal conflicts at bay. He saw dreams as an important part of letting us rest and get some well-needed sleep before reality would set in again in the morning.
Yung saw dreams as a journey of growth and understanding, not only for oneself but also the collective unconsciousness. The word “complex” and “introverts and extroverts” stemmed out of his studies. Dreams were a way of working through roadblocks to different levels of consciousness.
In Dalai Lama’s Tibetan philosophy, sleep is like a mini-death. It’s when the soul is in transition. Although many philosophies see sleep as an unconscious time, Tibetan Buddhism sees sleep as a super-conscious, super-aware time. A time that can significantly affect and even guide us into the next life.
Whatever your thoughts or beliefs are about dreams, there’s one thing we all have in common – we do indeed dream. Whether we remember them upon awaking or not. Our dreams quietly roll out their little red carpets to a world seemingly out of grasp yet also within reach. Dreams have the potential of offering a fascinating roadmap to deeper explorations into who we really are and where in the whole wide world and beyond we are going.
So here’s a meditative exploration to consider for this week:
Write down a recent dream. Ask a friend to do the same. Then have a cozy cup of coffee together and discuss them. Consider your dreams from a Freudian perspective, a Jungian perspective, a Tibetan Buddhist view, or simply from your very own unique persuasion. That dream may hold the answer to a serious question or concern you are having right now. It might even open a new door in your thinking. A door to a world you now only dream of.
Wishing you better than sweet dreams. Wishing you an inner world of ever increasing awareness.
Joan will be teaching this summer (with LaMarr Magnus) a 4-week course, “Adventures in Meditation,” ( EPSY494) through the Department of Education at the University of Illinois at Chicago, May 19-June 13.
