Dream interpretation has been practiced since prehistoric times, with beliefs ranging from messages from gods to expressions of unconscious desires. Psychologists like Freud and Jung added their own theories, while artists like Dali and Lynch incorporate dream imagery into their work. Most agree that dreams reflect the concerns of the waking mind and may even help solve problems.
Since prehistoric times, humans have searched for ways to interpret dreams. Primitive societies believed that dreams were communications from gods or spirits and could foretell the future, a belief that persists in some quarters today. In the 20th century, pioneers of psychology such as Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung searched for meaning in the life and unconscious desires of the dreamer. Subsequent generations of researchers added their own psychological theories. Studying these theories can offer the average person many tips for interpreting dreams.
Ancient peoples attached great significance to the puzzling images of dreams and revered those who could interpret them. According to the Bible and the Torah, the Jewish prophet Joseph predicted a famine with his ability to interpret dreams. Similar stories appear in the mythology of ancient Babylonia, Egypt and Greece. Over the centuries, this belief in the psychic origin of dreams has developed in contrast to later psychological studies. These two methods of interpreting dreams, the psychic and the psychological, remain distinct to this day.
In the early 20th century, Sigmund Freud proposed a new way of interpreting dreams, as expressions of fears or wishes that could not be expressed in waking life. Freud’s rival Jung went further, suggesting that each person in a dream represents an aspect of the dreamer’s personality. Gestalt psychologists, working in the mid-20th century, believed this also extended to inanimate objects seen in dreams. One piece of advice from this psychology school is to enter a relaxed, distraction-free state and focus on remembering the dream object or person. The dreamer’s feelings about this person or object can often reveal its meaning.
Freud and other psychologists have insisted that the dream should not be interpreted literally, as it is not a story but a collection of images. That is, to interpret dreams, focus on individual elements, not on the dream as a whole. Despite their differences, most psychologists agree that the items in a dream represent the concerns of the waking mind. In some cases, dreams may be the mind’s way of solving problems that frustrate normal ways of thinking. In fact, some psychologists have suggested that the threats and conflicts in dreams and nightmares are the mind’s way of training for real-life confrontations.
Artists are often fascinated by dream imagery and incorporate it into their art, either as a way to interpret dreams or simply to harness their strange and fascinating power. Early Surrealists such as Salvador Dali and director Luis Bunuel used dream imagery in works such as Un Chien Andalou and The Persistence of Memory. Director David Lynch continues the tradition with films that mix whimsical and dreamlike imagery with simple storytelling. Dreams have been depicted in paintings, plays, and even comics. Richard Linklater’s 2001 animated film Waking Life offers a long dream sequence of events, leaving the interpretation to the viewer, just as real dreams do.
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