Monique Aguerre, BA, resides in Petaluma, California, where she creates masks and facilitates workshops. She recently completed her studies in the Depth Psychology Master’s Program at Sonoma State University, and is writing her thesis on the use of masks as tools for personal transformation.
Abstract
This presentation documents my personal experience of using masks as tools for exploring dreams. My approach is to create wearable masks that represent actual dream images, and then employ the technique of active imagination to interact with those images. Active imagination is a method of Jungian psychology that allows for a dialogue to take place between the conscious and unconscious aspects of the psyche. My dialogue with the unconscious takes place through the vehicle of the mask. The mask acts as a bridge between worlds, allowing dream images to be carried into waking consciousness and fully embodied. It enables the waking life persona to step aside and make way for the expression of other archetypal figures within the psyche. In working with dream images, a mask can allow the dreamer to reenter the dream while being fully awake – a unique and powerful experience.
I gain a deep level of intimacy with my dreams as I move through the entire process, which includes creating the mask, engaging in movement and dance, dialogue, and written reflection. I then photograph myself wearing the masks, and in many cases, I further explore the images through collage and digital enhancement. These photographic images act as mirrors, providing me with fresh perspective on the meaning of my dreams. My presentation will include many examples of these images, and the stories of discovery that accompany them.
The masks help me interact with the dream images and discover more about them. For example, I have had many dreams about owls, which hold great significance for me. I created a mask of an owl to represent the owl figures in my dreams. The mask allows me to actually become the owl within the context of my waking consciousness. I am able to enact the movements and gestures of the owl, and to allow any messages to come through the owl image that might have been inaccessible otherwise.
Working with masks differs from other types of art processes in that masks allow the wearer to set aside the persona of everyday life and become immersed in character of the mask. A mask can allow the wearer to directly come in contact with the archetypal images that reside within each of us. This is particularly valuable when working with dreams. For instance, by donning a mask that represents the Shadow element of a dream, the dreamer can explore the dream from the perspective of the Shadow, rather than viewing that character as alien or separate. By creating masks that represent different characters within a dream, it is possible to experience the dream from a variety of perspectives by alternately wearing the various masks and looking through the eyes of the various dream characters.
I believe that each character in the dream reflects different aspects of the Self. I feel that by creating and wearing masks that represent these characters, a dreamer may achieve a greater experience of wholeness and integration.
*
Emily Anderson, MA, has a certificate of Dream Studies and a Master’s degree in Transformative Arts from John F. Kennedy University. She is a multi-media artist, dancer, teacher and arts administrator and has led and participated in art, dreaming and spiritual groups for over ten years as well as worked at the director level of Bay Area art nonprofits.
Abstract
Through creating collages based on a dream, series of dreams or one image from a dream we will evoke the state of creation, where dreams dwell. Through imagery and reflection, we will explore this expanded state to gain further insight into our dreams. This workshop is based on the wisdom inherent in the dream as well as the individual. Therefore, through the seemingly “simple” technique of sharing a dream with the group and then making a collage, various layers of unconscious connections and insights will be exposed. It relies on the richness of color and imagery to convey the essence of the dream beyond words. Supplies will be provided.
*
Elicia M. Arwen, MA, studies Contemplative Psychology and Transpersonal Psychology. She has studied the psychology of Carl Jung and dreamwork since 1994. She currently practices as a psychotherapist in Boulder, Colorado.
Abstract
This article demonstrates how dreamwork can be an essential aspect of the healing process of female incest survivors. Schellenberg (1997) found that symbols played a significant role in the lives of women who had survived childhood sexual abuse and Kane (1989) suggested that acknowledgment of images produced by the unconscious could give the survivor much needed information about her life patterns. The material presented here was extracted from a phenomenological study conducted to expand on these authors’ findings. The study explored dream material described as healing by four co-researchers. Co-researchers’ data indicated that dreams were an essential aspect of healing from childhood incest in the following ways: (a) dreams enhanced awareness of healing processes; (b) the evolution of their abusers in dreams facilitated their perceptions of their abuser as human and no longer a threat; (c) dreams helped them perceive themselves and others more accurately; (d) dreams helped them feel safer in their bodies and the world; (e) symbols in their dreams brought meaning to their healing processes; (f) dreams increased spiritual awareness; and (g) changes in their dreams over time validated their experiences and aided them in rebuilding self-trust.
Co-researchers of this study were recruited through therapists in the Philadelphia area and met the following requirements for inclusion in the study: they (a) were female survivors of childhood incest; (b) were at least twenty-four years of age; (c) had consistently seen the same therapist for at least six months; (d) remembered and used their dreams to inform their conscious lives; and (e) worked well with their dreams.
Data were collected in two ways. First, co-researchers completed a six-item questionnaire on their dream lives and were asked to describe two or three dreams they believed had an impact on healing from incest. Second, co-researchers were interviewed by the researcher to elicit further information on dream experiences they believed informed their conscious lives. This data was used to collect co‑researchers’ perceptions of the relationship to their dream lives, as well as aid in the self-reflection of the researcher during analysis.
This article reports specifically on how co-researchers experienced their dream lives as facilitators of accurate and healthy self-perceptions. The following themes from the study are discussed in this article: (a) dreams enhanced meaning and awareness of their healing processes; (b) dreams helped them perceive themselves and others more accurately; and (c) changes in their dreams over time validated their experiences and aided them in rebuilding self-trust. First, the article briefly summarizes the study from which the data was extracted. It then discusses the data related to the enhancement of self-perception. Brief case studies are presented to explain how co-researchers utilized their dream material to increase accurate and healthy self-perceptions. Finally, the article discusses the importance of dreamwork within the context of therapy with adult female survivors of incest.
*
Healing CollageSM Dream Group
Sheila McNellis Asato, MA, www.monkeybridgearts.com, is the founder of Monkey Bridge Arts, a center dedicated to the growth, transformation and healing of individuals and the community through art, dreaming and creative development. She also provides customized training in cross-cultural communication, with an emphasis on Japan, for Family Guidance International.
Abstract
This experiential dream group will focus on the Healing CollageSM process as a means of working with dreams on a daily basis. By working visually, first thing in the morning, participants will see how the dream influences the unconscious placement of imagery in their collages, creating a kind of visual dream journal.
Healing CollageSM is a non-verbal, creative way of accessing, interacting with and deepening one's relationship with dreams, even in the absence of dream recall. Like the collage artist in the studio, the dreaming self loves to cut, paste, and move imagery around in a number of surprising and occasionally shocking ways to get our attention. In this morning dream group, participants will have an opportunity to directly experience the relationship between waking creativity and dreaming in a way that stimulates further creative work with their dreams after the session has ended.
Dreaming is a highly emotional and visual state of consciousness. Upon waking, as one moves into the world of words and linear thought, it is only natural to try to articulate the dream experience in words. After all, verbal fluency is one of the great strengths of waking life. However, as useful as words may be in waking life, the dream itself remains an essentially non-verbal experience. When one relies primarily on words to bring dream content into waking life, a great deal is unnecessarily lost in translation. It’s hard enough to recall dreams without the additional burden of immediately translating them into words upon waking.
The Healing CollageSM offers a non-verbal means of bringing dream material into waking life through the language of form and feeling. As artists throughout time have known, it is possible to bring dreams into waking life through the use of shape, texture, position and color. When one trusts the eyes and hands to guide the way, it is possible to transcend the specific cultural limitations of words. As Jung said, “Often the hands will solve a mystery that the intellect has struggled with in vain.”
Once dream material has been embodied visually in a Healing CollageSM, it is then possible to begin the separate task of translating that material into words. Through demonstrations, participants will learn how to create a meaningful dialogue based on the tendency of particular issues to cluster together in specific areas of a collage. This will open up new ways of interacting with dreams, as well as deepening one's relationship with the inner world.
At the last session of this dream group, there will be a brief discussion on the Healing CollageSM as a unique synthesis of graphic design techniques, Japanese collage therapy methods, the Watchword technique and Kaplan-Williams' approach to dream cards, followed by an explanation of the underlying compositional principals that guide the unconscious positioning of images. Participants will leave with a deeper awareness of how dream imagery can emerge visually into waking life.
All forms have an underlying structure which holds them together. The dream is no exception. Like art, the dream has a structural integrity that can be observed visually when given free access to a two‑dimensional surface. The Healing CollageSM offers a direct, non-threatening approach to dreamwork that requires no background in art. Because of its accessibility, even people with little or no dream recall will find a way to begin working their images in a meaningful way.
*
The Business of Dreaming
Sheila McNellis Asato, MA, www.monkeybridgearts.com, is the founder of Monkey Bridge Arts, a center dedicated to the growth, transformation and healing of individuals and the community through art, dreaming and creative development. She also provides customized training in cross-cultural communication, with an emphasis on Japan, for Family Guidance International.
Wendy Pannier, (USA), has conducted workshops and dream groups with cancer patients for the past 11 years, as well as coordinating grants to IASD for the work she and Tallulah Lyons are doing with cancer patients. She has worked with Dr. Montague Ullman since the early 1980s and has led dream groups for diverse audiences here and abroad for over 25 years.
Nicole Gratton, (Canada), founder and director of the Dream School Nicole Gratton (École de Rêves) in Montreal. She also acts as a sleep consultant for the business community and has written fourteen books in French on the subject of dreams and sleep, two of which were translated into Italian.
Justina Lasley, MA (USA), www.dreamswork.us, is the founder of the Institute for Dream Studies and director of DreamsWork™ Certification Program for the NY Open Center. She is the author of Honoring the Dream: A Handbook for Dream Group Leaders. Justina also lectures, leads workshops, and facilitates dream groups throughout the United States.
Janet S. Steinwedel, PhD (USA). Building on her dissertation study which incorporated dreamwork in leadership coaching, Janet continues to build the case for dreams in the corporate world. She started her own business, Leader’s Insight, LLC, in 2005. She has worked with Leadership and Organizational Development for 20 years. Her doctorate is in Human and Organizational Systems.
Abstract
Dreaming not only nourishes individuals, but it also nourishes the community. Contemporary dream workers are bringing dreaming out into the world in a variety of ways that are enhancing the lives of dreamers as well as the dreams themselves. In this panel, four entrepreneurs will share their experiences of creating and running dream based businesses.
Justina Lasley in Following Your Dreams to Success will discuss her path toward founding the Institute for Dream Studies. She will discuss how opportunities, synchronicity, mentors, IASD, training and graduate programs, writing and publishing led the way to creating a learning center for dream workers. She will also share tips for following ones desire and interest, creating an identity, cultivating respect in ones field, developing business skills that will allow one to move into the business of dreaming.
Next, Wendy Pannier will speak about The Business of Non Profits. In this presentation, she will talk about the grants she and Tallulah Lyons have gotten and the pros and cons of pursuing this type of funding. She will also discuss the importance of running nonprofit work in a business manner and provide tips on some fundamental Do’s and Don’ts.
In Planning to Succeed – The Nuts and Bolts of Starting a Dream Business, Sheila Asato will share how she has brought dreaming together with her work in the studio arts. As the founder of Monkey Bridge Arts, she has found that dreams alone are not enough to start a business. Learning how to think like a business person, creating a business plan, doing market research, finding practical support, and developing a diverse audience have allowed her to bring her passions out into the public in a way that is meaningful and is leading to success. Sheila will review the practical steps she has taken to get her dream business off to a flying start.
In the third presentation, Running a Dream Business, Nicole Gratton has found that being a small business owner requires a variety of skills. Nicole will address four key areas essential to success including juggling one's public identities as consultant, teacher/ facilitator, professional speaker, and dreamwork practitioner. Tips for getting the word out through marketing tools such as business cards and pamphlets, advertising, the internet, networking, and writing. How to organize oneself for action by reading business newspapers, taking sales courses, and giving back to the community through consultation, workshops, and speeches. And finally, the importance of harmonizing ones professional and spiritual mission through daily meditation, dream incubation and by being a pure channel for Spirit"
Finally, in Dreamwork and Executive Coaching, Janet S. Steinwedel, PhD, asks the question, is there room for dreaming in the corporate world? In this presentation, Janet will share how she has incorporated dreamwork into an executive coaching practice. Through a case study, she will explore the benefits and challenges of bringing dreamwork into the corporate world and the coaching relationship. She will also share the work she’s doing with coaches and dreams in order to further their development and effectiveness.
*
Umberto Barcaro is an Associate Professor at the Computer Science Department of Pisa University, Italy, and a research collaborator at the National Research Council. He is particularly interested in text analysis of dream reports and dream associations. He has been a member of IASD since 1999.
Pietro Rizzi is a psychoanalyst and psychotherapist in Milan, Italy. He is an Associate Professor at the Department of Psychology of the Milano–Bicocca University. His research interests include theory and methods in clinical psychology and psychoanalysis, clinical interview, and psychoanalytic approaches to aesthetics.
Abstract
The memory sources of dreams can be present concerns, abstract assertions, or memories of past episodes. These sources are closely interconnected, very far from separate; the study of the links among sources can evidence interesting features of the dreaming phenomenon.
Possible links among dream sources can be identified by the automatic detection of word recurrences in text files including dream reports and the associations with the various dream items. A graph representation of the links can be helpful, because of its visual impact and its capacity to provide quantitative parameters. The study of the grammar roles of the recurring words allows identifying significant context changes. Based on these changes, plausible explanations can be advanced for the establishment of links among dream sources (Barcaro et al., 2002; Barcaro et al., 2005).
The automatic analysis is based on the detection of word recurrences, a method often applied in computer analysis of literary texts: approaches to text analysis proper of literary criticism can be helpful in the study of dreaming (Kramer, 2000). We assume that the associations provided by the dreamer can provide reliable information about the dream sources (Cavallero and Cicogna, 1993), even though the collection of associations requires carefulness and caution. In fact, most approaches to dream interpretation are based on asking the dreamer about the dream (see, e.g., the various chapters, written by different Authors of the book edited by Delaney, 1993). Establishing (or simply witnessing) links among different sources is an important feature of the dreaming process. Even very young children can have dreams which combine sources related to different episodes of their lives (Siegel and Bulkeley, 1998). In dreams after trauma, the past traumatic experience often works as a metaphor for present concerns of the dreamer (see, e.g., Kramer et al., 1987, Hartmann, 2001, Barrett, 1996): in spite of a tendency of the traumatic experience towards, so to say, occupying the whole dream, the memory of this experience is however connected to other contents. The fact that dream sources are closely connected is in agreement with the idea that cross-connecting is a basic function of dreaming (Hartmann, 1996).
In this presentation, we give examples of application of this method to dreams reported during therapeutic sessions. We have found that the study of the links among dream sources is helpful in therapy. When the patient reports a dream, the therapist exploits ideas, images, and recollections provided by the patient as associations with the dream, thus obtaining an initial assessment of the dream significance. An application of the method proposed can evidence new aspects of the dream content and can allow the therapist to review his first analysis and to discuss the new aspects with the patient. Furthermore, it often happens that the patient re-activates the dream contents in a new session and adds new items or details: in this case, our method can provide a confirmation of the initial analysis or suggest modifications to it.
*
Maryann Barone-Chapman is a Jungian psychotherapist in private practice in London where she specializes in women’s issues, including infertility. She holds a Master’s of Science from the British Association of Psychotherapists, Jungian Analytic Section, in collaboration with Birkbeck College University of London. She is currently pursuing her doctorate in women’s unconscious use of their bodies.
Abstract
The patient loves to dream. The patient dreams to love. This dream series chronicles two years of exploration into the unconscious obstacles of a mother bound female patient who is frightened of separating from mother and meeting her male other. The patient longs for home and family but at a time of life when she is most fertile, the journey is fraught with perils that include: images of a fierce mother protecting a young male baby from men with knives to swarms of flying insects and ants coming out of the walls when she is ready to have her man. The clinical use of the dream series and the patient’s use of its’ symbolism through drawings are experienced as creative endeavours differentiating her longing for the male from her longing to integrate her Animus as the “Partner Within”.
In Jungian terms this is the first hurdle toward individuation; the working through of being ‘mother bound’. The emergent themes include the affects of an absence of a good enough and present father to help daughter develop autonomy, agency, dependence and inter-dependence. Without father, the female is left with a one-sided view of the world and cannot form an intra-psychic marriage that allows both anima and animus development
Through the dream the patient is able to work with the split of the syzygy, her fear of penetration and genital maturity. Several transformations in the dream series and in the real time engagement with the male other emerge out of an over-development of Eros and romantic ideals. A second theme emerges within the canvas of the dream regarding the fear, hatred and envy of mother around dreams of sexuality and romantic relationships which serve as battlefield for having authority in her own life.
The struggle to find the other within and in the world is compensated for through a series of dreams representing the task the patient longs to accomplish: adulthood.
Several dreams and attending drawings where the patient has dreamed the dream on will be presented.
Cater, N. (2003) Electra, Tracing a Feminine Myth Through the Western Imagination New Orleans: Spring
Hillman, J. (1988) ‘Going Bugs’, Spring 40-72
Jung, C.G. (1913) The Theory of Psychoanalysis Collected Works 4
Jung, C.G. (1954) ‘The practical use of dream-analysis’, CW 16
Jung, C.G. (1963 Mysterium Coniunctionis CW14 New York: Bollingen Series XX
Jung, C.G. (1982) Aspects of the Feminine London: Ark Routledge
Leonard, L (1982) The Wounded Woman Healing the Father-Daughter Relationship Boston: Shambala
Mc Neely, D.A. (1991) Animus Aeternus Exploring the Inner Masculine Toronto: Inner City
Neumann, E. (1955) The Origins and History of Consciousness London: Routledge, Kegan Paul
Neumann, E. (1994) The Fear of the Feminine Chichester: Princeton University Press
Powell, S. (1993) Electra: The Dark Side of the Moon Journal of Analytical Psychology 38: 155-174
Seligman, E. (1985) The Half-Alive Ones. In A. Samuels (ed.) The Father Contemporary Jungian Perspectives
Williamson, M. (2004) The Importance of fathers in relation to their daughters’ psychosexual development In Psychodynamic Practice 10.2 pp.207-219
Woodman, M., Danson, K., Hamilton, M. & Greer Allen, R. (1992) Leaving My Father’s House, The Journey to Conscious Femininity London: Shambhala
Young-Eisendrath, P. Wiedemann, F. (1987) Female Authority Empowering Women Through Psychotherapy London: Guilford Press
Young-Eisendrath, P. (1999) Women & Desire Beyond Wanting to be Wanted London : Piatkus
*
Deirdre Barrett, PhD, is author of The Committee of Sleep: How Artists, Scientists, and Athletes Use Their Dreams for Creative Problem Solving – and How You Can, Too; The Pregnant Man and Other Cases from a Hypnotherapist's Couch; and editor of Trauma and Dreams. She is Editor-in-Chief of Dreaming, and Assistant Professor at Harvard Medical School.
Abstract
There are a variety of ways of combining hypnosis and dreamwork for the mutual enhancement of each. One can use hypnotic suggestions that a person will experience a dream in the trance state – either as an open ended suggestion or with the suggestion that they dream about a certain topic – and these "hypnotic dreams" have been found to be similar enough to nocturnal dreams (Barrett, 1979) to be worked with using many of the same techniques usually applied to nocturnal dreams. One can also work with previous nocturnal dreams during a hypnotic trance in ways parallel to Jung's "active imagination" techniques to continue, elaborate on, or explore the meaning of the dream.
Research by Charles Tart (1964) has found that hypnotic suggestions can be used to influence future nocturnal dream content, and Joe Dane (1985) demonstrated that hypnotic suggestions can increase the frequency of laboratory verified lucid dreams. Many people have also utilized hypnotic and self-hypnotic suggestions for increased dream recall.
The workshop will cover all of these techniques and include experiential exercises with several of them. It would be appropriate for both individuals interested in working with their own dreams and for professional therapists interested in acquiring more techniques for helping clients to explore their dreams.
*
Deirdre Barrett, PhD, is author of The Committee of Sleep: How Artists, Scientists, and Athletes Use Their Dreams for Creative Problem Solving – and How You Can, Too; The Pregnant Man and Other Cases from a Hypnotherapist's Couch; and editor of Trauma and Dreams. She is Editor-in-Chief of Dreaming, and Assistant Professor at Harvard Medical School.
Abstract
What does a theory of dreaming need to explain? I propose the key elements are:
- Why is there any mental content at all to our nights’ sleep?
- Why are dreams so different from waking perception, i.e. what is the explanation for their “bizarre” elements, their heightened visual imagery, motion and emotion; their lowered logic, language, and memory, their abrupt transitions?
- Do dreams have a function(s) – if so, what? If not, how do we explain their existence?
In this paper, I will address these with special emphasis on one aspect of the last question: if it is to fit within modern science, an explanation of any behavior needs to be consistent with evolutionary theory. I’ll outline a proposed function – that dreams are thinking or problem solving in a different biochemical state from that of waking and then discuss why I think the epiphenomena/spandrel model does not sufficiently account for this. I will review earlier evolutionary dream theories, suggest ways in which they may be too narrow, and question the utility of the ‘spandrel’ concept. I posit that dreams are thinking or problem solving in a different biochemical state from that of waking. I will describe how specific characteristics of dream mentation are determined by which sensory modalities we must monitor, the need to remain still and quiet during sleep, and perhaps other physiological parameters. However, dreaming evolved over at least 164 million years of mammalian history, and seems to be fine-tuned to certain psychological purposes. This paper will also examine whether dreams may have been more useful in an ancestral human environment.
*
Donald Bender, MFT, is a licensed psychotherapist, who specializes in the linguistic analysis of clinical and forensic documents. He moderates the online discussion forum dedicated to clinical and research approaches to the Thematic Apperception Test. He has a private practice and in addition is Director of Training for ‘TheirWords’.
Abstract
In this presentation you will learn to identify the different linguistic strategies that dreamers typically employ to conceal the subjective "I" in sensitive segments of their dream narrative.
The "I" character is generally recognized as being the most important figure in the dream narrative. The "I" can appear as a main character, part of the supporting cast, or an "uninvolved" witness to the action. The "I" can even disappear from the diegesis completely, confining its role to a meta-narrational capacity.
In their coding system Hall & van de Castle recognize that the dreamer or "I" character has a privileged place in the dream cast. Because the dreamer is such a constant factor in almost every dream they decided not to further code the dreamer (D) in any of their character classes. This decision however, functionally colludes with the subversive proclivity of the "I" to camouflage itself and disappear from the dream text.
The "I" in a dream is often hidden because we do not want to take responsibility for some of the thoughts and acts committed by our dream self. Repression is never total however, and the elided presence of the Self leaves a tell tale linguistic trail. We will follow that trail and expose the hidden "I."
This presentation will demonstrate how the techniques of discourse and forensic statement analysis can be usefully applied to the manifest content of the dream narrative.
Forbidden impulses, acts, and thoughts mediate and distort the dreamer's ability and inclination to accurately recount the dream. The dreamer always has two audiences whose opinion and judgment has to be taken into account. There is firstly any potential listener to the dream such as a friend, colleague, or therapist. There is also and more pervasively the felt moral stance of the dreamer's own waking self. Material might be left out or distorted because it is egodystonic – both embarrassing and incompatible with the dreamer's accepted ideal self construct.
The easiest and most natural way of dealing with egodystonic material is to simply let the forces of repression wash it from waking memory. Frequently the dream affect is too powerful to be completely repressed or too indelible because it has been written down. The censoring function then must fall back on elision, distortion, and confusion. Behind this second tier of defense there is a third tier by which the dreamer is able to linguistically withdraw commitment to and disown responsibility from suspect acts.
Tier 1: "I can't remember what I dreamed last night."
Tier 2: "I stabbed somebody."
Tier 3: "Somebody was stabbed."
Concentrating on the Tier 3 defense I will delineate twenty different linguistic stratagems that are employed in dream narratives to "mask" the personal involvement of the dream ego who goes by the legal name "I". Some of these strategies are semantic; others are grammatical. All of them serve to distance the dreamer from his own dream by diluting actational commitment and responsibility. By doing so the dream becomes not only safe enough to preserve, but also innocent enough to be displayed in public.
Authors Note: Linguistic Statement Analysis has a long theoretical and research tradition. It was first formulated by a German psychologist named Undeutsch in the 1950's to help the legal system distinguish fabricated from real accounts of child abuse narratives. There have been many refinements since then and thousands of clinical and experimental studies (see Vrij (2000,) Yuille (1989), and Ekman (1985) for a historical and literature review.) My own work has been to adopt these linguistic analytical techniques to more clinical material such as therapy session process notes, TAT stories, and most relevant to this occasion: dream narratives.
*
Mark Blagrove, PhD, is reader in psychology and Director of the Sleep Laboratory at Swansea University, Wales. He is a Past President of IASD, is a consulting Editor of the journal Dreaming, and is on the editorial board of the Journal of Sleep Research.
Abstract
Introduction
Much work has been conducted on the relationship between personality and the frequency of having nightmares. When nightmare frequency has been assessed retrospectively, or as the number of nightmares during a period of keeping a dream diary, significant correlations have been found by various authors with various traits, for example boundariness (Hartmann et al, 1998; Schredl et al, 1996), and anxiety (Zadra and Donderi, 2000). There has also been some work on correlating for single individuals their mood during a day with the presence/absence of a nightmare on the following night (e.g. Cellucci & Lawrence, 1978). The latter authors found that some individuals have a greater relationship than others between daytime mood and likelihood of having a nightmare. This current paper reports the first study to address whether particular traits are associated with a greater likelihood of having a nightmare on a night following a day with negative mood.
Method
42 participants (35 female, 7 male; mean age = 40.1 (19.0) years) who have nightmares at least once per month were rated on 13 personality trait scales. They then kept a dream diary for 14 nights in which they reported the hedonic tone of their dreams on a 7 point scale of very pleasant to very unpleasant. They also reported their level of state anxiety and state depression before going to bed each day.
Results
Dreams rated as very unpleasant were classed as nightmares. Mean number of nightmares over the 14 nights = 2.6 (SD = 1.78, range 0 – 7). Within subject correlations were conducted for each participant who had at least one nightmare and at least one dream that was not a nightmare over the course of the diary, between state anxiety and presence/absence of a nightmare. Mean within subjects correlations = .13 (SD = .33, range = -.41 to .85, n=38). These within subjects correlations were then converted to Fishers r within subjects correlations, and were then correlated for the 38 participants with each of the 13 personality traits. The following traits correlated at the .05 (1-tail) level with number of nightmares: cognitive arousal; fantasy proneness; borderline personality; neuroticism (all rs > .26); the following traits correlated at the .01 (1–tail) level : social conformity; trait anxiety; symptom check list severity (rs > .36). None of the traits had significant correlations with the within subjects correlations of presence of nightmare with presleep anxiety, largest correlation was with number of adverse life events (r=.24, n.s.). Traits generally correlated higher with within subjects correlations of presence of nightmare with presleep depression, only symptom check list approached significance (r=.31, p=.03 1-tail).
Discussion
Individuals differ in whether they respond with a nightmare to presleep anxiety or depression. Such individual differences only have weak (at best) correlations with various traits that were hypothesised to indicate a predisposition to having nightmares.
*
The Mediating Effect of Nightmare Distress in Relationships Between Psychopathology and Nightmare Frequency
Mark Blagrove, PhD, is reader in psychology and Director of the Sleep Laboratory at Swansea University, Wales. He is a Past President of IASD, is a consulting Editor of the journal Dreaming, and is on the editorial board of the Journal of Sleep Research.
Abstract
Introduction
Many researchers have found higher psychopathology in people who frequently have nightmares than in those who do not, although there iss dispute about the exact nature of these psychopathologies, with some researchers finding associations with shizotypy (Levin, 1998), others with neuroticism but not psychotoicism, and others with waking life stress and general poor-wellbeing (e.g.,Zadra and Donderi, 2000). However, Belicki (1992) found that psychopathology is related to the distress caused by nightmares but not to nightmare frequency itself. As Belicki assessed nightmare frequency by retrospective questionnaire Blagrove et al (2004) investigated whether this is also true for nightmare frequency when assessed by dream log. They found that there are relationships between nightmare frequency and various psychopathology measures, but that these relationships become negligible when the trait distress caused by nightmares is partialled out. This led to the conclusion that waking life stress and psychopathology does not lead to a higher frequency of nightmares, but rather that individuals who have higher distress due to nightmares recall nightmares more frequently: their nightmare frequency is thus an attribution. Blagrove et al (2004) used a sample of students in their study. The present study aimed to find out if the same mediation and attributtion due to nightmare distress is present for a sample with greater psychopathology.
Method
53 participants (44 female, 9 male; mean age = 38.2 (18.2) years) who have nightmares at least once per month were assed for retrospective nightmare frequency and for prospective nightmare frequency on a dream diary for 14 nights. They were also assessed on various psychopathology measures, including neuroticism, anxiety, acute stress, and borderline personality. They were also assessed on Belicki’s (1992) 13 item trait nightmare distress scale.
Results
Nightmare distress and prospective nightmare frerquency had similarly sized correlations (rs = approximately 0.3) as each other with various psychopathology measures. When nightmare distress was partialled out of the correlations between nightmare frequency and psychopathology the latter correlations generally remained significant, although diminished.
Discussion
There is a direct effect of psychopathology on nightmare frequency that is independent of the rarely assessed confound of trait nightmare distress. The results and conclusions of Blagrove et al (2004) may thus not be generalisable to non-student more psychopathologic populations.
*
Fariba Bogzaran, PhD, is an Associate Professor and the founding Director of the Dream Studies Program at JFK University. One of the pioneers in dream education and research on transpersonal experiences in lucid dreaming, she is the author of numerous publications on the spiritual dimensions and is the co-author of Extraordinary Dreams.
George Gillespie, MA, is a Sanskrit scholar and has done doctoral work in Sanskrit (University of Pennsylvania). He is an American Baptist Minister and has taught the history of religions at seminaries in India. He writes on the phenomenology of visual experience and religious experiences of light.
Scott Sparrow, EdD, LPC, LMFT, is an Assistant Professor at the University of Texas-Pan American. He is the author of Lucid Dreaming: Dawning of the Clear Light (1976) and several books on the phenomenology of religious experiences. His recent book is his memoir, Healing the Fisher King: A Fly Fisher’s Quest, in which the lucid dreaming and experience of light figure prominently.
Robert Van de Castle, PhD, is Professor Emeritus of the Health Sciences Center at the University of Virginia. He is a Past President of IASD, co-author with Calvin Hall of the dream classic, The Content Analysis of Dreams, the author of Our Dreaming Mind, and has authored numerous publications including Our Dreaming Mind (1996).
Abstract
The experience of light is widely acknowledged as a core mystical experience by the world’s religious and spiritual traditions. Such experiences occur in dreams and Near Death Experiences, as well as in prayer and meditation states. Recipients report that light experiences coincide with spiritual openings and exert a significant impact on their lives. While light itself is formless, it manifests in a phenomenal context that includes non-representational geometric imagery, as well as representational imagery with clear archetypal and idiosyncratic qualities.
This presentation focuses on four different aspects and dimensions of light in dreams.
Fariba Bogzaran will discuss the relationship between the experience of Light and experience of Void – including hypnagogic, lucid dream, and hypnopompia – and the impact of such experiences in the spiritual growth of the dreamer. Through examples and personal observations, she will present the experiences and visual impressions leading up to the presence of light, qualities of light and union with the light.
George Gillespie will present a particular form of light he calls “stable intense lights.” Stable intense lights can be categorized as: an area of light, a disk of light, peripheral light, a sun-like concentration of light, and/or fullness of light. These forms of light are more characteristic of elementary imagery (geometric and related forms) than the representational or perceptlike forms of dreaming. He will explore the experience of stable intense lights during lucid dreaming in relation to hypnopompic geometric imagery.
Scott Sparrow will present several dreams in which the dreamer reports the interior experience of radiance, and then examine the dreamer’s cognitive and emotional states alongside the imagery before and during the experience of light. By describing the immediate antecedents and correlates of the experience of light, he will raise some hypotheses concerning dreamer states or conditions that may be facilitative or inhibitory of the experience of light.
Robert van de Castle will focus on the association between angels and radiant light in dreams. He will describe several dreams in which a radiant light accompanies the presence of an angelic figure and comment upon the quality of the light which appears and the reaction of the dreamer when such imagery is present
*
Fariba Bogzaran, PhD, is an Associate Professor and the founding Director of the Dream Studies Program at JFK University. One of the pioneers in dream education and research on transpersonal experiences in lucid dreaming, she is the author of numerous publications on the spiritual dimensions and is the co-author of Extraordinary Dreams.
Daniel Deslauriers, PhD, is Professor and Director of the East-West Psychology program at the California Institute of Integral Studies. He was the co-founder of the Montreal Center for study of dreams. He co-authored the book Le rêve: sa nature, sa fonction et une méthode d'analyse and has authored several articles.
Marilyn Fowler, MA, is an Associate Professor and the current Director of the Dream Studies Program at JFK University. She has an extensive background in organizational development, dreamwork, research and coaching. She is also the Director of the MA program in Consciousness and Transformative Studies at JFKU.
Stanley Krippner, PhD, Professor of Psychology at Saybrook Graduate School, served as the President of IASD and APA. A pioneer in the field of dream research, he was the Director at the Maimonides Medical Center Dream Research Laboratory, Brooklyn, NY. He is author, co-author or editor of numerous articles and books.
Abstract
This presentation builds on findings from a 2006 survey, The Transformative Power of Dream Studies (Bogzaran and Fowler), which examined the impact of formal Dream Studies education on the life of JFKU students and alumni. Findings from that research strongly indicate that the study of dreams has a significant effect on the lives of those who choose to study dreams formally.
This panel will continue this inquiry by presenting new research findings from focus groups with JFKU dream studies students and alumni, describing the on-going effects of dream studies on individuals' personal and professional development, as well as the impact of their education on others in their lives.
The panel includes themes from survey with dream educators and their experience of teaching dreams in university and colleges internationally. The themes address the teacher’s observation of student’s development. Examples will be reported. Among the teachers in the survey are pioneer dream educators who have been teaching dreams for over twenty years.
Dream research in academic institutions offering doctoral programs or courses on dreams will be discussed. Stanley Krippner from Saybrook Graduate School will present how dream studies has developed in his institution and his work with MA and Ph.D. students focusing their research on dreams. Daniel Deslauriers from California Institute of Integral Studies, will share his experience supervising qualitative dissertation topics on dreams using, in particular, phenomenology and narrative methodology. They will also include dissertation topics conducted in their academic institutions.
*
Kirsten Borum, dream therapist, Denmark, has been working with dreams professionally since 1983. She combines dreamwork with energy work, meditation and healing. She was trained and supervised by Jes Bertelsen and Bob Moore. She has a private practice in Copenhagen. She has appeared in various media on dreams and dream interpretation.
Abstract
The background of my teachings of dreamwork and meditation/energy work are based on my intensive and long-standing studies with Jes Bertelsen and Bob Moore, see above.
There is a correlation between the images of our nightly dreams and the subtle energy of man. Dreams will prompt certain specific energy exercises to be performed, and energy exercises will have an impact on the contents and symbols of the dream.
I have studied in great depth the subtle energy system of man for 25 years throughout which period I have regularly done energy exercises and meditations. I have taught dreamwork and meditation/energy work separately, and I have had several ongoing groups in which I use dreams, dream symbols and energy work in different combinations that I have developed. My own experiences as well as those of many participants in my "dreams and meditation" groups have confirmed this correlation.
I also make use of the correlation between the dreams and the subtle energy system with clients in dream therapy. Apart from the dreamwork as such, I look at the dreams in their energy aspect. This enables me to select specific energy exercises for the clients to do at home to support and further their process, and gives me a clue of how to work on their energy system in a form of healing that I call therapeutic healing.
*
Ghazaal Bozorgmehr holds an MA from Tehran University, Tehran, Iran. She teaches English to children and is one of the translators of Masters of Children’s Literature. She also collaborates with the authorized representative of ‘Kids’ Skills’ in Asia, teaching Kids' Skills.
Hooshmand Ebrahimi holds an MA from Shiraz University, Shiraz, Iran. He is a child counselor. He is the first ‘Kids’ Skills’ instructor in Asia, officially recognized as such by Ben Furman, MD, the founder of ‘Kids’ Skills’.
Abstract
“Kids’ Skills”, developed by psychiatrist Ben Furman at Finland Brief Therapy Institute, is a solution‑oriënted method by which children overcome problems in a positive and pleasing way by learning new skills. Through Kid’s Skills the child’s parents and instructors can convert the child’s problem into a corresponding skill and teach this skill to the child in order to solve his/her problem. Kids’ Skills method comprises systematic tasks. It begins with the task of converting a problem into a skill and after exploring the benefits of learning the skill as well as naming the skill by the child, is followed by choosing a power creature. In addition, there are also other tasks to be accomplished such as building confidence, practicing the skill, dealing with frustration and, celebrating success.
Converting nightmares into goodmares is one of the skills which the child can learn with the help of Kids’ Skills method. In the process of learning this skill, choosing a power creature is very important because, as Patricia Garfield, the internationally known dream researcher, points out, a child who has nightmares, needs help and must find someone to get help from. Harry Potter is a power creature who can help the child to learn the skill of converting nightmare into goodmare. The media got everyone interested in Harry Potter. Harry Potter, according to William Glasse,r the founder of Reality Therapy, lives in an external control world that pushes him around. But what makes him a hero is that it fails to control him. Harry Potter uses both his brain and magic to escape the external control that surrounds him.
This proposal discusses the power creature from a Kids’ Skills perspective and reviews the characteristics of Harry Potter as a power creature. Then it shows how Harry Potter can help a child reclaim his or her resources and overcome nightmares.
*
Mary Brill, LCSW, is an experienced psychotherapist who uses her skills in problem solving and mentoring to help people develop their inner resources. She leads national and international seminars and tours focused on personal growth, dreams, feminine wisdom and spirituality. She is known for her unique ability to tame the inner critic and foster self-acceptance.
Abstract
Main principles
a. Participants will learn to identify and use their unique, artistic language to map their dreams.
b. Participants will understand the use of combining dream mapping and art, voice dialogue, movement, etc. as a way to make life changes, break free from old patterns, and for self empowerment.
c. Participants will learn a set of tools for mapping their own dreams and the dreams of others.
d. Participants will explore the creative process of self empowerment by accessing and developing their innate healing abilities and personal resourcefulness in contrast to seeking the answers from outside themselves.
e. Participants will have an opportunity to work with the tools learned for dream mapping.
Examples and Studies
a. A history of the use of Dreams for healing and guidance.
b. A Power Point presentation of 6 Case studies that illustrate the process of dream mapping and demonstrating the clients process of making life changes, breaking patterns, and identifying shadow.
c. A video demonstrating the use of dreams and creativity in coping with illness, life changes and transformation.
Experiential Learning
a. Participants will practice using the dream mapping tools to gain insight into one of their own dreams.
b. An exploration in how this insight can then be used to guide decisions and choices.
Conclusion
a. A summation of the use of dream maps and individual creativity in working with self and/or clients.
b. A discussion on the effectiveness of using a client’s dreams in gaining insight, healing psychological problems, making life changes, breaking free from old patterns and empowering our clients.
c. A questions and answer period.
*
The Roots of Healing Dreamwork in Welsh Mythology
Nicholas Brink is a clinical psychologist. He is Past President of the American Association for the Study of Mental Imagery. He is book review editor for the journal Imagination, Cognition and Personality and author of Grendel and His Mother: Healing the Trauma of Childhood Through Dreams, Imagery and Hypnosis.
Abstract
The ancient Welsh myth of Branwen, Daughter of Llyr, the Second Branch of The Mabinogion (1), when examined as a dream of our ancestors portrays our continued struggle with and the death of the shadow and the rebirth of innocence. This workshop is a continuation of last year’s Bridgewater IASD workshop that dealt with the First Branch of the Mabinogion, the story of Pwyll, Prince of Dyfed (1).
According to Clara Hill (2), dreams can reflect experiences of waking life, parts of self, the dream experience itself, spiritual issues and relationship issues. Dealing with one’s shadow can be considered a process of dealing with parts of self. There are many parallels between Branwen and Loki’s Children, the myth I presented at the Copenhagen IASD conference, both dealing with parts of self and with more specifically with the shadow. Yet, in that myths are very central to the spiritual values of a culture, myth necessarily also reflects spiritual issues.
In the beginning of Branwen, the Welsh King Bendigeidfran come face to face with his shadow, the Irish King Matholwch, who arrives unexpectedly from across the sea. To form an alliance between the ego and the shadow Matholwch seeks to marry Branwen, the Welsh king’s sister. This marriage takes place, yet the trickster, Efnisien the half-brother to Bendigeidfran attempts to prevent this alliance. Matholwch and Branwen return to Ireland and after an initial year of bliss, resentments arise with Efnisien fanning the flame to where most everyone in this story eventually dies, allowing the rebirth of innocence.
This workshop will function as a dream group with the story of Branwen, Daughter of Llyr being the dream/myth to be explored. It is my belief that we each gain much in personal growth by experiencing the myths of our culture when we examine and understand them as myth-dreams of the culture. This understanding is greatly facilitated by a dream group. For the purpose of this abstract I am tentatively offering my interpretation of the personal struggle with the shadow, but that will be left for the group to discover if that is what they should discover.
Jean Gebser (3) suggests that human consciousness is in the process of changing from or going beyond our current rational/perspectival consciousness way of thinking to the transparent/aperspectival way of thinking. In his book the /Ever-Present Origin/, at this newly developing level of consciousness we are now capable of understanding ancient myth more transparently.
*
Nicholas Brink is a clinical psychologist. He is Past President of the American Association for the Study of Mental Imagery. He is book review editor for the journal Imagination, Cognition and Personality and author of Grendel and His Mother: Healing the Trauma of Childhood Through Dreams, Imagery and Hypnosis.
Abstract
Felicitas Goodman, who died this last year spent many years as an anthropologist studying the body postures found in ancient and primitive art and contemporary shamanistic practices of healing. She identified several dozen postures that she has found produce specific dream experiences. As teacher of anthropology at Denison University and founder and director of the Cuyamungue Institute, she presented her workshops at the Institute and around the world and collected the dream experiences of a large number of participants. From these experiences she found commonalities in the dream experiences of individuals standing, sitting and lying in specific postures. She also found that in being true to the posture, including the use of costumes and facial or body paint used by the dreamer, the dream experience would become more vivid.
Goodman suggests that certain postures produce an experience of a “spirit journey,” either into the heavens, the earthly realm or into the underworld. Other postures produce divination experiences to provide answers to specific questions held by the dreamer. Other postures provide healing and birthing experiences and healing specific to women. Shape shifting, celebration, death experiences and life after death are the dream experiences for other postures.
From reading one of her books, “Where the Spirits Ride the Wind: Trance Journeys and Other Ecstatic Experiences,” I expect that expectation and practice play a significant role in determining the vividness of the dream experience. Though I do not believe that these factors diminish the significance of her research, in this workshop, propose to ask part of the group to leave the room for a couple of minutes while we tell the rest of the group what might be expected in the dream experience, thus add one more dimension to the replication.
Goodman typically had the dreamers hold a posture for 15 minutes, timed by as long as she shook her rattle. Using this time frame and sharing dream experiences, possibly two postures could be experienced in an hour. A two-hour workshop might allow for up to four replications, while the morning dream group might allow for more.
*
Kelly Bulkeley, PhD, is a Visiting Scholar at the Graduate Theological Union and teaches in JFKU’s Dream Studies Program in the San Francisco Bay Area. He is a Past President of IASD, and is author of The Wilderness of Dreams and The Wondering Brain, co-author of Dreaming Beyond Death, and editor of Dreams: A Reader and Soul, Psyche, Brain.
Abstract
The basic precondition for dreaming is sleep. If people have no place to sleep in peace and safety, what happens to their dreaming? And if they can’t dream, what hope do they have for a healthy and creative life in the waking world? This is the reality for the countless homeless people in the San Francisco Bay Area and nationwide, and it’s an issue that should be of special interest to dream researchers. If it is true, as decades of research have shown, that sleeping and dreaming have enormous benefits for healthy human functioning, then more attention should be given to the psychological, social, and economic conditions that either promote or disrupt regular sleep. The Gubbio Project at S. Boniface Catholic Church in San Francisco offers a remarkable illustration of the challenges and rewards of working to extend the benefits of sleep and dreaming to society’s most vulnerable members. This presentation will include interviews with the Gubbio Project staff and the people who regularly sleep at the church, providing information about the impact of the program on their dreams. For many of the homeless people, the church is the only place they feel safe enough to sleep deeply and dream freely, since life on the streets poses so many dangers that the people must maintain constant alertness and anxiously resist falling asleep. The spacious sanctuary of the St. Boniface cathedral, with its lofty arched ceiling, beautiful stained-glass windows, and ornately carved wooden pews, provides a latter-day dream incubation space in which the homeless people can relax their fearful waking alertness and enter the realm of “sacred sleep.”
*
Patricia Bulkley, DMin, is a Presbyterian Minister who earned her doctorate of ministry from Princeton Theological Seminary. She served for ten years as Spiritual Services Provider at Hospice of Marin, has taught pastoral care at San Francisco Theological Seminary, and is co-author with Kelly Bulkeley of Dreaming Beyond Death.
Kelly Bulkeley, PhD, is a Visiting Scholar at the Graduate Theological Union and teaches in JFKU’s Dream Studies Program in the San Francisco Bay Area. He is a Past President of IASD, and is author of The Wilderness of Dreams and The Wondering Brain, co-author of Dreaming Beyond Death, and editor of Dreams: A Reader and Soul, Psyche, Brain.
Abstract
Pre-death dreams and visions have been reported throughout history by people in cultures all over the world. The same is true today, when terminally ill people experience strange dreams in the final days of their lives. These dreams often have a remarkable impact on the dying person: as a direct result of the dream or vision, the person’s fear of death diminishes, replaced by a new understanding of living, dying, and that which lies beyond death. This presentation combines fascinating stories of contemporary dreamers, the latest scientific research on dreams, and the insights of the world’s religious traditions to provide a simple, spiritually-sensitive approach to understanding these remarkable end-of-life experiences. Intended for those people (family, friends, clergy, medical staff) who are in a position of caregiving for someone who is dying, this presentation is an invitation to discover the surprising potential for personal change and religious transformation that opens up as mortal life draws to a close.
*
Jette Fabiola Cabo [may be presented by alternate] is an anthropologist and Chair of the Danish Association for the Study of Dreams. Her thesis explored a group of 10-year-old Catalan girls’ dream stories on power relations in social school life. She is currently conducting a research project in Copenhagen focusing on how children may benefit from dreamwork in the classroom.
Abstract
This presentation discusses, how dreamwork with teens may become teambuilding though cultural norms and values, that are at play in the politics of everyday school-life, may collide with dreamwork knowledge.
In Denmark the awareness of dreaming is low and the conscious users of dreams are few and mainly adults to be found within the field of therapy and self-development. The presentation argues that a society that prides itself of its liberal education should and may include dreaming in the primary school curriculum and apply dreamwork as a pedagogical method to help children develop the necessary competencies to meet curriculum goals and master social norms and values. Three forms are suggested: A scientific, cultural and historical approch to create awareness of dreaming as a natural and universal phenomenon, which may be used and understood in a diversity of cultural ways. Aesthetic dreamwork to open a shortcut to creativity. And thirdly reflective dream-teamwork to create a social free space for reflection on self and others.
The presentation offers an evaluation of dreamwork done along these lines in a primary school in Copenhagen during a 4 month period. 200 children ages 6 -14 were introduced to dreaming and dreamwork chiefly in Danish language lessons, but also in drama, art, religion, history and math. All children worked with dreams as narratives within aesthetic learning processes, the teens were also presented with the first part of the Ullman-method and Delaney’s dream interview method.
Benefits and challenges within the different age-groups are outlined; the main focus being on the teens.
Some of the Danish teens developed a new identity as storytellers, quite a few came to see their dreams as reflections of their lives and cultures, others became conscious yet sceptical dreamers. The sceptical dreamers engage eagerly in the dreamwork and even grasp the opportunity to use their dreamstories as a free space to reflect upon their own life circumstances and express critique of cultural norms and values. Rational boys express feelings of solitude and fear, empathetic girls express aggression and jealousy. But the next moment they return to a widespread Danish cultural conviction that dreams are just entertaining or scary nonsense, i.e not related to social life. The dreamstories of these sceptical dreamers and their contradictory perspectives on dreams are discussed in the light of values, gender roles, and power relations within the group. It is suggested how the expression of such contradictions may be valued and respected in the classroom.
*
Manlio Caporali, MD, is a neurologist and psychiatrist. He was Assistant Professor at La Sapienza University, Rome, Department of Neurology and since 1988 has been Assistant Professor at Tor Vergata University, Rome. He has published over 150 scientific papers, two books, and now works in the fields of Group Analysis and Dream Textual Analysis.
Abstract
The authors present the findings of an analysis of dream reports collected from patients who attended group psychotherapy. The data show a correlation between behavioral changes that reach a more mature level and dreams’ images that show an analogous development in richness and complexity. This process, to the authors, reflects the inner perception of the individuation process as experienced from the patients.
*
Lucidity and Dream Messages from the Dead
Deborah Coupey is a Dream Studies and Consciousness M.A. candidate. She has worked with dreams here in the US and internationally. Deborah conducted a dream group in the Washington, DC area for three years. She is a member of IASD, and has served on the Nightmare Hotline since 2001. She has kept a dream journal since 1974. She has traveled to over 100 spiritual places in the world.
Abstract
In our group topic of lucid dreaming and death, my particular concentration is lucidity and messages from the dead. I will concentrate mostly on the writings of Patricia Garfield’s book: “The Dream Messenger”, even though I read many other interesting books on the subject. In short, she does not give many examples of lucid dreams that involve contact, even though several of the dreams are lucid in nature. These dream encounters are eternal, and arrive at the dreamer’s doorstep for many reasons. The hope is that the dream can help heal the bereaved, loved ones left behind.
According to Garfield, there are 9 steps in receiving a message from the dead. In this order:
1. The Announcement
2. The Arrival at the Meeting Place
3. The Dream Messenger
4. Attendants of the Dream Messenger
5. The Dream Message Delivered
6. The gift of the Dream Messenger
7. The Farewell Embrace
8. The Departure of the Dream Messenger
9. The Aftermath of the visit
She gives us very detailed descriptions with each of the nine steps of receiving a message, and an idea as to what to expect. These messages might be positive, negative or neutral. She also devotes chapters to ten types of dream messages from the dead. “I’m not Really Dead” and “Goodbye”, for one type. Each of the messages are instructive, and some dream messages are quite rare.
The best example of lucid dreaming and a message from the dead is about psychologist Paul Tholey, in Frankfurt who studied lucid dreams, and used them as a therapy for grief. He had many images of his passed on father usually as a dangerous figure in the dream. Finally one night when Paul became lucid in the dream he was able to confront his father instead of running away, and in the end he grew through admitting some of his father’s criticism, and he changing his behavior. In the end of the dream they shook hands, and Paul was able to feel most liberated in his dream and waking life. This action was very therapeutic for Paul.
If one is talented in becoming lucid in dreams, one might have an advantage of incubating dreams from the dead. Or receiving dream messages from the dead in the hypnogogic or the hypnopompic state.
In the back of her book she details many exercises for closure with the dead loved ones. They are very therapeutic, and I believe more of this kind of therapy is needed in our culture.
Culturally, I believe that we need to honor our dead more through dreams and ritual. For instance, in France and in Europe there is a “Day of the Dead”, whereby people remember their loved ones as it is a formal holiday. Also in Kelley Bulkeley’s Book on: Dreaming Beyond Death, he and his mother Patricia have shown the need for the dying to address their dream journeys that they have before death for a necessary and peaceful closure of this life. He explains this in the chapter on what is a ‘good death’? I also believe what Elisabeth Kübler Ross states about dreams from the departed that they are definitely a spirit connection. Culturally we need to embrace and work with these end of life dreams.
Future Research Questions:
In my research I found a many books on communication with the dead, and we have ideas about how to incubate and communicate with them. But it seems little is said as to how those passed over decide to communicate with us? We have ideas about states of consciousness, that they might be in, i.e. the bardo, or as the Tibetans believe that if one is read : “The Tibetan Book of the Dead”, while one is dying or after one dies one might discover their own map of where to take the death journey.
Are these dreams more of a projection of our mind wanting to connect with our loved one?
How can one weigh the spirit?
Where does the spirit really go?
*
Linda Cunningham, PhD, MFT, is the author of Relational Sandplay Therapy, as well as many articles in the Journal of Sandplay Therapy. She is Adjunct Faculty in the Depth Psychology Program at Sonoma State University and at New College of California, and is in private practice in Petaluma and San Francisco.
Abstract
The initial dream in psychotherapy may symbolically inform the course of the therapy, or even the advisability of undertaking therapy at all. The initial dream illuminates the problem, as well as possible resources and potential solutions.
We will explore a clinical case as it is illuminated by an initial dream, foretelling the problems, resources and solutions within a ten-year therapy. This dream seemed both to summon and to herald archetypal energies – the maternal, compassionate, embodied attunement of the Bodhisattva Avalokitesvara, more popularly known as Kwan Yin. Kwan Yin is the “Regarder of the Cries of the World,” and the Bodhisattva of Compassion. According to Buddhism, a Bodhisattva is an enlightened being who is ready to move into Nirvana but who chooses stay behind in order to help all sentient beings whose enlightenment is not yet accomplished. Kwan Yin hears the cries of suffering, and appears whenever the sufferer cries her name. Kwan Yin heals through the use of compassion, as embodied in her main tools: seeing, hearing, holding and skillful means.
As intimated in the initial dream, this therapy proceeded as a meditation on sound, a meditation on the disguised cries of suffering profoundly experienced in the relational field. Through the course of the therapy, the presence of Kwan Yin held both therapist and client, helping them to tolerate the suffering, activating a vital force within the depths of each of them, and awakening bodhisattva qualities. The initial dream and the ensuing therapy illustrate that qualities of embodied compassion for self and other are archetypal energies of psyche. Kwan Yin is the personification of a generous and loving force that flows from Self. In Blofeld’s (1988) words, “the essence of practice” is not to know Kwan Yin, “but to become her.”
*
Linda Cunningham, PhD, MFT, is the author of Relational Sandplay Therapy, as well as many articles in the Journal of Sandplay Therapy. She is Adjunct Faculty in the Depth Psychology Program at Sonoma State University and at New College of California, and is in private practice in Petaluma and San Francisco.
Abstract
Often called a “waking dream,” sandplay is a Jungian symbolic method of psychotherapy. Like the dream, it is a royal road to the richness of the unconscious, and to the transformative energies of the Self.
Dreams may slip away as we awaken, but a world made in the sand is concrete and visible. We can capture a sandworld in photographs and others can witness it. When we view a sandtray, we viscerally experience the energies of symbols in the sand. Simultaneously, we gain experience visualizing, embodying and understanding symbols in dreams. Immersing ourselves in the experience and understanding of a sandplay process may enrich our understandings of the structure and dynamics of a dream series, and vice versa.
We will explore an entire sandplay process through the visual images of seven sandtrays. We will give special attention to the initial tray, which like the initial dream, may symbolically reveal the dreamer’s problems, resources and solutions.
In the case we will consider, a twenty-nine year old man suffers from depression and blocked creativity. As he unearths layer after layer of grief in the sand, he gradually experiences a more active, vital connection with the unconscious. As the process deepens, these energies grab him and he has a transformative experience through nightly visions, leading to a peacefulness and a grounded creativity he had never known. This sandplay series will demonstrate how dreamlike images of depression, loss and trauma lead the “waking dreamer” through creative blocks, and how the use of the “waking dream” of sandplay may help the dreamer to integrate shadow and more consciously to connect with the Self, thereby experiencing a dramatic shift in attitude.
*
Layne Dalfen, author of Dreams Do Come True: Decoding Your Dreams To Discover Your Full Potential, founded The Dream Interpretation Center in Montreal. She appears on radio shows and lectures. She has a certificate in Gestalt Counseling, is a member of the C.G. Jung Society and is a board member of IASD.
Abstract
Attempting to understand a dream's meaning is exactly like trying to do a puzzle. You try one piece. It doesn't fit, so you try another. I call these attempts different points of entry, using the theories and frameworks of Perls, Freud, Jung and Adler with each try. I will explain the different points of entry I use, with the goal of better understanding the dream's meaning. Participants will learn how to discover what point of entry works best for a particular dream, or is the most comfortable for the dreamer. I will teach ways to look at and work with symbols, emotions, and noticing the atmosphere in the dream space.
The workshop will run from between one and a half to 2 hours and begin with a 45-minute lecture. I will pass out notes on the lecture portion to each group member so they can relax and focus on the discussion rather than the note-taking. Once the current issue the dream is addressing is uncovered, solutions to the problem as they may be presented in the dream become the focus of discussion. In this section, I have two goals. As we so often focus on the negative or frightening aspect of a dream, one goal is to show participants how to recognize and apply the strength in the dream. Very often the dream actually discloses the solution to the problem. I will also look at polarities that present themselves and how we might benefit from noticing and working with them. My second goal is to help dreamers see the solutions our subconscious introduces before our conscious mind catches the message.
In my use of an eclectic approach to understanding our dreams, I strongly emphasize practical methodology and individually directed results over abstract theory. For example, I will ask the dreamer questions such as: What familiar stories, fables, movies, or characters come to your mind when you think about the story and people in this dream? What do these stories or characters have to teach you about your current situation?
We will then attempt to understand the dream of a volunteer from the group with the participants using an “If this were my dream” format. The group will help define the layers of the dream using these different approaches, as the dreamer connects to each level of the dream. I will reserve 15-20 minutes at the end of the workshop to reexamine the process and answer questions or engage in discussion.
*
Making a Book for a Dream
Betsy Davids, MA, from Berkeley, California, USA, is a writer/artist whose primary medium is the book. She is a longtime member of the graduate and undergraduate faculties at California College of the Arts (formerly California College of Arts and Crafts), where she teaches book arts and writing.
Abstract
Why Books?
The book as a cultural artifact has long been understood as a container for memory, insight, and preservation of knowledge. Making a book by hand can be a fulfilling way to honor a memorable dream. Moreover, books are an especially appropriate site for creative arts dreamwork, because the book is a culturally sanctioned place for combining words and images. Most dreamworkers habitually document their dreams in writing, yet dreams are also highly visual. An art form that combines the verbal and the visual has much to offer to our field.
Personal bookmaking (such as journals, scrapbooks, photo albums) is a widespread cultural practice, and artist's books in the last few decades have explored new creative possibilities of the book form. In particular, many simplified book structures suitable for brief workshops have been developed.
Workshop Process
The workshop leader will briefly show some examples of artist's dream books and will introduce two or three quick and intriguing book structures. Participants will have the opportunity to create a personal dream book using the tools and materials provided as well as any relevant materials they have brought. At the conclusion of the workshop session, a few minutes of sharing the book-in-progress with a partner (or with the whole group if feasible) will bring acknowledgment of the creative act and the dream it honors.
*
Dr. Teresa L. DeCicco is an Assistant Professor of Psychology at Trent University in Peterborough, Ontario, Canada, specializing in personality, abnormal psychology, health and dreams and dreaming. Research and applied interests include personality, health and dreams, and dream imagery directly relating to the waking state.
Abstract
There have been many dream interpretation techniques that have proven to be successful in dream research and/or dream practice. A few of these techniques include those by Gayle Delaney (Delaney, 1988), Clara Hill (Hill, 1996), and Carl Jung, (Jung, 1964), to name a few. One method that has had great influence on the field of dreams and dreaming is The Ullman method of dream interpretation (Ullman & Zimmerman, 1979). This method has been widely adopted since it provides safety and discovery for dreamers. Also, the method is very useful for group therapy and dream groups in general.
The technique involves a dreamer telling a dream to a group and then each group member telling the dreamer what the dream would mean, if it were their dream. The dreamer listens to everyone’s input and then decides if he or she has discovered something meaningful from the input.
This presentation will present research from 53 dream participants taking a third year dreams and dreaming course at a university in Canada. Each participant told a dream to 3 other people and then they told the dreamer what it would mean, if it were their dream. Dreamers then recorded any discovery that occurred for them.
The actual dreams for all 53 participants were content analyzed via the Hall and Van de Castle method of content anlaysis (Hall & Van de Castle, 1966). All possible categories were coded for each dream. Some of the categories included familiar female, familiar male, relatives, stranger, architecture, good fortune, animals, confusion, anger, unhappiness, objects, etc. The discovery for each dream was also coded with as many possible categories of the Hall and Van de Castle method. Discovery categories included familiar female, familiar male, relatives, stranger, architecture, good fortune, animals, confusion, anger, unhappiness, objects, etc.
Correlation analyses of the dream content categories revealed many significant correlations. For example, high scores on animals were significantly correlated with apprehension/fear. Also, high scores on strangers were correlated with males, females, relatives, unhappiness and, low scores on confusion. Results and implication of 17 categories will be discussed.
Results of correlations among dream content and discovery categories also revealed many significant and relevant relationships. For example, high scores of anger in dream content correlated significantly with discovery of males. High scores of females and activities in dream content were correlated with discovery of females. Also, high scores of apprehension/fear in dream content were correlated with discovery of misfortunes. Results present 9 significant findings in terms of dream content and discovery content. Finally, the results of 6 regression analyses will present dream content that predicted discovery. For example, significant dream content of anger, groups of people and negative on relatives, predicts discovery of objects. Finally, past research findings are linked to the findings in this study and, limitations of the research are discussed. Future directions in terms of research and applied dreamwork are suggested.
*
Dr. Teresa L. DeCicco is an Assistant Professor of Psychology at Trent University in Peterborough, Ontario, Canada, specializing in personality, abnormal psychology, health and dreams and dreaming. Research and applied interests include personality, health and dreams, and dream imagery directly relating to the waking state.
David B. King, BSc, is a student at Trent University in Peterborough, Ontario, Canada. He recently completed his undergraduate degree in psychology and is now pursuing his Master’s degree under the supervision of Dr. Teresa L. DeCicco. His current research interests include dreams, spirituality, intelligence, sexuality, and health.
Abstract
The Storytelling Method of Dream interpretation is a new method that was designed and then scientifically tested (DeCicco, 2006). This method has been found to significantly predict discovery when used properly (DeCicco, 2006). The method has also been tested with a control group and it was found that the method predicts discovery in a statistically relevant manner.
The purpose of the Storytelling method is to lead dreamers from their own dream imagery to discovery about their waking day circumstances. The method provides “safety” because dreamers do not have to reveal any private or sensitive material to anyone, including the workshop leaders. Complete confidentiality is assured.
The method is easy to use and not time consuming. Once participants learn how to use the method, they can do so in a relatively brief period of time. This will encourage participants to continue dreamwork since it is so practical. Also, because successful discovery occurs so quickly, this will encourage participants to continue with their dreamwork long after the workshop is over.
The Storytelling Method of dream interpretation will be conducted by first giving all participants a worksheet to follow. Participants will be taken through the worksheet in a step-by-step format. Questions and queries from participants about the steps will be encouraged. Once the steps have been taught, each participant will then analyze one of their own dreams with the worksheet.
Workshop leaders will help participants work through the worksheet with their own dream imagery. Leaders will be available to answer questions or guide participants through the process. Once dreamers have created a story from the dream imagery, the workshop leaders will then assist them in bridging the story they have created to an insight they may have relating to their own life. Again, privacy and safety are ensured, as the dreamer does not reveal any insights to the group with this method.
The Storytelling Method is an excellent starting method for novice dreamers as it will provide discovery very quickly. It is especially useful as a starting point for all dreams as it may immediately bridge to waking day circumstances. If a dream has many layers of meaning then the Storytelling Method is an appropriate starting point before more difficult methods are employed. Participants will be given handouts that will include the Storytelling Method Worksheets both for the workshop and for future use.
*
Dream Interviewing and Emotional Competence Education and Training
Loma K. Flowers, MD, is a US psychiatrist with 38 years of practice. She is President of www.EquilibriumDynamics.org, a nonprofit organization dedicated to teaching adults and children how to build a life in which feelings empower – rather than sabotage – relationships, activities and careers. She still supervises psychiatry residents and trainees.
Gayle Delaney, PhD, is a US dream educator and author. She is President of Delaney & Flowers Dream Center, in San Francisco and founding President of IASD. She is creator of the Dream Interview method, www.gdelaney.com. She is also romance coach, www.ChooseRomance.com, using the strikingly insightful feedback offered by dreams in dating and mating.
Abstract
This workshop gives participants experience in using Dream Interviewing for insight into their own personal or professional development, with emphasis on the twin components of emotional competence: interpersonal and intrapersonal skills.
We shall begin with a brief overview using examples illustrating the basic principles and dynamics of emotional competence and the steps and strategies useful in increasing it in ourselves, our students, or patients. We shall then summarize the basic steps of the Dream Interview method of interpretation and how this approach to dreaming can facilitate the development of the skills necessary for emotional competence. The intrapersonal skills include recognizing feelings, managing their changes, identifying personal values, and coordinating feelings, thinking, and judgment before taking action. The interpersonal skills include listening, conflict resolution, boundary definition, and communication.
Drs. Flowers and Delaney will demonstrate the integration of Dream Interviewing with the long-term goal of enhancing the dreamer’s emotional competence by working with the dream of a volunteer among the participants.
Attendees will then practice interviewing each other’s dreams in dyads and triads with a view to identifying how a given dream could advance the dreamer’s emotional competence beyond the usefulness it serves in grappling with a specific life concern.
*
Gayle Delaney, PhD, is a US dream educator and author. She is President of Delaney & Flowers Dream Center, in San Francisco and founding President of IASD. She is creator of the Dream Interview method, www.gdelaney.com. She is also romance coach, www.ChooseRomance.com, using the strikingly insightful feedback offered by dreams in dating and mating.
Abstract
Gayle Delaney will discuss the various ways dreams provide insightful feedback on:
1. The attitude and resourcefulness of the dating dreamer in his or her efforts to meet potential sweethearts.
2. The conscious and unconscious selection process the dreamer uses to choose a long- or short-term partner. This of course includes the clarification of psycho-dynamics that mercilessly drive the dreamer into the wrong arms.
3. The “management” of early dating relationships including identifying early-on, fatal and challenging red flags, noting ways the dreamer may sabotage the relationship, and sounding the bell when it is appropriate to make timely and kindly exits.
4. The Creativity and Flair with which one does or COULD infuse the early relationship to lay the groundwork for later elaboration of a richly romantic and deeply generous bond.
*
Daniel Deslauriers, PhD, is Professor and Director of the East-West Psychology program at the California Institute of Integral Studies. He was the co-founder of the Montreal Center for study of dreams. He co-authored the book Le rêve: sa nature, sa fonction et une méthode d'analyse and has authored several articles.
Abstract
Intersubjectivity calls attention to the fact that shared cognition (and, to a certain extent, emotions) are essential in the shaping of our ideas and relations with others. In this light, language is viewed as communal rather than private. Thus when dreams are shared by means of language or other forms of expressions, they enter the intersubjective space. It becomes problematic to view the dreamer as partaking in a private world only.
In an integral approach to dreams, we do not only pay attention to the subjective dimensions of dream meaning but also to the context of intersubjective (conscious or unconscious) collaboration in meaning making. This is called the “2nd person approach” to knowledge and engages a wide array of phenomena and practices. This presentation will investigate the pervasiveness of the intersubjective nature of meaning making in dyadic work (including psychotherapy) and group work. It will discuss the various dimensions of intersubjectivity as commonly understood: projection, setting of boundaries, the context of dream telling, transference, countertransference. We will also discuss also less commonly recognized dimensions such as dreams arising as a result of intersubjective interaction. The major goal of this presentation is to highlight the importance of the intersubjective dimensions in the work with dreams.
*
G. William Domhoff, PhD, is a Research Professor at the University of California, Santa Cruz, where he hosted the IASD meetings in 1988 and 1992. He is the author of The Mystique of Dreams (1985), Finding Meaning in Dreams (1996), and The Scientific Study of Dreams (2003).
Abstract
Using quantitative content analysis, this paper shows that the 143 dreams about his deceased wife that a widower wrote down over a 22-year period as a form of solace and remembrance embody his main conceptions and concerns in regard to her, thereby supporting a cognitive theory of dreams.
*
Jennifer Dumpert received her BA from York University in Toronto and her MA from the New School for Social Research. She achieved ABD status from GTU, wrote half her dissertation, and abandoned academia. She has published and lectured on dreams, Buddhism, ritual, and hula hooping. Her web site is www.urbandreamscape.com.
Abstract
Urban Dreamscape: SF is a self-crafted practice based on dreams, a declaration of spiritual authority, an act of establishing sacred space in the city.
This presentation begins with a description of how to create practices of our own based on that which holds meaning for us, such as dreams. The talk introduces the notion that practices have three specific definitions and values: as evocations that summon whatever one considers holy into one’s life; as means of giving form to the ineffable, thus manifesting meaning in ways that allow one to perceive it; and as ways of, literally, practicing abiding within the sacred, entering sacred space and moving gracefully within it. The discussion moves next to practical steps toward evolving a personal practice, to taking on spiritual authority to determine what in our lives holds deep ineffable meaning and then entering into interaction with that ineffability.
The talk focuses primarily on Urban Dreamscape: SF, a practice that grew from a rich dream life and the drive to create sacred space in an urban environment. Loosely based on Art of Memory and Australian aboriginal Songlines practices, Urban Dreamscape: SF involves overlaying the city with dream narratives, layering the architecture and features of San Francisco with images and stories carried back into the waking world from the realms of sleep. The practice reconnects inside and outside, psyche and lived space, arenas that easily become severed in the lives of modern people. Urban Dreamscape: SF remaps the city according to a personal cartography, juxtaposing meaning over the street grids of neighborhoods. In today’s Google Maps world, this practice also lays the groundwork for a shared psychogeographical practice among dreamers. The presentation closes with suggestions about how Urban Dreamscape: SF could become a collective process that creates a shared urban dreamtime. This presentation will make use of images from the web site that describes the practice, www.urbandreamscape.com , and will, hopefully, seed the ideas that bring the site to its next incarnation as common public space.
*
Dreaming, One of the Four Evolutionary States of Consciousness as Described in the Mandukya Upanishad
Laurette Dupuis is a Canadian documentary filmmaker. She became a member of the C.G. Jung Society of Montreal at its inception and was active on its executive for several years. From 1985 to 1990, she was on the executive of the Centre d’étude des rêves de Montréal. She obtained a Master’s degree in East-West Psychology from the California Institute of Integral Studies in 2005.
Abstract
The Mandukya Upanishad, a sacred text from ancient India, describes the four states of consciousness: waking, dreaming, deep sleep and turya, the transcendental consciousness. It teaches that the knowledge of these four states of consciousness is contained within the mantra AUM and that, as we progress through the first three states of consciousness, we are moving towards the goal of our evolution which is to attain the fourth state, turya, the attainment of the Self, or oneness with all that is. This is the state of bliss described by many great beings who have lived in different parts of the world through the ages.
This presentation explores these four states of consciousness by referring to well-known and respected commentaries on the Mandukya Upanishad that bring to light the meaning of this ancient text and looks at how the teachings of this Upanishad correlate with relevant contemporary sleep and dream research. It is amazing to note that this text goes back thousands of years BCE, while our Western scientific investigation of these states of consciousness is still very recent.
In addition, reference to the work of Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche, author of The Tibetan Yogas of Dream and Sleep (1998), raises a need to make distinctions in how the deep sleep state is understood.
The goal of this study of the Mandukya Upanishad is to highlight how the progressive development of awareness through each of the three first states of consciousness culminates in the fourth state, turya, the transcendental consciousness.
*
Rita Dwyer, Vienna, VA, is a former research chemist, co-author of papers and patents in the aerospace field, ASD founding life member, Chair of the Board (1987‑90), Past President (1992‑93), Executive Officer (1993‑99). A founder and facilitator of the Metro DC Dream Community, she is also a writer, lecturer, and certified pastoral counselor.
Robert Van de Castle, PhD, is Professor Emeritus of the Health Sciences Center at the University of Virginia. He is a Past President of IASD, co-author with Calvin Hall of the dream classic, The Content Analysis of Dreams, the author of Our Dreaming Mind, and has authored numerous publications including Our Dreaming Mind (1996)
Abstract
Try your psi! Test your dreaming mind’s ability to tune into a visual target which will be broadcast telepathically during the night by a designated “sender”. Loosely patterned on the cutting edge experiments in dream telepathy done at Maimonides Dream Laboratory in Brooklyn by Drs. Stanley Krippner and Montague Ullman, the annual IASD contest is a playful but surprisingly successful way to test your own telepathic skills. Instructions will be given making it easy to join in the fun.
*
Rita Dwyer, Vienna, VA, is a former research chemist, co-author of papers and patents in the aerospace field, ASD founding life member, Chair of the Board (1987‑90), Past President (1992‑93), Executive Officer (1993‑99). A founder and facilitator of the Metro DC Dream Community, she is also a writer, lecturer, and certified pastoral counselor.
Bob Hoss, MS, USA, is author of Dream Language, Executive Officer and former IASD President, and head of the Dream Science Foundation. He has been teaching dreamwork for over 30 years and is presently on the faculty of the Haden Institute for dream leadership training; he is Adjunct Faculty at Sonoma State University and Scottsdale College.
Judy Gardiner, New York, NY, has been analyzing, writing about and researching her dreams for 15 years. This led to scientific information she had never known, and her self-study transformed to a cosmic wake-up call illuminating the union of Science and Spirit. Her work with Montague Ullman focuses on this transcendental quality of the dream.
E. W. Kellogg III, PhD, is a proficient lucid dreamer, and his long-standing interest in the phenomenology of dreaming led to the presentation of numerous papers and workshops on such topics as the lucidity continuum, lucid dream healing, and mutual dreaming. From 2002-2005, Ed organized and hosted IASD’s online PsiberDreaming Conference.
Stanley Krippner, PhD, Professor of Psychology at Saybrook Graduate School, served as the President of IASD and APA. A pioneer in the field of dream research, he was the Director at the Maimonides Medical Center Dream Research Laboratory, Brooklyn, NY. He is author, co-author or editor of numerous articles and books.
Abstracts
Rita Dwyer – overall abstract:
When I was working as a research chemist in the aerospace field my life was saved by a coworker who had dreamt of rescuing me from a fiery death several times before the laboratory accident occurred in waking reality. I am alive because of his transpersonal precognitive dreams.
At the time, I had no interest in dreams nor any idea that there might be some that were precognitive and transpersonal, but in my effort to understand what had happened to me, I found that such dreams actually existed and came, often unbidden, as helpful guidance. I learned that Spirit seems to enter into our dreams whether or not we believe it exists. Why? How? I searched for answers.
On a grand scale and cross-culturally, world literature contains numerous examples of "big" dreams which foretold the future, dreams which were acted upon by the dreamers, often saving lives, as with the dream of Pharaoh in the Bible, who stockpiled grain for the years of famine that visited his country; by military leaders who won battles following dream advice; and by spiritual leaders whose dreams were clearly sparked by divine guidance, gifts of Spirit. Closer to home, anyone who journals dreams will discover hints of the future contained in them, as well as examples of other psi phenomenon, such telepathy, clairvoyance, deja vu, synchronicity, etc.
This information can be used in ways that can change our personal futures for the better, here and now, every day, if we pay attention and learn to recognize the messages that our dreams present. While many in the public at large still think that dreams are nightly nonsense, or are only reflective of personal concerns, years of being involved with the International Association for the Study of Dreams have led me into a much broader awareness of the vast and varied ways in which dreams come to serve us personally and transpersonally.
Some of these dreams can be about concerns of those who are not close to us, even perfect strangers. Exercises such as the Dream Helper Ceremony devised by Henry Reed, PhD, and Robert Van de Castle, PhD, have shown that dreamers who dedicate a night of dreaming to a person requesting dream help will often turn up advice which is practical and important to resolving the concern. Dale Graff in his books Tracks in the Wilderness of Dreams and River Dreaming describes his remote viewing experiences with Project STARGATE, in which downed planes were found, hostages recovered, and enemy facilities targeted, much of the information coming from dreams.
The transpersonal and panpsychic dreams posted on IASD’s PsiDreams E-study group offer even more impressive greater examples of the early warning systems which alert us to the need for changing possible futures, such as national disasters, illness and death, threats to life s we know it on this planet.
Does this information come from some deep part of our own psyches, our greater Self, or from outside guidance of a spiritual nature? Does it come from a cosmic connection in which all is seen and felt as related, physically and energetically, psychically and spiritually? In reflecting on the writings of David Bohm and other physicists’ new theories, Ole Vedfelt’s book The Dimensions of Dreams which outlines their multidimensionality, Rupert Sheldrake’s morphogentic field theory, or on the inspiring words of Dr. Montague Ullman, in his invited address, The Dream in Search of a New Abode at the 2006 IASD Conference, dreamers may find themselves considering a strange new world, a world in which their expansion of consciousness allows for dreams and waking life events which seem almost miraculous in their power to create change. Lucid dreamers have much to share with us about their travels and experiences. Participants will learn methods for promoting, recognizing, and of working with transpersonal, cosmic, dreams.
The members of this panel, Bob Hoss, Judy Gardiner and Ed Kellogg will relate some of their ideas and experiences, and will be joined by Stanley Krippner to provide an overview of their presentations and how they fit into new paradigms surfacing in consciousness studies. Dreams are much more than they were once thought to be, and we as dreamers are much more than we thought ourselves to be. Our connections with each other and the many dimensions surrounding us transcend time and space, with our actions and interactions – waking and sleeping – of real importance to the future for us personally and transpersonally, locally and globally.
Individual abstracts:
Judy Gardiner: Circling the cosmos on a dream
I felt myself spinning through space as I recorded a dream about spinning disks.* What was the origin of the spin? This dream came through a departed loved one and set the stage for communication from the spirit world. The spin gained momentum as slices of dreams whirled about, cross sections of something larger than self. Puzzling pieces of science, unknown to me, revealed a broad range of themes: astronomy, botany, chemistry, physics, geology, mineralogy, metallurgy, paleoanthropology, genetics …. I had to make sense of this chaotic, dizzying, magical-beyond-words experience. Dreams of light and vision suggested I was not seeing the light. A dream of blinding lights informed me of my family matrix, releasing me from my earlier role. Subsequently, disordered connections to geologic clues emerged. Attention to inanimate matter eclipsed emotional issues, sparking the realization that my mother was a simile for Mother Earth; her floor represented the earth’s crust. Urine and junk symbolized uranium and radioactive waste; plates represented tectonic plates. The network of veins in the earth linked to separate, yet interconnecting tectonic plates, replicating the connectivity of the dreams. Ultimately, dream fragments joined to sound an ecological warning to mankind. They also correlate with David Bohm’s thinking that ”arrangements can be mutually related and dependent, as if there had been a force of interaction between them.”
I realized that the logic of cosmic dreaming does not follow the same range of emotion found in personal dreaming. It connects to matter rather than ego-based feelings. Positive emotions are stimulated by curiosity about the unknown, whereas negative emotions respond to threatening planetary events. The revelatory nature of cosmic dreaming produces powerful feelings of spiritual connection and oceanic waves of gratitude. Concern for species-survival outweighs concern for self. Factual data rather than emotional tones serve as markers. Similarly, my spirit guides were frequently identified by earthly markers attached to their memories. As random dream fragments connected into a circular whole, Psi events, particularly electronic transmissions, validated intuitive suppositions. Empathic dream imagery transmogrified to matter – becoming one with the Earth – corresponding to the Gaia theory, again connecting to something larger. I was the child from the mother. It was archetypal: the Great Mother Earth; the ultimate reunion at the Omega Point.
“Trust In God,” “Be Patient” echoed across the timelessness of my Dream as its message, spinning like planet earth, searched for its place in the cosmos. Dreams of light and vision circled back to the beginning, illuminating an inner vision which perceived that the more entangled we become in the higher dimensions, the greater is our potential to see past, present and future. In so doing, we learn that the universe is within us.
1 Wholeness and The Implicate Order, David Bohm, 1980, p.233.
2 Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
Bob Hoss, MS The Transformative Power of Cosmic Dreams
“I dreamed that the sky was boiling and the ground shaking; it was the end of the earth and all mankind. I was on a mountaintop but water was rising all around me. Suddenly the clouds parted and I heard a voice.”
“I dreamed that it was atop a mountain and it was the end of the earth and God was descending through the clouds as the holy trinity.”
Jung called these dreams that seem to transcend personal experience, “big” dreams. Are these “big” dreams a foretelling of things to come for our earth and all of mankind, or are they simply picturing an ego shattering (earth shattering) transformation of ones own personal psyche ? According to Jung, “The general function of dreams is to try to restore our psychological balance by producing dream material that reestablishes… the total psychic equilibrium [Man and His Symbols p50]. ” Furthermore these “big” dreams are “impartial spontaneous products of the unconscious psyche…they show us the natural truth [vol 10, p149]. He claimed that the driving force within the collective unconscious has no deliberate plan outside of an urge towards self-realization.
So lets further explore these two dreams – the way they ended may be a clue to the nature of the purpose of those dreams.
“I dreamed that the sky was boiling and the ground shaking; it was the end of the earth and all mankind. I was on a mountaintop but water was rising all around me. Suddenly the clouds parted and I heard a voice… which said – the water is only your unconscious, jump in and you will be fine.” This dream seems to define itself as a dream about the evolution of the psyche of the dreamer, an urging from the unconscious to the ego to release its fears and begin the integration process – as Jung stated “showing us the natural truth”. It was not a foretelling of the end of mankind, simply the end of the ego state as it presently existed.
And the second dream also ends with an apparent personal message aimed at the transformation of the individual psyche: “I dreamed that I was atop a mountain and it was the end of the earth and God was descending through the clouds as the holy trinity. But God appeared as a trinity of Santa Clauses, who merged as one and began pouring gifts of love from an urn. They were invisible, but I felt the gifts hit me, so I ran. I tripped, falling down the mountain, with the gifts pouring on me the whole time.” Jung called these messages “compensating” messages, an attempt at transformation by reversing personal misconceptions which stand in the way of the evolution of the personal psyche. In this case the dreamer had lived what they considered a highly spiritual life, yet in life she felt confused that she were not endowed with the riches and rewards for all she had done. Instead she experienced a lot of personal pain. The dream was attempting to compensate for this misconceived view of God, by illustrating how she saw God, as a Santa-Claus who rewards little girls who are good, with tangible physical gifts. Rather God endows one with gifts of love which often do hurt.
But before we consider all of these big dreams as simply the product of the transformation of our own personal psyche, our own self realization and individuation …. Jung also stated that “at the deepest level of our unconscious is “an absolute unconscious ( a collective unconscious) that has nothing to do with personal experience….something which unites all humanity.” The collective unconscious is not individual but is common to all mankind and perhaps to all animals, and is the true basis of the individual psyche. The collective unconscious contains the whole spiritual heritage of mankind’s evolution born again in the brain structure of every human.” – Jung [the Portable Jung, p34,35, 38].
This deeper unconscious source of our dreams typically makes itself know in the archetypal imagery of our dreams, imagery which seems familiar and common across cultures, when one studies the mythology of humankind, but bears little resemblance to anything one has seen in their personal experience: “I dream of two women doing a ritual dance in ancient arena one of them holds a golden sword has a golden snake encircled around her head the other woman a golden rope circling around her body. Their skins are also shining like gold and their eyes are deep emerald green. The woman with the golden sword turns around herself a few times and looks in my eyes, holding the sword high. I feel that she wants me to know that I am free to take the golden snake and it's power. I feel that their time is over and it is time for others to have the snake and sword. She is looking directly in my eyes and not moving, like a golden statue."
Here again, although the dream brings archetypal material from a non-personal collective level, the dream seems to hold a message related to the evolution of the dreamer as the golden woman looks directly into her eyes wanting her to know she is free to take the golden snake and its power.
However there appears to be an even deeper level than purely one’s own psyche, that dreams often transcend. Our collective unconscious appears at times to connect us to all humankind, not only in some ancient evolutionary manner, but in real time and often in a timeless fashion. This often occurs as we open ourselves up to truth that expands beyond our individual psyche, permitting our view of the whole self to include the entire universe of the human and divine.
This was a case of a dreamer who had embarked on a spiritual search for the meaning of life and universal truth. It resulted in a series of “big” dreams both of a personal as well as a universal nature. The series began with the following dream: “I was being shown a huge brightly lit triangular-shaped sign with lettering in red which said, ‘Make yourself a perfect channel and wait, and all things will be given to you’.” This dream was followed later by a dream, which closely resembled the description of Ezekiel’s dream in the Bible. “I saw a wheel of fire – a strange wheel endlessly turning. Fire - yet not fire - not material fire; electrical forces like the fire seen through closed eyes. The wheel was the Wheel of Time, and hovering above it were souls of all things created; animal, vegetable and man. Much like a computer, programmed to accept each one in its time, each one descended onto the earth only when an opening appeared in the wheel. The vibrations at the opening were attuned to the vibrations of that particular soul. The return from earth happened in a similar manner. Only when the proper opening appeared and the vibrations were right could the soul return from whence it came. There were some who wandered or floated beneath the wheel, unable to return through the fire until the proper opening appeared. And I saw the wheel from above, without wonder, as something I had seen before and recognized.”
Although the dream was an important truth in the transformation of the dreamer, it transcends the individual to reveal a truth at a cosmic level.
Ed Kellogg: "Trans-Personal Dreaming Beyond Time and Space."
Some models of consciousness posit that although humans have separate personalities, that at the deepest level we all share the same greater Self. As a metaphor think of our waking selves as leaves upon a tree – although the leaves differ from one another, they all belong to the same Tree and share the same trunk and roots. In this model, telepathy would not involve transfer of information over a distance between separate minds, but of simply accessing information by going within to find what the ‘Greater You’ already knows. This "Tree of Life" model of creation has found support in the writings and experiences of mystics through the ages. In recent years, scientific research under controlled conditions has demonstrated that through psi-dreaming we can connect with people, places, and times unrelated to our waking lives.
How might this manifest in our dreams? I've noticed over the years that while many people often dream of themselves in ways that closely match their waking physical reality experiences, that these people report also dreams in which they become someone else, or even something else, and experience the world from a very different perspective than in their waking lives. In my own case, I've experienced myself in dreams as many different beings – age, sex, race, etc. Often not only does my dreambody differ from its waking physical reality counterpart, but so does my dream personality and memories. However, through all this, my essential sense of self somehow remains the same – "I" remain "me", my dreambody, personality and memories seem no more "me" than does the clothing I wear or the car that I drive. I’d estimate that in 80% of dreams my dream self differs significantly in some way from my waking physical reality self.
Although I believe that although some dreams of this type may have to do with personality "aspects", that for most of them this explanation proves inadequate. Instead I favor different interpretations, in that I experience while dreaming parallel selves, past lives, future lives, and even other dimensional lives, and that tuning into different locations and different beings throughout the Multiverse just seems a routine and normal activity for my dreaming Self. And after many years of such experiences, I've finally come up with an answer to the perennial "Why do we dream?" question that rings true for me. Dreams provide "food for the soul", reconnecting us to our greater Selves and allowing a therapeutic release from the constraints of a time-space bound existence that reminds us, if only unconsciously, of the illusion of separateness.
Although I believe that although some dreams of this type may have to do with personality "aspects", that for most of them this explanation proves inadequate. Instead I favor different interpretations, in that I experience while dreaming parallel selves, past lives, future lives, and even other dimensional lives, and that tuning into different locations and different beings throughout the Multiverse just seems a routine and normal activity for my dreaming Self. And after many years of such experiences, I've finally come up with an answer to the perennial "Why do we dream?" question that rings true for me. Dreams provide "food for the soul", reconnecting us to our greater Selves and allowing a therapeutic release from the constraints of a time-space bound existence that reminds us, if only unconsciously, of the illusion of separateness.
*
Dr. Iain Edgar lectures in anthropology at Durham University, UK. He has written many articles, including two published in Dreaming, on dream and imagework and their relation to culture, politics, education and identity. His most recent book is Guide to Imagework: Imagination-Based Research Methods which was published in 2004.
Abstract
This paper uses a wide variety of examples to argue that the experience of the true dream (ru’yâ) is a fundamental, inspirational, and even strategic, part of the contemporary militant Jihadist movement in the Middle East and elsewhere. Dream narratives are contextualized through a consideration of the historical role of the perceived revelatory power of the night dream in Islam. This paper further explores some key aspects of Islamic dream theory and interpretation, and offers examples and analysis of the inspirational guidance claimed by many of the best known Al-Qaeda and Taliban leaders and Jihadists. Islam is probably the largest night dream culture in the world today. In Islam, the night dream is thought to offer a way to metaphysical and divinatory knowledge, to be a practical, alternative and potentially accessible source of imaginative inspiration and guidance, and to offer ethical clarity concerning action in this world. Yet dreams, even purportedly true dreams, are notoriously difficult to validate and, sometimes, to interpret. This paper explores some key aspects of Islamic dream theory and interpretation, and considers many examples of the inspirational guidance claimed by many of the best known Al-Qaeda and Taliban leaders and Jihadist activists. I thematically analyze these dream narratives. I argue that Islamic theory of true and false dreams is congruent with, and possibly derived from, earlier dream interpretative theories. Arguably then, what is most distinctive about Islamic dream theory and practice is the Prophetic example, and its historical and cultural location in the Islamic worldview, and not because of its tripartite classification of dream imagery. I reference the true dream tradition across human time and space. I contend that, in contradistinction to western psychoanalytical theories of dreaming, perceived, reported and interpreted dreams are a powerful essence of charismatic
religious and political leadership, and such dream narratives still contribute today, as they have throughout history, to the generation of existential, political and militant realities.
*
Lynne Ehlers, PhD, is a Jungian-oriented licensed clinical psychologist in private practice in Berkeley and San Francisco, Dream Studies faculty at JFK University in Pleasant Hill and a faculty member in the Continuing Education departments at JFKU and Sonoma State University; she has taught dreamwork and sandplay in the Bay Area for many years.
Abstract
The Self, as the central archetype of the psyche, holds the power to inspire awe, terror and ecstasy. It also has the power to heal and to transform. As therapists, dream-workers and healers, it is incumbent upon us to be fully aware of the Self as it appears in all of its manifestations in the dreams and daily lives of our clients, ourselves, and the world around us. Because dreams, active imagination, theater, dance, great works of art, and the architectural and natural wonders of the world all arise from the same source – i.e. from the archetypal collective unconscious – they share the same – largely visual – language and are thus appropriate vehicles with which to explore the richness and depth of the archetype of the Self, the "center and circumference of the personality". It is my hope that this special slide program, inviting discussion and participation, will not only teach, but will also touch you in a very deep place.
*
Jim Emery, MM, received his teacher certification from the International Shinsundo Association in 1980. As a teacher, lecturer and seminar facilitator he has guided many people through his yoga classes in a variety of settings including health clubs, educational classes, and conferences.
Abstract
Yoga sessions will offer several breathing techniques, gentle stretches and guided visualizations. You will be guided through Yoga postures called the “Seven Energy Asanas” and a special yoga practice called the “Five Tibetan Rites.” No past experience in yoga is necessary.
*
Using Intuition to Explore Transitional Dreams
Marcia Emery, PhD, host of the 2005 IASD Conference and board member, is a psychologist, intuitive consultant, college lecturer, and author. She has a chapter on Intuitive Dreamwork in her books: PowerHunch!, The Intuitive Healer, and Dr. Marcia Emery’s Intuition Workbook. She appeared on the ‘Dream Decoders’ TV series in 2005.
Abstract
Everyone is flowing with the changing tide of transitional times. During these challenging times, you can’t just question with a logical mind. Instead, you have to see the whole picture. The secret for getting back in balance and seeing the whole picture is INTUITION. Intuition lets us ride the wave of rapid change and stay on the crest. Intuition, as Marcia teaches, is that immediate and indisputable knowing. It is the deepest wisdom of the soul, which gives us the broadest and clearest insight into any situation. It is the intuitive mind that will comb through the dream and provide instant understanding.
Applying simple principles of intuition to the dream examples, will show participants how to unravel the transitional message in the dream. The people immersed in transitions that can profit from receiving intuitive guidance through their dreams include those going through: marriage/divorce; pregnancy/childbirth; career change; loss of a loved one or of a pet; health crises; change in finances; empty nest syndrome; mid-life crisis; sexual orientation change; starting and/or graduating from college; purchasing a new home; and victim of a natural disaster.
In this workshop, Using Intuition to Explore Transitional Dreams, Dr. Marcia Emery uses her DreamShift method along with other intuitive association techniques to show participants how to easily and effortlessly go right to the dream’s bottom line. Dr. Emery has successfully used this method for decades, to help her clients and students unravel the mysteries embedded in their dream images. One of the steps in the DreamShift is to let the intuitive mind reveal one or two salient symbols that literally jump forward for analysis. Using intuition to freely associate to this symbol will instantly clarify the dream message.
Here’s an example: Thirty-year-old Brittney is originally from Mexico and moved to Canada after her marriage. She wakes up with a panic attack after having the following dream. I am at the beach and see a huge wave rising. I am worried that it is going to fall on me and pull me out to sea. I run away so I won’t drown. She titles the dream “Drifting Out to Sea” and finds the “huge wave” symbol compelling and retrieves the following associations: inundate, menacing, water, drowning, and then she has an Aha to the association, “over the head. “She realizes she is in “over her head” in the new culture with different customs, another language etc. As we talk, I show Brittney that the dream is revealing her underlying fear of being inundated and she realizes that the adjustment will come eventually and she won’t feel “over her head.”
Does this sound a bit simplistic? It is! In this workshop, intuitive resolutions will be elicited to dreams in order to provide insights into challenging transitional times. During the workshop, we will work with dreams provided by the Facilitator as well as the transitional dreams of the participants.
*
Katherin Enriquez-Pecheroga, A.S., is an undergraduate student at George Mason University, obtaining a B.A. in Psychology in May 2007. Currently working with Robert L. Van de Castle in the field of dreams and psychopathology. Born in Cuba, and having resided in Ukraine for 9 years, the US is her current country of residence.
Robert L. Van de Castle, Ph.D., is Professor Emeritus of the Health Sciences Center at the University of Virginia. He is a Past President of ASD, co-author with Calvin Hall of the dream classic The Content Analysis of Dreams, the author of Our Dreaming Mind, and consulting editor of the SUNY Press Series of Dreams.
Abstract
This study is based upon material obtained from psychiatric inpatients who completed an MMPI as well as a written dream report at the time of admission. Dream reports from patients younger than 18 or older than 60 years of age, as well as dream reports shorter than 12 words in length, were excluded from this evaluation. A total of 293 Ps (106 M; 187 F) were evaluated. Dream reports were scored for the presence or absence of dysthymic elements in inpatient dreams using scores from several Hall/Van de Castle (1966) scales. Dysthymia is characterized by mild depression or despondency, a depression of spirits from loss of hope, confidence or courage. The Dysthymia Dream Scale (DDS) (Enriquez-Pecheroga & Van de Castle, 2006) is represented by (DDS = MF + FL = SD/AP). The mean T scores on MMPI scales 2, 3, 6, and 8 were compared for the Dream Dysthymia-present and Dream Dysthymia-absent groups. The mean T score was significantly higher on each of the above MMPI scales for the Dysthymia-present group.
*
Performative Writing and Dreams: A Case for a Poetic Understanding
Gillian Finocan, MA, is doctoral student in Clinical Psychology at Miami University in Ohio. As a qualitative researcher, she uses a performative writing approach to present experiences with dreams. Her dissertation focuses on the role of dreams in the process of recovery from the sudden traumatic death of a parent.
Roger M. Knudson, PhD, is Director of Clinical Training in the PhD program in Clinical Psychology at Miami University. He has taught courses on dreams at Miami for over 25 years. His research focuses on the on-going significance of significant dreams.
Abstract
Emerging from the many ongoing postmodernist efforts for alternative modes of scholarly presentation is the presence of the poetic and the use of performative writing to present experiences evocatively (Pelias, 2005). Performative writing evokes the poetic and is always “something constructed, something made” just as the fictions we story our lives with are always constructed and made for each event that touches us (Pelias, 1999, p. xiv). Performative writing, like all performance approaches, places an emphasis on the sensual, evocative, empathic, embodied, multivocal, multifaceted, constructive, reflexive, improvisational, nonverbal, and useful (Mattingly, 2000; Pelias, 2004). It also honors the complexity of experience and allows for the presentation to be truthful in a local, situational, contextual, and partial way. Performative writing has the beautiful and unique potential to present experiences with dreams because both dreams and performative writing behave in similar ways.
Performative writing pieces and dreams speak the language of metaphor, image, and poetics. Dreams offer us windows into the imaginal and opportunities for the witnessing of, experiencing of, and learning from enactments in our imaginal fictions. Performative writing allows readers and/or audience members to vicariously experience scenes and to identify with the characters presented in the performative pieces. Through the evocative potential of dreams and performative writing, individuals are able to experience a knowing of what matters based on how the body feels and responds to the scenes. Dreams and performative writing also invite mysteriousness, possibility, puzzlement, and improvisation.
This paper provides an argument and rationale for the use of performative writing for understanding and presenting how individuals experience their dreams.
References:
Mattingly, C. (2000). Emergent Narratives. In Mattingly, C., & Garro, L. C. (eds.)
Narrative and the Cultural Construction of Illness and Healing. Berkeley, University of California Press.
Pelias, R. J. (1999). Writing Performance: Poeticizing the Researcher’s Body. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press.
Pelias, R. J. (2004). A Methodology of the Heart: Evoking Academic and Daily Life. Walnut Creek: Altamira Press.
Pelias, R. J. (2005). Performative writing as scholarship: An apology, an argument, an anecdote. Cultural Studiesßà Critical Methodologies, 5(4), 415-424.
*
The Prevalence of Nightmares and of Cessation of Dreaming After Traumatic Brain Injury
Samantha Fisher has a PhD on the aetiology of nightmares from Swansea University and is a Clinical Psychology (DClin) student at Cardiff University, Wales.
Rodger Wood, PhD, is consultant neuropsychologist and a Full Professor of Psychology at Swansea University, Wales.
Roger Weddell, PhD, is a neuropsychologist and an Honorary Lecturer at Swansea University, Wales
Mark Blagrove, PhD, is reader in psychology and Director of the Sleep Laboratory at Swansea University, Wales. He is a Past President of IASD, is a consulting Editor of the journal Dreaming, and is on the editorial board of the Journal of Sleep Research.
Abstract
Neuropsychological assessments of patients suffering brain lesions have offered insights into the neurological organisation of dreaming. Solms (1997) found that 34.6% of his brain lesioned sample reported the absence of dreaming, this being associated with bilateral white matter lesions in the ventromesial frontal region or lesions in the inferior parietal region of either hemisphere. He also found that 14.9% of his sample reported an increase in non-recurring nightmares, although relationships with mood were not explored.
Methods:
Fifty-one patients who had suffered a head injury (male = 35, f = 16, mean age = 39.69 (SD= 13.7), range =20.77) were recruited from a head trauma clinic. The majority (78%) had sustained head injuries in road traffic collisions. Mean time since injury was 49.35 months (SD= 36.13, range = 9-177). The mean Glasgow Coma Scale (GCS) score was 10.91 (SD = 4.24; range = 3-15). On this basis they were considered to have suffered moderate to severe head injuries. The majority of patients showed neuropsychological signs of frontal dysfunction against a background of diffuse cerebral injury. Patients completed a neuropsychological examination including the WAIS, WMS-III, tests of frontal functioning, depression and anxiety. They also completed a questionnaire assessing frequency of dreams and nightmares.
Results:
30.8% (n=16) reported experiencing at least one nightmare a month, which is in excess of the 5% estimate for the general adult population (American Sleep Disorders Association, 1990; The international classification of sleep disorders). 23.1% reported the occurrence of repetitive nightmares, compared to only 7.9% in the Solms’ study. 34.6% (n=18) reported that they did not dream, which contrasts with the rate of not reporting dreams in the normal population of 6.1% (Borbely, 1984; cited in Stauch & Meier, 1996, In Search of Dreams). Individuals with frequent nightmares had higher levels of waking anxiety and lower sleep quality than those without frequent nightmares. Importantly, frequent nightmares were associated with milder head injuries, whereas more severe injuries were associated with a lack of dreaming. There were no significant differences on IQ, memory or tests of frontal functioning between dreamers and non-dreamers, but non-dreamers were less anxious and had better sleep quality compared to dreamers.
Conclusion:
The frequency of nightmares (recurring and non-recurring) is increased following head injury, as is the incidence of reporting complete cessation of dreaming. Nightmares may be associated with milder injuries as those with less severe injuries have been found to underestimate their perceived quality of life. Thus, greater emotional distress in this group may lead to an increase in the frequency of nightmares. Such nightmares may be clinically useful indicators of mood disturbances. It could be speculated that reported lack of dreaming in those with more severe injuries may be a result of damage to the lesion sites that Solms suggests are necessary to support dreaming (parietal and deep bifrontal lesions).
Reference:
Solms, M. (1997). The neuropsychology of dreaming. Lawrence Erlbaum.
*
Dream Emotions and Nightmares in Patients with Sleep Apnoea
Samantha Fisher has a PhD on the aetiology of nightmares from Swansea University and is a clinical psychology (DClin) student at Cardiff University, Wales.
Keir Lewis, MD, is a respiratory physician and Senior Lecturer at Swansea University Medical School.
Ionah Bartlett is sleep laboratory technical officer at Prince Philip Hospital, Llanelli, Wales.
Mark Blagrove, PhD, is reader in psychology and Director of the Sleep Laboratory at Swansea University, Wales. He is a Past President of IASD, is a consulting Editor of the journal Dreaming, and is on the editorial board of the Journal of Sleep Research.
Abstract
Introduction
Gross and Lavie (1994) found that dreams of apnoeic patients from untreated nights and from just after sleep apnoeas were more negatively toned than after CPAP treatment nights and after awakenings without apnoeas. MacFarlane and Wilson (2006) found that 69% of patients with sleep apnoea reported nightmares ‘sometimes’. Owen et al. (1997) reported that unrecalled nightmares were significantly increased in a sleep apnoea group in comparison to population norms. However, in contrast, Schredl et al (1999) found that high Respiratory Disturbance Index (RDI) was related to dreams with lower negative emotions: these were also more realistic, less bizarre and less intense than for low RDI.
Method
49 consecutive patients attending a sleep disordered-breathing clinic were assessed. 26 patients (21 males; mean age 55; SD = 10.78; mean 4% diprate = 30.95) were subsequently diagnosed with sleep apnoea syndrome (SAS) and 23 (17 males; mean age = 50.14; SD = 8.76; mean 4% dip rate = 4.05) were classed as sleepy/snoring controls. 10 of the SAS patients took part in a follow up study after a minimum of 3 months on CPAP (mean BMI =37.15; SD = 7.44; ESS = 15.1). Participants kept a diary for 10-days in which they recorded their incidence of dreams and nightmares and rated the emotional tone of these on a seven point scale of very unpleasant (1) to very pleasant (7). Participants also rated how anxious and depressed they were before sleep and on awakening using visual analog scales. This diary was repeated for a further 10 days in the follow up study.
Results
61% of patients with SAS and 43.5% of controls had at least one nightmare during the 10-day study period. Although not significantly different from each other, the prevalence rate of both groups are in excess of the 5% estimate for the general adult population (American Sleep Disorders Association, 1990; The international classification of sleep disorders). Mean dream emotional tone was significantly more negative in the apnoea group, however, there was no significant difference in ratings of waking mean anxiety and depression between the groups. Importantly, no significant relationship was found between dip rate and the frequency of dreams and nightmares. Instead, when dip rate was used to divide all the participants into three groups according to diprate (apnoea) severity, Levene’s test for homogeneity of variance found that as the severity increases the variance in emotional tone decreases significantly, although the mean of emotional tone did not differ between the three goups. Dream frequency was significantly reduced following CPAP (z = -2.25; p =0.02) and there was a slight but non-significant increase in nightmare frequency. The variance of mean dream emotional tone was not significantly altered by CPAP therapy.
Conclusion
The frequency of nightmares is higher in the apnoea and snoring/sleepy control group compared to the general population. The main finding is that as apnoea increases in severity the variance in emotional tone of dreams becomes less, with a mean of neutral emotional tone. It could be speculated that in severe apnoea sleep is so fragmented that it interferes with the process of dreaming, thus not allowing dream plots and dream emotion to develop, and so diminishing the variability in level of emotion of dream reports.
*
Exploring the Central Image of a Dream Through Art
Marilyn Fowler, MA, is an Associate Professor and the Director of the Dream Studies Program at John F. Kennedy University (JFKU). She is also the Director of the MA in Consciousness and Transformative Studies at JFKU and Adjunct Professor in the Graduate School of Professional Psychology at JFKU.
Abstract
This workshop presents an innovative approach to dreamwork in a group setting, developed by Marilyn Fowler. This dream group approach is based in Jungian psychology, exploring Jung’s idea of “finding the images which are concealed in the [dream’s] emotions” (Jung: Memories, Dreams, Reflections)
Jung was a great believer in embellishing his dreams with drawings, finding that drawing could tap the unconscious in a way that writing alone did not provide. He found this particularly effective in exploring the emotional content of a dream.
Drawing on Jung’s experience, participants in this workshop will be encouraged take on a dream “as if it were their own”, paying particular attention to the emotions generated by particular images in the dream.
Participants are then asked to draw the image(s) that stand out for them personally, amplifying the image as needed to bring out the significance. Group members are encouraged to draw spontaneously as much as possible, allowing their unconscious to supply meaning to their drawing. (“Artistic” renderings are not required. Drawings are only to convey meaning.) Group members share their drawings with the group, giving the dreamer the benefit of their individual and collective insights about the dream. As the group’s images are shared, the central image of the dream will often emerge, providing the dreamer with fresh insights about the core meaning of the dream.
This approach was pioneered by Fowler in the Dream Studies Program at John F. Kennedy University and has been taught in various settings, including Dream Studies classes, private workshops and previous IASD conferences.
*
Ten Dimensions of Dream Meaning
Art Funkhouser earned his PhD in digital picture processing and his diploma as a Jungian psychotherapist in 1981. Besides seeing clients in his private practice, he long led a seminar in dreamwork at the C.G. Jung Institute near Zurich and still leads a dream group in Bern, Switzerland.
Abstract
Dreams are often worked on according to their contents and these can be classified according to various schemes. For example, Jung spoke of dreams as being subjective and/or objective. The scheme that will be proposed and worked on in this workshop attempts to elaborate these two possibilities into ten dimensions: four subjective ones, one transitional one, and five objective ones. It is hoped that those participating will provide examples, both from their own dreams as well as from ones they have heard about, with which to illustrate these dimensions. It may well be that the participants will wish to modify this scheme by giving other names to the levels being discussed or even subtracting or adding additional ones. It should be clear from the outset that any given dream may well have meaning on more than one level at the same time.
*
Art Funkhouser earned his PhD in digital picture processing and his diploma as a Jungian psychotherapist in 1981. Besides seeing clients in his private practice, he long led a seminar in dreamwork at the C.G. Jung Institute near Zurich and still leads a dream group in Bern, Switzerland.
Abstract
A dream group is an amazingly effective way to work on dreams. It is important, though, that an atmosphere is created in which each person feels him or herself safe. There is thus no coercion to tell a dream nor to accept what anyone says about the various dream images that are presented in the group. All dreams are to remain in the group and are not to be discussed with persons outside the group during or following the conference except with the dreamer’s express permission. Each person has her or his own dream “language” and the group will learn how to ask questions and listen to what the dreamer says in such a way that the message of the dream emerges in a natural way.
*
Art Funkhouser earned his PhD in digital picture processing and his diploma as a Jungian psychotherapist in 1981. Besides seeing clients in his private practice, he long led a seminar in dreamwork at the C.G. Jung Institute near Zurich and still leads a dream group in Bern, Switzerland.
Abstract
The 87-question déjà vu survey questionnaire has been available on the Internet for more than two years. Well over 1400 persons have now filled it out. One of the explanations for the experiences people are having has to do with precognitive dreams. In this short report, the results obtained up to shortly before leaving for the conference will be presented. Given the recent interest in the phenomenon (or phenomena) commonly called “déjà vu”, it was thought that the time has arrived for a portal to be put up on the Internet in order to provide information about this experience and also to provide on-line forums where individuals who are having such experiences can share their more vivid ones. Some aspects of the portal will be presented.
*
Jayne Gackenbach, Ph.D., Professor of Psychology, Grant MacEwan College, Canada. A past president of IASD, she has been an active research and writer in the area of lucid dreams and the psychology of the Internet. Her current research interest is in consciousness and video game play.
Abstract
Relationships between dreams and absorption and between media use and absorption have been identified. In this study all three types of experiences are examined. Enhanced dream recall has been associated with psychological absorption as has lucid dreaming, although the latter is midigated by dream recall. Also nightmare prevalence and nightmare distress have been found to be associated with absorption.
Absorption has been an important variable in understanding video game appeal. Although absorption in computer game play is often reported, it is seldom studied. However, it has been found that rapid absorption into games was rated as highly important by gamers. Furthermore subjects who were rapidly absorbed into game play have reported experiences during video game play indicative of altered states of consciousness. Additionally absorption as part of the experience of flow has been repeatedly shown to be higher in gamers and indeed as a function of a variety of new media experiences.
In an online mass testing survey 352 college introductory psychology respondents were asked to identify a recent dream, answer questions about it and their media use the day before the dream and take the Tellegren Psychological Absorption Scale. A factor analysis showed a relationship between these variable types. Specifically in a principle component analysis the first two factors loaded all three types of variables. In factor one absorption was associated with media use the day before a dream as well as with media dreams and a sense of dream control. In the second factor media use was negatively associated with absorption as well as with dream control and dream recall clarity. In this second factor lucid dreams loaded negatively. Thus two types of psychological absorption and media associations are indicated one positively associated with media use and one negatively associated with media use. Different dream variables loaded on each of these factors.
*
High End Video Game Players Play Experience and Dreams
Jayne Gackenbach, PhD, Professor of Psychology, Grant MacEwan College, Canada. A past President of IASD, she has been an active researcher and writer in the area of lucid dreams and the psychology of the Internet. Her current research interest is in consciousness and video game play.
Beena Kuruvilla, BA student, Grant MacEwan College, Canada, is a third year psychology honors student. Her current research interests are in video game play, dreaming, and flow from a developmental perspective. She has worked as a researcher, examining the relationship between media use and dreaming.
Alexis Zederayko, University of Alberta, is currently a student in the Department of Psychology. Her interests include interpersonal relations and dreams. She has taught disabled children on a volunteer basis.
Jordan Olischefski is currently completing a Psychology honors degree at Grant MacEwan College. His interests include consciousness, evolutionary psychology and the influence of technology on human functioning. He has volunteer and work experience with young offenders, as well as youths with developmental disorders and substance abuse disorders.
Abstracts
Symposium Overview Abstract:
In this symposium the experience of self during video game play and the dreams of hard core video gamers will be examined. These were gathered in hour long interviews of 25 young men and 2 women who are students at a college in western Canada. In order to be interviewed they had to say yes to these four criteria:
Do you play video games on average several times a week?
Is your typical playing session more than 2 hours?
Have you been playing video games since before grade three?
Have you played 50 or more video games over your lifetime?
The semi-structured interview protocol included these basic questions. Each had further elaborations as needed:
1. Why do you play video games?
2. Talk about the emotions you experience while playing video games.
3. Describe the nature or quality of your thinking while playing video games.
4. Discuss your sense of your body while playing video games.
5. Do you ever experience motion sickness while playing video games?
6. While playing video games how do you experience time?
7. Please talk about your sense of self during video game play.
8. Do video games come up in your dreams? If so how?
9. Tell me your most recent dream.
10. Tell me your most recent dream which in some way included video games.
11. Finally would you tell me your most noteworthy video game dream?
12. Have you ever had any experiences of alterations in consciousness associated with your video game play?
This symposium is aimed at understanding more deeply the effects of game play on both the experience itself while awake as well as when asleep.
Jayne Gackenbach, Grant MacEwan College, “Video Game Players Play Experience”
In the present inquiry 27 hard core college student gamers were interviewed about their experiences while gaming. This line of questioning was aimed to explore self consciousness during gaming. Exploration of self consciousness is always a problem. As Harnad (2000) notes there is a “long litany of "self-X" terms meant to illuminate consciousness (self-awareness, self-reference, self-representation, etc.) – while in reality merely renaming it” (p. 58). So too in this inquiry, when informants were asked specifically about their awareness of self while playing they were most often puzzled by the question thus self consciousness was broken down into aspects during play which were more easily recognizable. This approach agrees with Revonsuo’s (2006) point that “self-awareness is the ability to become aware of one’s own phenomenal experiences (bodily experiences, thoughts, memories) as one’s own phenomenal experiences” (p. 49).
Although emotions are experienced, thinking occurs, bodies are attended to and self is acknowledged, the most noteworthy report regarding self consciousness is that of a deep absorption in play. Revonsuo (2006) would argue that this is an indicate of the lack of self-awareness while the gamers might not entirely agree. It’s probably more accurate to say that what they need from self is available if called upon. Thus is they are physically uncomfortable they can change position if needed even if they simply don’t know they are uncomfortable till the game is over. They know they are having emotions upon reflection on the experience of gaming as well as some awareness of themselves if at times transferred in some sense to the game character. Despite the prevailing experience of self as absorbed in the game this does not interfere with their thinking process in terms of the needs of game play. Thus problems are solved and progress is made. This emphasis on absorption in the game while calling up skills to progress is reminesent of classical flow. These interviews help to delineate how flow is experienced during play.
In terms of anomalous experiences of self during play, few were reported for these gamers while awake although the third person perspective was more common while asleep. This is relevant to the current paper because as Revonsuo (2006) points out, self awareness while awake is typically first person with only anomalous experiences of consciousness such as out-of-body states evidencing third person perspectives. In this data while only a few players noted a shift to third person perspective while awake, more mentioned it during dreams of video gaming. Furthermore, this is unusual as the research on the dream ego concludes that self is almost always experienced from the perspective of the dream self or from one’s own eyes, which is the first-person perspective.
In conclusion, is there self consciousness during game play for hard core gamers? If absorption is an indicate of the lack of self consciousness as claimed by Revonsuo (2006) then the answer is no. But as shown herein self consciousness is not entirely gone rather it’s components are put towards the service of the game. The flow model of consciousness in gaming including self consciousness is best in characterizing the gaming experience. That is, there is sufficient challenge to engage with not so much as to frustrate. Thus flow or deep absorption is the primary characteristic of the experience of gaming.
References:
Harnad, S. (2000) Correlation vs. Causality: How/Why the Mind/Body Problem Is Hard. Journal of Consciousness Studies 7(4): 54-61.
Revonsuo, A. (2006). Inner Presence: Consciousness as a Biological Phenomenon. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.
Bena Kuruvilla, Grant MacEwan College, “Hall and Van de Castle Content Analysis of Gamer Dreams”
Four of the 12 interview questions dealt with dreams and thus 56 dreams were collected from 27 high end gamers. These dreams were content analyzed using the Hall and Van de Castle system as delineated by Schneider and Domhoff (2006). Analysis were computed using the latter’s DreamSAT spreadsheet which analyzes the codes and automatically generates percentages and h-profiles. Since all but two of the interviewees were male, norm comparisons were for males only.
Two coders were trained on eight dreams until they attained congruence in coding. Percent matches averaged 77% agreement. The remainder of the dreams were randomly assigned to each coder for the remaining dream coding.
The largest effect size for these video game players dreams was evidenced in higher dead and imaginary characters, aggression/friendless percentage and physical aggression than the Hall and Van de Castle norms. Large effect sizes were also found where gamers dreams were lower in bodily misfortunes and lower in dreams with at least one instance of friendliness.
Several other variables also showed significant deviations from the norms. Gamers dreams had more familiar but fewer friendly characters. In addition to what has been mentioned, dreams with at least one element, which differed significantly from the norms, included fewer aggression, sexuality, misfortunes and good fortunes. Interestingly although there was more physical aggression in their dreams overall and more aggression/friendless percent overall, when examined in terms of the number of dreams reporting at least one instance there were fewer aggressive instances than the norms. In part this may be due to the low sample size of dreams but it may also be that when gamers dream of aggression there is more of it in those dreams but they don’t dream of it as often. However, this aggressiveness theme is also evidenced in the fewer friends relative to the norms. Interestingly, the fewer bodily misfortunes would seem to indicate that they are winning at their aggressive dream battles. This is not surprising given all their practice while awake in virtual reality battles. The majority of the interviewees expressed a preference for role playing games with a battle motif (i.e., World of Warcraft) or first person shooters.
Another interesting finding is the higher incidence of dead and imaginary characters. This certainly seems to characterize the virtual world of many of today’s games showing up in their dreams. In fact in interviews on gamer commented that there is no reason to be a human in a game as they have fewer powers than other types of creatures.
In conclusion, dreams of gamers seem to reflect their gaming experience while awake. However, since few dreams were available, about half of what is suggested, these results must be viewed as suggestive. Further Hall and Van de Castle analyses are currently being undertaken with larger samples of video game players dreams.
Schneider, A., & Domhoff, G. W. (2006). The Quantitative Study of Dreams. Retrieved December 10, 2006 from http://www.dreamresearch.net/
Alexis Zederayko, University of Alberta, “Gamer Dreams Content Relevant to Consciousness in Sleep”
Several content analysis categories were developed based upon the interview elaborations on dreams and consciousness during sleep and upon previous research into lucid dreaming. These content categories included palpable sensations, balance, video game dreams, media dreams, lucid dreams, control dreams, observing dreams and self-reflectiveness in dreams. This scale was developed and refined using dreams from another video game dream study and in dialogue with the primary researcher. Once the categories were refined they were applied to this group of dreams. Specifically the same 56 dreams from the 27 high end gamers were analyzed using these consciousness in sleep sensitive content scales. As a group high end gamer dreams showed few palpable sensations, balance or lucidity but did evidence some control with the dream self as showing some third person orientation.
These dreams were then identified based upon the interview questions into video game dreams versus nonvideo game dreams and were examined in terms of these consciousness variables. Word count was a covariate in these analyses due to video game dreams being almost twice as long as those which were not identified as a non-video game dream. Of the 10 one-way ANOVA’s all but one resulted in significant differences for these content scales between video and non-video game dreams. Specifically 33 video game dreams versus 23 non-video game dreams were compared controlling for word count.
Video game dreams were evaluated as having more balanced emotions, more lucidity, more control of self, events, character and setting and watching of emotions than non-video game dreams. Without the word count covariate control of events and character and balanced emotions remained significant. That is the strongest effects as a function of video game versus non-video game dream content was in terms of two dream control variables and the ability to balance emotions during play. These characteristics would be expected as some control of emotional reactions to a game is necessary in order to progress in the game. Additionally, control of game elements is not surprisingly translated into dreams of games. In terms of self-reflectiveness without the word count covariate there was no difference in dream type while with word count as a covariate non-video game dreams were higher in self-reflectiveness.
Jordan Olischefski, Grant MacEwan College, “Gamer as Participant-Observer”
This final paper will view the data described in the first three presentations from the perspective of a participant observer. As a long time gamer and student, the presenter was one of the interviewees and later became a research assistant to the primary author. Thus he will talk both about the experience of gaming as a gamer and as a researcher. The presentation will be phenomological in orientation using various quotes from the hard core gamer interviewees which illustrate components of the findings.
So for instance, although gamer dreams seemed to indicate more aggression than the norms when asked about their feelings while playing joy was the most prevalent emotion expressed with anger talked about less often but not the least frequent which was sadness. In fact, only 15 players admitted that they sometimes feel angry and none said they were frequently angry according to an interview rater (Gackenbach, Matty, & Samaha, 2006). It was explained by the gamers that they only felt angry if they were loosing or as a function of the other players’ actions. Several pointed out that they used to get angrier at the games when they were younger but they do not experience it as often anymore. One young man explains “I’ve gotten incredibly angry when I was young like I’ve thrown my controllers across the room or whatever playing Mortal Combat.” The maturity of some of these young college student gamers showed with comments like this “it’s just you learn that there’s appropriate outlets to vent your frustration or anger and a lot more constructive methods.”
Yet aggression was in their dreams more so than the norms provided by Schneider and Domhoff (2006). Here are two such dreams:
It was basically two sides to a conflict and we were bombarding each other. Like I had all the powers of the character like I could jump really high and I could switch guns and shoot things, and it was rewarding.
I ended up arguing with one of my friends ... arguing incredibly, and almost getting into a physical fight.
The higher incidence of dead or imaginary characters was also a provocative dream finding and is illustrated by these interviewee quotes:
I had a dream that I was watching the TV but there was me and I was running along trying to save the princess like in Mario ... it was me but I was saving a bit character, the princess.
I'm pretty sure Link from the Legend of Zelda and Eminem were also in my dream and there was a parade and really big fireworks and the fireworks were from the gold saucer sequence in Final Fantasy 7.
This sort of fantasy and self merging is especially evident in this gamers comment:
the latest dream that I do remember was of a video game ... sort of seems like almost clips of that reality mixed in with real reality ... I had to go look for herbs in the dream which I normally wouldn't do but it's something that one of my characters would do.
In fact, 20 of 27 said that they “sometimes” identified with the characters when asked how they experienced themselves during game play. This element does seem to translate into gaming dreams.
References:
Gackenbach, J.I., Matty, I. & Samaha, A. (2006). Self Consciousness during the Play of Video Games. Unpublished manuscript.
Schneider, A., & Domhoff, G. W. (2006). The Quantitative Study of Dreams. Retrieved December 10, 2006 from http://www.dreamresearch.net/.
*
Dreams and Media Use
Jayne Gackenbach, PhD, Professor of Psychology, Grant MacEwan College, Canada. A past President of IASD, she has been an active researcher and writer in the area of lucid dreams and the psychology of the Internet. Her current research interest is in consciousness and video game play.
Beena Kuruvilla, BA student, Grant MacEwan College, Canada, is a third year psychology honors student. Her current research interests are in video game play, dreaming, and flow from a developmental perspective. She has worked as a researcher, examining the relationship between media use and dreaming.
Abstract
This study is based upon previous studies (Gackenbach, 2006a; Gackenbach, 2006b) showing some relationship between experiences thought to be indicative of consciousness development, especially the emergence of lucid dreams, associated with video game play. A causal link still needs to be made thus in this study dream collection and day before video game play information are being gathered. Because video game play is but one form of media, use of other media forms from the day before the dream reported are also being collected.
In this research study dreams are being gathered from students in a face to face setting asking them for their most recent, preferably night before, dream. About 200 students participated in this research in the spring term of 2006. The same sorts of classes are currently being approached online at the same college.
Following their written report of their dream, participants are asked to answer a series of questions in these categories: demographics, dream history, video game history, sleep pattern of the night of the dream, media use amounts the day before the dream, and dream content questions regarding the reported dream.
Dreams will be content analyzed using three procedures. The first involves reading the dreams with some of the same content questions asked of the subjects as well as a few found to be relevant to the study of lucid dreams (i.e. presence of balance or palpable sensations in dreams). The second is the Hall and Van de Castle scale for normative content and the third is a scale examining self awareness in the dream.
It is hypothesized that the more media use, and especially video game play, the more likely a student will be to report lucid, observer, control and media dreams. The relationship between media use and nightmares is unclear as some research has shown a positive relationship while other research has shown a negative relationship. These effects are expected to be especially pronounced for heavy video game players. Controls will include dream recall history, motion sickness and sleep quality. In terms of the content analyses this emphasis on media use offers a new dimension to such analysis. On the one hand norms for students in general should echo those available for the Hall and Van de Castle scale while the outcome of the self awareness in dreams analysis remains to be seen.
In preliminary factor analysis of the first 200 participants responses to questions about the dream they reported and their media use, interactive media use loaded with lucid and control dreams while audio media or audio/video media showed no such association. Observer dreams loaded with audio media. The first person perspective in dreams, as versus the third person perspective, was associated with use of phones, CD’s, MP3 players and radio during the day before but not associated with audio/video media use (TV, movie) or interactive media use (video games, computers). Electronic media dreams loaded with audio/video and interactive media use. Finally, in this preliminary factor analysis nightmares loaded with dream recall clarity but not with any media use variable.
References:
Gackenbach, J.I. (2006a, April). The relationship of video game play to dreams and other related consciousness forms. Paper presented at the biannual meeting entitled "Toward a Science of Consciousness" sponsored by the University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona.
Gackenbach, J.I. (2006b). Video Game Play and Lucid Dreams: Implications for the Development of Consciousness. Dreaming: Journal of the Association for the Study of Dreams, 16(2), 96-110.
*
Patricia Garfield, PhD, leading dream expert, Doctor in Clinical Psychology, authored nine books on dreams, and co-founded ASD (President 1998-99). Her Creative Dreaming, bestseller in print since 1974, appears in fourteen languages; The Dream Book (2002) for teens, won two prestigious awards. Instructor OLLI, Dominican University, San Rafael, California, USA.
Abstract
Dr. Garfield’s talk examines typical dreams related to senior issues, with special focus on the areas of: approaching or recent retirement; the loss of a loved person and subsequent bereavement; and of physical aging in the dreamer. Using examples from a class of lifelong learners in a university program for people over the age of fifty years, as well as examples from seniors in literature and the arts, she demonstrates the most common features in imagery that appear in dreams dealing with these important senior issues.
Dr. Garfield also presents several dream methods that can be used to support coping with the stressful aspects of seniors’ lives, along with ways to use their personal dream material as a creative resource to enhance waking life.
As a senior herself, aged 71, Dr. Garfield is increasingly aware of the challenges of the last decades of life. More importantly, these same issues are becoming a crucial issue for society, since there are some 76 million seniors, “baby boomers,” reaching age 60 in the year 2006 in the United States alone. Many universities and colleges are currently establishing special enrichment programs for this huge increase in the aging population. So far, very few courses for seniors address dreams.
Thus, seniors, in reference to dreamwork, are a large and relatively neglected population. They need our attention, for we, as dreamworkers, have invaluable skills to offer. Together, we can come to a better understanding of the special dream issues involved for seniors, and develop the best methods of supporting their emotional health during this latter phase of life.
*
The Dark Journey: Adolescents in Crisis
Dr. Monique Golis has specialized in working with youth in the United States, India, Russia, Honduras, Guatemala and Germany. Her commitment is to bring a mind body connection into depth psychological work.
Abstract
The field of clinical psychology has been conflicted about how best to serve the mental health needs of adolescents in crisis. While a great deal of attention has been paid to the problems these adolescents pose to society, very little attention has been given to the subjective point of view of the adolescents themselves with respect to the process of personality development and individuation.
The voice of the adolescent patient is often muffled by studies of broader patient groups. The difficulty with this practice is that adolescents require a substantively different therapeutic approach because they are coping with entirely different issues than adults, such as identity & character development, moral development and socialization. Moreover adolescents face these challenges with more limited coping skills, fewer life experiences and amidst dramatic changes in their bodies and emotional constitution.
With institutionalized adolescents, the cost of health care and the reticence of insurance providers to fund long-term care results in short-term cognitive-behavioral therapy, which leaves little space for a depth psychological insight into the motivations, intrapsychic experience, and other factors that contribute to adolescent problems, especially drug abuse and suicidality.
This study provides an examination of these factors by using questionnaires and in-depth interviews, as well as examining creative products by the children such as poetry, photographs and artwork. The methods of phenomenological theory are used to analyze this data. Ultimately the understanding of the lived experience of adolescent crisis will provide insight and resources for clinicians in diagnosis and treatment planning. This multimedia presentation captures the subjective experiences of institutionalized adolescent patients through their own words, artwork, dreams, and poems, and recounts their archetypal struggles to transmute personal crisis into the crucial transformational process of self-discovery and individuation.
*
Determining and Honoring the themes in your dreams.
Robert P. Gongloff is the author of Dream Exploration: A New Approach. He is the IASD
Secretary and has hosted two international dream conferences. He lives in Black Mountain, NC, where he conducts dream groups and workshops. His website is www.heartofthedream.com.
Abstract
The need for working with themes
Very little literature exists on dream themes and how to work with them in the dreamwork process. Most self-help books on dream interpretation have the dreamer dwell on the symbolism in the dream. Symbolic analysis can be misleading and time-consuming.
Intensive work on determining themes helps dreamers gain a better understanding of the waking life issues the dream is asking the dreamer to explore. This is true both when working alone, but also in group dream-sharing.
What are themes?
Themes reflect the major issues going on in one’s life. A theme is the important message, idea, or perception that a dream or waking life event is attempting to bring to your conscious mind.
How to determine the themes of one’s own dreams
I have developed a process of determining the theme of a dream, including some dos and don’ts to make the job a bit easier. Following are some key questions one can ask to aid in this process: What is the basic activity going on in the dream? What are the main characters doing in the dream? What is the major issue concerning the characters? What is the apparent or presumed motivation of the characters that causes them to act this way? What drives the characters’ behavior: emotion, will, or intelligence?
Theme statements are best determined when they are personalized, stated in the present tense, and don’t just restate the words or actions from the dream.
The Theme Matrix
The basic issues of life and of dreams can be described in terms of twelve distinct themes. These twelve themes are presented in the form of a matrix.
A matrix is an arrangement of bits of information ordered in some logical fashion to be useful for determining relationships with other bits of information. For our purposes in relation to dreams, the Theme Matrix is a listing of twelve core themes designed to help dreamers relate the themes of their personal dreams to a set of common themes.
The common core themes represent the twelve activities – aspects of life, instinctive forces, underlying life principles, and lessons of life – that are common throughout humanity. They can help one address the positive or negative side of any issue or concern. And they can be used to represent the twelve key phases of any cyclical life journey.
Using the Theme Matrix to honor the dream
By treating each core theme in the matrix as a phase or level of progression, we can apply the practice of concentrating on subsequent themes – advanced phases, “higher” levels – to resolve current issues presented in our dreams. For instance, when a dream presents us with a particular issue in our waking lives, we can seek out the common core theme representing that issue and concentrate our thought on the next phase or level in the matrix and initiate actions recommended at that level. This procedure helps us benefit from, or honor, our dreams.
*
Gary Goodwin has taught at the local Jung Society for nearly ten years. He has been a dream group leader for six years, and has recently formed a center that provides a home for teachers of the ‘inner arts’ (journaling, art for reflection, dreamwork, active imagination, and other related topics).
Abstract
This course will take us through an introduction to how Jung rediscovered active imagination – -the path to touching and communicating with the unconscious. We will learn the techniques of Active Imagination, look at the nature of imagination, when to use this technique, and how to use this practice for dreamwork.
We will set aside time to actually practice active imagination and share what we have experienced (optional for everyone). Please bring a dream image or dream theme you wish to explore.
Note: I follow the dream group ethics and practices developed by the International Association for the Study of Dreams. These practices assure that dreamwork is applied appropriately and gently in public settings.
Also, this workshop or technique is not a substitute for therapy or work with a therapist.
*
Gary Goodwin has taught at the local Jung Society for nearly ten years He has been a dream group leader for six years, and has recently formed a center that provides a home for teachers of the ‘inner arts’ (journaling, art for reflection, dreamwork, active imagination, and other related topics).
Joan Robinson has been leading dream groups for 13 years and is a psychotherapist with a private practice in Marin County, California and she is a spiritual director. She uses art in her groups and has led group work in a variety of settings, including at San Quentin prison.
Kirsten Borum has led dream groups in Denmark for 20 years using a variety of dreamwork approaches. She also leads workshops in dreamwork, meditation, and energy work. She is on the Board of the Danish Association for the Study of Dreams.
David Jenkins, PhD, is the author of Dream RePlay: How to Transform Your Dream Life. He teaches classes on dreams and offers dream groups in Berkeley and Oakland, California. His PhD study of Emanuel Swedenborg's dreams led him to focus on the reality of the dream experience. He writes a weekly column which can be read at www.dreamoftheweek.com.
Sheila McNellis Asato, MA, www.monkeybridgearts.com, is the founder of Monkey Bridge Arts, a center dedicated to the growth, transformation and healing of individuals and the community through art, dreaming and creative development. She also provides customized training in cross-cultural communication, with an emphasis on Japan, for Family Guidance International.
Abstracts
Although all panelists will participate in a robust discussion of this important topic, each will also present material from their own studies and experiences. The abstracts of each presentation are included below:
Summary of Kirsten Borum Presentation: While working with dreams personally and in dream groups over many years, I was also working with meditation and a special form of energy work. Over the years I have been more and more attracted to the connection between dreams and meditation, especially when seeing dreams as an expression of energy. This presentation will focus on the unique connection I have found, how to do energy work, and how to introduce it to a dream group.
Summary of Joan Robinson Presentation: I use a technique for leading groups that I learned from Dr. Alan Siegel. After the dreamer shares a dream and we talk about it, then we all draw a picture of our own imagined version of the dream. This process enables people to “get out of their heads” and is actually a way to meditate that allows people to go deeper into the dream because it uses the language of dreams – -the archetypal symbol. Then we all share our thoughts as we share the pictures with the group. At the end all pictures are given to the dreamer as a gift in exchange for the gift he’s/she’s given us of sharing his/her dream. This presentation will outline the approach, what materials to use, how much time to allow, how my dream groups have responded, and how dreamers been affected.
Summary of David Jenkins Presentation: What are the core issues and matters that anyone aspiring to lead dream groups must master? David Jenkins will present his personal appraisal after 6 years spent on the learning curve. In summary, there are some skills to learn, techniques to grasp but overall each dream group leader is pursuing a quest for their own individuality.
Summary of McNellis Asato Presentation: IASD is a dynamic, international community devoted to bringing the diversity of dreaming out into the world. For local dream group leaders, partnering with IASD can offer a tremendous opportunity for raising public awareness for one’s work in a specific community, as well as for IASD. These events can range from small intimate dream dinners to larger regional conferences. In this presentation, Sheila Asato will share her experiences as a regional conference host and dream events co-coordinator in Minnesota.
Summary of Gary Goodwin Presentation: Jung frequently suggested that Active Imagination could be used to “dream the dream forward” showing a dreamer how to bring closure to a dream that seemed to lack an ending. Current Jungian analyst, Robert Bosnak uses Active Imagination to fully engage the dream group so that they can get to deeper understanding. This presentation will cover: what is Active Imagination, how to learn how to do it, how to use it in dream groups.
*
I: Mindful Dreaming: Honoring the Tension of Opposites in Dreams and Waking Life
II: The Clinical Application of Mindful Dreaming
David Gordon, PhD, is a clinical psychologist from Norfolk, VA, and past IASD membership chair. He has given workshops and presentations throughout the US and Canada. His book, Mindful Dreaming: A Practical Guide for Emotional Healing through Transformative Mythic Journeys, explores the lessons in mindfulness dreams teach us.
Dani Vedros, LCSW, is a licensed clinical social worker from Norfolk, VA. She is currently in private practice and is the Co-Director of the Studio for the Healing Arts and the Dreamwork Institute in Norfolk, Virginia. In addition to her clinical practice, she facilitates dream groups and workshops on a regular basis.
Abstract
Workshop I
This workshop is based on evidence from clinical practice that the relief of symptoms in psychotherapy is predicated on the resolution of what Jung termed the “tension of opposites” – the tension between ego strategies conditioned by family and society versus the guiding presence of our wiser Self.
I have found that this tension is expressed in five archetypal or universal conflicts present throughout most of our dreams – and equally present in waking life. Each dream suggests one of five ego strategies to be resolved through greater mindfulness of the tension between distraction and solitude; control and surrender; attachment and letting go; judgment and compassion; impatience and acceptance of the present moment. In addition, when clients practice mindfulness of these conflicts in waking life, their dreams are diagnostic of the progress they are making in this effort – for better or worse.
In this workshop we devote the first 40 minutes to a didactic presentation of the above paradigm. The remainder of the workshop utilizes a Taylor or modified Ullman group process approach to working with dreams volunteered by participants. The dreamwork process is never intrusive and group members are required to own all discussion of a dream as projection: “ If this were my dream... .”
Workshop II
Having learned in Workshop I to identify the five core conflicts present in dreams, participants are provided with exercises in mindfulness to assist their clients in resolving these conflicts. These exercises also facilitate their clients’ embrace of five alternative values that promote emotional healing and recovery.
In this workshop we devote the first 30 minutes to a didactic presentation of the paradigm taught in Workshop I as well as the benefits of mindfulness for clients. In the remainder of the workshop participants will use their own dream imagery to learn and practice dream-based mindfulness techniques. Methods for integrating these techniques in a clinical setting will be discussed.
*
Dale E. Graff, MS Physics, is an internationally recognized lecturer, writer, and researcher in psi topics. He is a former Director of project Stargate, the government program for research and applications of remote viewing. His books, Tracks in the Psychic Wilderness and River Dreams, present his experiences with remote viewing, psychic dreaming and synchronicity.
Abstract
During the past year, I have been systematically exploring precognitive dreaming to discover how such dreams are created and to gain insight into how consciousness interacts with time. The occurrence of precognitive dreaming suggests that time is not the linear flow that it appears to be but that time may be more like a non-linear curtain that has “folds” and “gaps.” When asleep, our dreaming mind finds ways to peek through the time curtain to glimpse the future. Alternatively, it may be that the future is not in the future but is in the now and results from projections of all that is currently knowable from complex integrated global subconscious interactions.
I chose a simple precognitive dreaming protocol: to seek dreams about photographs for articles that would appear in certain pages on future newspaper publications. The only requirement was to carefully record each suspected precognitive dreams and to sketch in detail the key features of the dream or its ending as soon as possible in the morning following the dream. Working with the future news as the psi targets simplified procedures and facilitated independent investigations.
The results of over fifty precognitive dreaming investigations are summarized in this presentation along with a few illustrative examples that compare the dream sketches to the corresponding news photographs. Various constraints such as the future time period, specific newspapers and pages, types of news desired or not desired are explained, along with precognitive dream incubation statements and evaluation procedures.
Some of these precognitive dream investigations involved a cooperative effort with a research colleague to see if combining multiple inputs improved results. Overall, a high degree of correlation between many of the precognitive dream sketches and the corresponding future news photographs was achieved. Incidents of poor correlations provided insight into the precognitive dream creative process.
The main findings from this exploratory precognitive dreaming investigation are presented for attendee comments. These lead to the following questions: (1) Why is there a difference between the ability to sense (see) accurately the elements of the news photographs and the ability (or inability) to know or interpret what is seen? (2) How can precognition occur when the future incident (and its photograph) is not planned and has not yet occurred at the time of the dream? Is there a “real” future ahead of current time or is the future an illusion that results from a global/collective unconscious projection from “now?” If so, would this support the Gia hypothesis? And to what extent are precognitive dreams about “probable” or “fixed” futures? I will argue in favor of probable and cite possible connections with concepts about quantum physical reality.
Precognition has significant implications. We can keep a step ahead of future incidents to either accept, avoid, or possibly prevent them. Precognition should motivate us to widen our concepts of reality and to support research that seeks ways to integrate consciousness with advancements in physics.
*
Geri Grubbs, PhD, is a practicing Jungian analyst in Seattle, WA. A graduate of the C.G. Jung Institute-Zurich, she has been practicing depth psychology since 1987. She has lectured and taught widely on dream interpretation and bereavement, and is the author of Bereavement Dreaming and the Individuating Soul.
Abstract
Geri Grubbs’ book, “Bereavement Dreaming and the Individuating Soul,” presents the death-and-grief process expressed in our dreams following the death of a loved one. The workshop follows the content of her book, beginning with the sharing of a precognitive dream that she had prior to the sudden death of her 16-year old son, and the dreams that came to her immediately afterward. She reveals how the archetypes in her dreams and those from three other personal stories not only prepared the dreamers for the upcoming tragedy of death in their lives, but also helped them address their grief and transcend their suffering. According to Jung, archetypes are the God-likeness in man that are “meant to attract, to convince, to fascinate, and to overpower.” It is through the archetypes that life renewal occurs.
It is quite evident that the bereaved enter a transitional, or liminal, period following a sudden separation by death, and this liminal state is revealed in their dreams. In Eastern religions, it is believed that dreams cross the realm of sleep for the living and the place of death for the deceased; therefore, encounters with deceased spirits in dreams are not uncommon. Such encounters, referred to as visitations, may occur for several months or even years following a loss by death, and can be a source of resolution and transition for the bereaved.
Significant dream themes may come upon the bereaved during the early phases of bereavement, all of which connect them symbolically and psychically with the world of the dead. Such themes include the death tunnel and bridal chamber commonly seen in near-death experiences, dismembered Osiris, the Egyptian deity of afterlife, the Dark Night of the Soul, a representation of the deep sorrow of bereavement, images of the Self as encounters with the divine, and the death wedding or sacred marriage in which the soul of the deceased, as well as the bereaved, unite with the universal dimension. These themes will be presented visually through a slide presentation. Also shown will be images of Mexico’s Day of the Dead celebration that gives an insightful example of how other cultures accept death as part of the life process.
Following the presentation, if time allows those who wish will have an opportunity to share their experiences involving bereavement dreaming and explore what these dreams may be expressing.
*
Doug Grunther is the host of ‘The Woodstock Roundtable,’ a popular radio talk program. Involved in dreamwork for over 10 years, he has an advanced certification in dreamwork from the Marin Institute for Projective Dreaming, completed a dream group training with Dr. Montague Ullman, and has led many successful dream groups.
Abstract
In this workshop Doug Grunther, radio talk show host and certified dreamworker, shows how focusing on the dream’s deep sense of humor can often lead to the siginificant meaning of the dream. F. W. Hildebrandt, a predecessor of Freud’s, remarked in his 1875 book on dreams, “There lies in dreams an incomparable humor, a rare irony. The dream shows us our everyday fears in the ghastliest shape and turns our amusement into jokes of indescribable pungency."
After a brief review of other historical references to humor in dreams, Doug will present 4 dreams (2 of his own and 2 offered by participants in dreams groups he leads) where the truth of the dream was revealed from the realization of a deeply layered pun, intricate joke, or playful synchronicity. In one of the dreams the uncovering of an embedded pun helped the dreamer through an emotionally frightening health issue; in another, a scene featuring a barbecue was revealed to be a playful metaphor for the dreamer's coming to terms with old age.
These dreams show that what the conscious mind perceives to be weird, embarrassing, confusing, ominous, and/or frightening often turns out to be the dream's way, notlike a Zen master's loving mockery of our entrenched illusions, of shattering our false masks, waking us up to our true nature, and showing us solutions to significant physical, emotional, and spiritual issues.
Doug will then lead a dream group dynamic where attendees will volunteer dreams and we will seek out the humor and playful elements to see where it leads us.
*
Mark Hagen, MA, is the Director of the International Institute for Dream Research. He graduated from the University of Zürich, Switzerland, in clinical psychology in 1983, and undertook three years of analytical training in depth psychology. He is the author of Restoration of the Dream. His website is www.dreamresearch.ca .
Abstract
The poets' imaginative vision much as the dreamers, expresses the dramatic myths of literary periods. Allegory an ancient form of religious literary expression is understood and read as a story which "speaks otherwise", having a surface meaning and a deeper hidden archetypal meaning. There are many examples of literary allegory, including Dante's Divine Comedy, Bunyan's Pilgrams Progress and Melville's Moby Dick. The parables of Christ are also discussed as forms of Scriptural allegory.
*
From Explicate to Implicate – 20th Century Dreamwork
Louis Hagood, psychoanalyst, has led dream sharing groups at the annual IASD conference, for FIONS in NYC and at his psychoanalytic institute. He presented on dream healing at the 2003 IASD conference. He has published a book, Midlife at the Oasis: Dreaming in the Second Half of Life, and journal articles.
Abstract
At the beginning of the 20th century, Freud analyzed his own dreams in his book, The Interpretation of Dreams in the tradition of reductionism in classical physics. His was a one-person approach emphasizing repression.
Melanie Klein and her followers Bion, Winnicott and Grotstein developed a two-person model for dreamwork based on mother and child play and therapy adding splitting and projection. Carl Jung, after his descent into the collective unconscious, added dissociation requiring compensation of an unbalanced conscious position. The evolution of dreamwork from classical one-person to more mystical two-person and collective parallels the progress of physics from Newtonian to Quantum, culminating in Montague Ullman’s dreamsharing group.
*
A Multidimensional Model of the Dreaming State of Consciousness
Christian J. Hallman, PhD, is a metaphysician from Minneapolis, Minnesota, and founder of Quality Health Fitness and Wellness, an organization that helps people progress beyond the absence of illness, rehabilitation and total fitness. He is also a Captain in the United States Army and Global War on Terrorism Veteran.
Abstract
Dreaming has been well studied by psychologists, anthropologists and neurophysiologists. Yet few models to date have really attempted to explain the spatial domain and temporal zone of the dream state. This paper presents a multi-dimensional model that implements some key ideas from theoretical physics and mathematics. A description of the spatial domain of dreams will be explained using such concepts as hyperspace and Reimannian Geometry. Hyperspace can provide a plausible explanation of where the actual dream world takes place. Another description of the temporal zone of dreams will be explained using the notion of 3D time from Dewey Larson’s Reciprocal System Theory. Three dimensional time can explain how it is possible for people to experience a variety of different time shifts in dreams such as retrocognition or precognition. A comparison is made between the Conventional 4D Space-Time Model and the newly proposed multidimensional model.
Following the introduction, the first part of this presentation gives a more detailed description of imagination, which helps us understand why this ability is so important for shaping our perceptions of the dream world. Through this ability, the dreamer is able to perceive a variety of different peoples, places and things in the dream world. A comparison between imagination and sensation is made, plus an explanation is provided of why the human brain cannot tell the difference between what it senses from what it imagines.
The second part of this presentation describes the bodily vehicle (i.e. the Imaginal Body) of dreaming consciousness. By using the newly constructed model, a description of the relationship between the Physiological Body and Imaginal Body is shown, and an explanation is given of how these two complementary bodies represent our biological nature.
The third part will use the model to explain how people can have multiple dreams throughout the day/night and why each dream scenario can seem so different from one dream episode to the next.
The fourth part outlines a list of well-established techniques for helping researchers explore the realm of dreams so they can test this model to either verify or falsify its claims. Some proposed ideas such as Charles Tart’s State Specific Sciences will be discussed as a means to help dream researchers prepare for such journeys and present some possibilities of how actual data can be collected while in the dream state.
And finally, the closing part of this paper will present some possibilities of what it would be like to experience more than 3 dimensions of space or time at any given moment. This part will share some insight of how it is possible to be aware of what is occurring in the dream world while fully engaging in the world of waking consciousness.
*
The Role of Dreams in the Study of Human Transformation
Nigel Hamilton, PhD, UK, is Director of the Centre for Counselling and Psychotherapy Education, a Transpersonal Psychotherapy Training Centre and Clinic in London where he lectures and practices as a psychotherapist; UK Representative for The Sufi Order International; originally trained as a physicist, working at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Energy Storage Research.
Abstract
Dreams can be used to monitor the psycho-spiritual transformation process during which several changes in consciousness or changes in the level of consciousness can be observed (Hamilton, 2006). This work has been documented in several studies of people undergoing a solo, spiritual retreat (Hamilton & Hiles, 1999; Hamilton, 2000, 2003). Similarly, individual cases have also been monitored over several years in which the subjects have undergone a long and profound psycho-spiritual transformation process out of the retreat setting (Hamilton, 2004). The latter cases, however, have revealed a number of leaps or paradigm shifts, that are significantly different from the so-called ‘ascent’ experienced in going through several levels of consciousness reported during the typical short, solo retreat process.
This presentation will focus on the use of dreams to monitor significant paradigm shifts in the individual’s consciousness, by tracking the changes in colours, symbols and directions as well as the appearance of a succession of evolving spiritual figures in their dreams. These dreams show clearly that a paradigm shift in consciousness is not merely a change in the levels of consciousness being accessed during their psycho-spiritual transformation process, or a shift in thinking (West, 2000), but that a complete revolution takes place in the dream-life, whereby totally different dreams, showing completely different spiritual qualities (including profound changes in the appearance and intensity of colour and light), begin to appear. Such changes in their dreams have been accompanied by corresponding changes in their waking experience. This phenomenon is strikingly similar to Wilber’s spectrum of consciousness (Wilber, 1999).
As an example, the outlining features of several significant shifts in the consciousness of a person who has undergone a profound psycho-spiritual transformation process will be presented for discussion and analysis. The dream-work presentation will also show how the dreamer has been able to integrate these shifts into their everyday life, bringing profound personal changes in their perception and outlook.
The results of this research imply that dreams are not only a most important source of information and guidance concerning the dreamer’s personal life, but they also provide distinctly clear guidance as to what has really changed and how to incorporate or unfold this spiritual potential, thereby giving far greater depth and meaning to their lived experience.
*
Dreams Weave Cultures
Olaf Gerlach Hansen, MA, Denmark, has degrees in Danish philology and linguistic psychology and has done postgraduate studies in the psychology of dreams. Over the last 16 years he has become specialized in culture and development as director of various cultural co-operation programs and projects involving in particular Africa, the Middle East, Asia and Latin America.
Misa Tsuruta, MA, Japan, is a doctoral student in Clinical Psychology at New School for Social Research. She has presented on Japanese culture and movements and space at past IASD conferences. She is a dream journalist.
Abstracts
Tsuruta topic:
A Japanese Case on How Dreams Interact with Language, Literary History and Folk Culture
“Masa-yume” stands for a dream that comes true. “Hatsu-yume” is the first dream you have in the New Year. Does the existence of these dream-related words in Japanese vocabulary mean that Japanese have paid closer attention to dreams than other people in the world? Having a word may “normalize” the experience and enables people to talk about it in daily conversation. For example, “masa-yume” is a true dream, and “kanashibari” is sleep paralysis. Literature and history tell us that ancient and medieval Japanese engaged in dream sharing and dream interpretations. Does this tradition continue to this day? What are attitudes toward dreams of contemporary Japanese people? This presentation is an attempt to answer all these culture-related questions.
Hansen topic:
A Danish Case on How Dreams Interact with Language, Literary History and Folk Culture
Dreams are an important theme in Danish literature and texts from the Viking Age until today, which over the years have tended to have shifting functions. Dreams have for some writers been a way to express communication with the spiritual and religious. For most artists and writers dreams have been a source of creative inspiration, leading to new insights and in one case even been the source of major societal reform. The key personality in Danish cultural history, N.F.S. Grundtvig, based many of his visions and texts on dreams. In the 19th century he reformed the Danish Lutheran Evangelical Church and was the driving force behind the reformation of the educational system and his visions also was of significance for the creation of the co-operative movement as well as the establishment of democracy and much of present day political thinking in Denmark. Hans Christian Andersen as well as many contemporary writers such as world famous Peter Høeg (“Smillas Sense of Snow”), Susanne Brøgger, Henrik Nordbrandt and many other creative thinkers in Denmark also credit much of their creativity to dreams.
*
Is the CI (Central Image) the Fast Lane on the Royal Road to the Unconscious?
Ernest Hartmann, MD, is the author of over 325 articles, and nine books, most recently Dreams and Nightmares. He is a Past President of IASD and was the first Editor-in-Chief of Dreaming. He is Professor of Psychiatry at Tufts University School of Medicine.
Abstract
The Contextualizing Image or Central Image (CI) is the most powerful image in a dream, which sometimes appears to picture the dominant emotion or emotional concern of the dreamer. Thus the very common dream image “I was overwhelmed by a tidal wave” pictures the dominant emotion of terror or helplessness in someone who has just experienced a severe trauma. The situation after trauma, when there is one overwhelming emotion, provides the clearest example, but other dreams can be approached in the same way.
Is the CI more generally an important part of the dream? Will an examination of a CI lead quickly and reliably to an underlying emotion or emotional concern?
In this workshop, the CI will be carefully defined and a system for finding and scoring CIs will be briefly described. Research on the CI will be briefly reviewed. Participants will have a chance to examine some of their own dreams to determine whether powerful dreams, memorable dreams, “big dreams,” contain CIs. Participants in pairs or small groups will have a chance to work on their own dreams, starting with the CI and working on the dreams in various ways to get a sense of whether beginning with the CI is useful in dreamwork, or in therapy.
Finally we will try to construct or build a dream using the CI model of dreaming. We will examine whether, even in the waking state, allowing imagery to develop while experiencing a powerful emotion can lead to a dream or very dream-like imagery.
*
Developing Consciousness of Personal Mythologies Through Dreams in a Community College Setting
Dr. Deborah Armstrong Hickey is Assistant Professor in Psychology at Greenville Technical College, is a Faculty Research Mentor with Walden University, and specializes in expressive therapies, supervision of therapists, and dreamwork at The Mindgarden in Greenville, South Carolina. She has been active in IASD for almost twenty years.
Abstract
This presentation will describe the process involved in bringing a Dream Education Group program into a community college setting within a community in the south which is conservative and economically challenged. The entire process from development through implementation will be described. Outcomes from the two semesters which have been completed will be discussed, and artwork and writing from the two groups will also be presented. Student responses from the first semester have found student’s unanimously requesting that the group meet more often and be made available to more students.
Other material which will be presented includes: how each group meeting was structured; didactic materials which were covered and films which were viewed; forms and materials which were developed to support the program; problems which were encountered and how they were dealt with; and some preliminary findings regarding the dream reports which were submitted. At first glance, there appears to be many synchronicities between students and their dream content reported; themes; and affect experienced within dreams.
The presentation will also speak to the level of student motivation in this program, which is highly unusual for the student population in this area at this school; and the level of trust and depth which the students were able and willing to create.
*
Developing the Intuition in Group Dreamwork
Curtiss Hoffman, PhD, is an archaeologist and consciousness researcher who has taught in the Anthropology Department at Bridgewater State College, USA since 1978. He is particularly interested in Jungian approaches to dreaming. He has an interest in Wagner’s work because of its archetypal symbolism. He was the host of the 2006 conference.
Abstract
Jung once wrote that he found it useful to approach each dream of his analysands with absolutely no preconceived idea of what the dream might mean. This discipline helps to eliminate the interference of the conscious mind in the dreamworking process and allows for the entry of intuitive wisdom. Anyone who has done dreamwork for long enough is likely to have had many of what Jeremy Taylor calls “ahas” – intuitive insights which help not only the dreamer, not only the person commenting on their dream, but the entire group which is working the dream. By using the Ullman-Taylor method of group dreamwork, which involves assuming that the dreamer knows better than anyone else what his/her dream means, and then attempting to elicit the multiple meanings by a question-and-answer methodology without imposing the dreamworker’s views in an authoritative way, these intuitive sparks can be nurtured and the capacity to recognize them can be enhanced. This is especially likely to occur in a group setting, as the group works together over an extended period (in this case, 4 days) to generate bonds and interaction patterns that resonate with one another and their dreams also weave together in mutual patterns. As a way of augmenting this yet further, dreams will be explored beyond the personal dimension with reference to the archetypal ideas emerging from the collective unconscious, using the method Jung referred to as “amplification”, which draws historical and mythological and literary material into the orbit of the dreamwork, again in a non-authoritative manner, using the “If It Were My Dream” approach developed by Ullman.
*
The Wonder Realm of Night: Dreaming in Wagner’s Music Dramas
Curtiss Hoffman, PhD, is an archaeologist and consciousness researcher who has taught in the Anthropology Department at Bridgewater State College, USA, since 1978. He is particularly interested in Jungian approaches to dreaming. He has an interest in Wagner’s work because of its archetypal symbolism. He was the host of the 2006 conference.
Abstract
Richard Wagner (1813-1883) was the seminal musical genius of the mid-19th century. Unlike any of his important contemporaries in the field of opera, Wagner not only composed all of the music, he also wrote the texts (often based on northern European mythological themes), designed the stage sets and costumes, and even planned the architecture of the theatre. All of his mature music-dramas contain dream settings. He also expressed a theory of dreams which prefigured Freud and Jung, and provided examples of precognitive and lucid dreams in his works. His use of leitmotivs – musical fragments which can be split, inverted, imitated, recombined, and contraposed – is very similar to the process by which dream imagery is constructed.
We will explore Wagner’s ideas about dreaming through visual and musical imagery. Examples include:
1. Der Fliegende Holländer: Erik’s dream and Senta’s visions of the coming of the Dutchman (a precognitive nightmare mutually dreamed and accepted)
2. Tannhäuser: The Venusburg as dreamscape
3. Lohengrin: Elsa’s dream of Lohengrin (a precognitive dream of the archetypal, spiritualized animus)
4. Das Rheingold: Wotan’s dream of Valhalla (day residue, creation through dream)
5. Die Walküre: Sieglinde’s dreams of childhood (repressed memory) and of Siegmund’s fate (psychic, precognitive); Siegmund’s vision of Brünnhilde (a classic anima figure)
6. Tristan und Isolde: Tristan’s invitation to the “wonder-realm of night” and his dream-coma (dreams of an afterlife state)
7. Traüme: Song set to a poem of Mathilde von Wesendonck (dream and daydream, spiritual impression)
8. Die Meistersinger von Nürnburg: Walter’s dream of Eva as lover and muse, and Hans Sachs’ advice for interpreting it (dreamwork, dream creativity)
9. Siegfried: Erda’s dreaming (creation of the world through dreams)
10. Die Götterdämmerung: Hagen’s dream of Alberich (a lucid dream conversation)
Parsifal: Kundry’s dreams (recurrent nightmares); the Flower Maidens (wish-fulfillment)
Through these examples we will explore Wagner’s ideas about the dream state as a fundamental, underlying form of consciousness which is a perennial source of creation and creativity, potentially dangerous for those unprepared to deal with its power, but with great promise for those who dare to undertake the journey.
*
Do Dreams Change as Selves Change?
Caroline Horton, University of Leeds, UK, is a tutor at the University of Leeds, a lecturer at Leeds Metropolitan University and a part-time tutor for the Open University, all based in the UK.
Abstract
The continuity hypothesis (Schredl and Hoffman, 2003) claims that there is much overlap in terms of dreaming and waking experiences, consciousnesses, and cognitions. The present study investigated whether dream content, as well as an ability to remember those dreams, would change over time, specifically, when a change in “self” occurred. In order to observe such a change, 20 participants were recruited before they had left home and moved to university. Participants completed a dream diary of 5 reports and a short questionnaire on dream recall. They also generated “I am…” statements to examine changes in the self (Kuhn, 1954). The same data was collected 6 weeks later, once the participants had become students, living independently, at the University of Leeds, and again 6 weeks later, presumably once they had established a new “self”. Questionnaire data revealed that dream recall did not change significantly over these three time periods, despite the fact that sleep routines did. The extent to which the dreams reflected changes in the self was measured by examining the incorporations of “I ams” in the dream reports over the three stages. Incorporations were highest when the time periods at which the “I ams” were generated and the dreams were recalled, matched. The inter rater reliability correlation was high (.779) and support was also found for the idea that individuals dream about their current self when a separate sample of 58 undergraduates rated their own “I am”s incorporations. The findings are discussed in relation to the continuity hypothesis, in terms of the stability of consciousness over the sleep-wake cycle, as well implicating the relationship between dreaming and autobiographical memory.
*
The Dream to Freedom Technique: Bridging Dreamwork and Energy Psychology
Bob Hoss, MS, is the author of Dream Language, Executive Officer and former President of IASD and founder of the Dream Science foundation for research grants. He is on the faculty of the Haden Institute for dream leadership training, and Adjunct Faculty of Sonoma State University and Scottsdale Community College. www.dreamscience.org .
Lynne Hoss, MA, EHP-C, is the Energy Psychology Program Director for Innersource in Ashland, Oregon and a former counselor, journalist and communications director. She was coordinator and counselor for EAP programs with the Hunterdon Council on Alcoholism in New Jersey. As a member of the Association for Comprehensive Energy Psychology, she is trained in various energy psychology protocols.
Abstract
There are many approaches to dreamwork that effectively put us in touch with emotional issues that may be standing in the way of personal progress. According to many researchers and theorists, the very nature of dreams is to focus on the most important unfinished emotional processing of the day. Thus dreamwork can be an important means of very effectively identifying a critical issue, as opposed to peeling away at surface-level problems and emotional layers until the critical issue surfaces. Typically dreamwork by itself, unless part of a more encompassing therapeutic process, is useful for identifying or experiencing inner emotions, but not necessarily for dealing with the emotions or reducing the barriers to progress that they impose. The field of Energy Psychology, on the other hand, provides some relatively simple approaches for reducing emotional conditions and stress once the condition is identified. By “bridging” the two disciplines, using specific approaches which complement each other, both the identification and reduction of emotional barriers and stress can be affected.
This bridging of disciplines may also have a natural synergy in the biology of the brain. While dreams appear to reflect the nocturnal processing of unresolved emotional issues, involving the limbic system among others, energy psychology targets similar centers in the brain with methods intended to reduce emotional stress and anxiety. Neural plasticity theory and clinical reports indicate that energy psychology is able to produce neurological shifts which neutralize emotional patterns in the limbic system, formed when the amygdala responds to waking life experiences.
In this workshop, participants will learn specific means for identifying and addressing emotional and psychological issue through: 1. an effective 6-step Gestalt-based dreamwork method for identifying the emotional issue the dream is working on; 2. a unique new application of the Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) to the dreamwork process, which uses self-stimulation of acupressure points while holding the problem in mind, to reduce the emotional stress from or reaction to the issue the dreamwork reveals; and 3. a means for using the dream for creating a closure metaphor, and defining next steps for personal movement, once the stressful barriers have been reduced. A brief discussion of the supporting research and some exercises, illustrating the basis of the combined methodologies, is provided in the first half hour of the workshop. This will be followed by a demonstration of the technique, beginning with a short case study followed by a step-by-step experiential session with all attendees who wish to participate and privately work on one of their own dreams. The workshop will include a handout and worksheet.*
A - H I - R S - Z
