Dreams in the Analytic Process: Patients’ dreams as an objective commentary about the treatment

It is the way of dreams to give us more than we ask...They not only allowed us an insight
into the causes of the neurosis but afforded a prognosis as well. What is more, they showed us at what point the treatment should begin.
(Modern Man in Search of Soul, p. 5, C.G. Jung)

As Jung has taught us about the profound meaning of dreams and their ability to provide a deeply meaningful perspective about our life, this seminar builds on these insights while looking to the dream as offering an objective perspective on treatment. We will see how our clients’ dreams allow us to understand the nature, trajectory, and meaning of the treatment, and how the analyst may have become entrained and entwined within the patient’s personal and archetypal drama. Through illustrations of both patients’ and analysts’ dreams that occur from the beginning of treatment and throughout the analysis, we will come to an even greater appreciation of the dream’s capacity to provide an accurate commentary and needed corrective to the therapeutic process.

Learning Objectives:

1. Identify the role of the initial dream in assessment of clients’ psychological needs and constellated archetypal dynamics.
2. Discuss the objective, non-transferential nature of dream material.
3. Recognize the symbolic, derivative representation of the analyst in dreams.
4. Discuss the dream’s objective commentary regarding the analysis.