Remember these important facts when interpreting dreams
1. Dreams are about emotions/emotional energies and your dreams are about you and your emotions.
2. All dreams have at least two interpretations/applications with all interpretations using the same images and actions.
---One interpretation is addressing foundations to attitudes, actions and even personality traits that come from early life/childhood. This may be the primary focus of the dream or it could be secondary. But it is always present, a simple equation that reflects the basic reasons for who you are and why you are that person. The early life emotional experiences that are ingrained in the psyche and influence if not control your waking life as an adult.
---Another is focused on more recent experiences that possessed strong emotions energies causing or could cause emotional conflict for the dreamer {unconscious if not conscious}. Developed attitudes/traits from foundations could play into the experience and your actions/re-actions
---Other later experiences related to the original emotional energies could also be a subject of the dream. The same devloped attitudes/traits would be involved in these experiences
---Later life experiences that possess strong emotional energies. Experiences related to trauma, grief, physical or emotional injury
3. Dreams have a language of symbol and metaphor with literal applications fused with the symbolic references. An image of a brother could be addressing the literal bother relationship but could/would also point to the symbolic references related to characteristics of the brother or masculine energies within the dreamer {anima/animus aspects}. The dream of a brother is in relationship to the dreamer's emotions.
General Guideline to Interpreting a Dream
1. Write or record your dream just as it unfolded. Anything you feel relevant to the dream add later unless you 'sense' it is 'implied' in the dream.
2. Break the dream down by paragraph and then by sentence {proper paragraph structure is important}. Then take each image and action {example of an action: moving at a slow pass} and consult the dream dictionaries for possible meaning/application.
--If the word is not in the dictionaries look up synonyms for the word plus its meaning. Apply what fits best in context with the images {determine the meaning of images that are in the dream dictionaries first then interpret and add the words that are not}.
3. Take each meaning/application and replace the dream image in the context of the dream sentence. You may have to move around some image meanings to get its true application {example: I was in my house with people I did not know and I felt afraid of one guy who was there.
Translated: house-you/people I did not know- hidden aspects/felt-outlet for true emotions/afraid-self doubt or lack of control/one guy {male}-assertive, aggressive, masculine aspects as well as the possibility of an actual person
Translation of Sentence: you have hidden aggressive/asserive unconscious energies of self doubt or feelings of not being in control of some aspect of your life
4. When determining the best meaning/application listed in dictionaries use the one that best fits you and your emotions. The images/actions in dreams are addressing emotional energies that motivate or influence your waking life {example: the word afraid is an emotional energy that is undelies why you have self doubt or why you are not in control of some aspect of your life}.
5. Take the sum total of the interpreted images/actions in context as the dream unfolds. Just as with any statement of actions there is a story unfolding, a story of your life, your emotional life, as it really is and not necessarily as you think it is.
A Dream Addressing the Two Applications
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Dream: I dreamt that my nephew and his mother (my sister) were surrounded by a swarm of cockroaches on the floor. My nephew was terrified and screaming. In my dream it seemed like his dad was trying to test his braveness. In the dream I saw this happening and I was livid and so mad. So mad that I started crying. The deep painful cry where no sound comes out
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Note: The dreamer had a recent experience involving her sister, her nephew and his father which suggests current life experiences are in play. This would be the literal application of her recent experience
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| Literal Application Seldom do dreams come out with a literal description of an experience. But if there was an experience that left a strong emotional undercurrent it could be a part of the dream. In this instance the dreamer was very concerned about how her nephew was being treated by his parents. Although there were issues in the family they were not on the scope of the way the dream portrayed the experiences. It is the strong emotional undercurrents that caused the dream to present the experiences as it did. Those undercurrents reflect deeper issues, issues to do with th dreamer's mother and father. The dreamer's parents and her as a child {focused on her masculine self}. She is the nephew who is lacking masculine guidance, her animus {read actual dream to see dreamer's response to her early life Terrified Blindfolded Child}.
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| | Symbolic Application
As stated the primary language of dreams is symbol and metaphor {a thing regarded as representative or symbolic of something else}. Along with the literal applications of the mother, father and nephew as well as other images {cockroaches, floor, terrified, screaming, etc} these images/actions are symbolic of the dreamer's emotional energies. They are addressing these energies as they apply to her current emotional experiences as well as her past, spefically her childhood. The mother and father would be her own parents and that relationship {in particular with her father}. The nephew would represent {metaphorical} her under-developed masculine aspects, her animus. The stress and anxieties as they apply to her concerns about her nephew are also stress and anxities {albeit unconscious} of her own childhood anxieties. The application of this aspect was confirmed in the dreamer's response to my analysis of her Terrified Blindfolded Child dream posted at the Power of Dreams Dream Forum.
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Interpreting the Images and Actions
This was my interpretation of the images and actions as they apply symbolically and metaphorically to the dream. I have addressed the literal applications so the same images and actions also apply to the literal people in the dream {mother, father and nephew}. The strong actions of being terrified and screaming were exaggerations of her emotional energies but their inclusion were used in this manner to draw attention to the deeper issues as they apply to her as a child. Of course the cockroaches would be symbolic as would be the floor {undercurrents to the foundations in which she was brought up as a child}. Below is my interpretation of the individual images and actions for which I derived my final analysis.
- In my dream/I dreamt-I interpret these phrases as indications of unconscious energies. When you sleep and dream you are in the unconscious world
- Nephew and mother-The nephew would personify what she identifies in his situation with her own childhood
--mother-her mother
--nephew-her masculine aspects as they apply to the development of inner masculine attitudes/traits
- Blindfolded-being blind, not seeing/being aware her own childhood experience as they apply to her nephew's situation. A blindfold often suggests unconscious aspects, the conscious mind being blind to the unconscious energies
- Hands tied behind their back-restriction of emotional energies within unconscious {back is a common symbol for the unconscious/front would be the conscious self}
- Cockroaches-bound by undesirable aspects. It represents psychological, emotional disturbances that need healing
- Floor-a common image for the dreamer's support system and sense of security. It also symbolize the division between the unconscious and conscious. What is below the floor is the unconscious and whatt is above the floor consciousness
- My nephew was terrified and screaming-this part of the dream points to aspects of the dreamer's animus aspects. There were actual experiences that bordeon terror in her childhood {in relationship with her father}
-Being terrified indicates unresolved fears and/or doubts that need to be confronted
-Screaming represents a release of emotional energies, something she needs to do to heal what was missing in her childhood - It seemed like his dad was trying to test his braveness-having the courage and a need to confront rejected aspects stored in your unconscious
-his dad-referencing her animus aspects in relationship with her father
-test-unconscious scrutizing of the emotional energies
-his braveness-a need and willingness to confront the unconscious energies as they relate to masculine aspects, her animus qualities as well as in her relationship with her father
- In the dream I saw this happening and I was livid and so mad-Unconscious witness to both the literal situation with her nephew as well as her own childhood
-I -I saw this happening- pointing to the literal situation with her nephew as well as what exists within her unconscious
-I was livid/so mad-inner anger that likely is refelcted in some aspects of her waking life {unconscious emotional energies influencing or controlling conscious actions} - So mad that I started crying-inner anger that needs a release
- The deep painful cry where no sound comes out- a true reflection of actual pain that exists
-where no sound comes out-inability to express emotional energies
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