Jungian dream interpretation

[Angel von Himmel]

Does anyone here know much about Jungian dream interpretation? I have this weird dream I am trying to figure out the meaning of.

[Not A Communist Shill]

I know a little about it - but it is often confusing or contradictory whenever I read explainations of it - I think most Jungian dream interpretations require you strip to the bare bones of the dream to get the general context + theme of the dream - e.g. the location, the situation, the bits that reoccur, the people\objects in them - it sounds quite simple. I think with other people's dreams you have to take into account the current stresses in their life or the meaning they attach to certain places\people\memories etc., but he also mentioned archetypal objects which have a common meaning, like dragons + skulls etc. - it seems wishy-washy in places.

I have a recurring dream about falling from an airplane and being the only survivor - I'm on fire to begin with, then fall into the ocean, which possibly represents some form of symmetry (yes I'm bullshitting ) - I then end up on a fishing boat and am taken to some hospital in Norway (it's puzzling, but I have some idea why). People keep coming to me and talking about how I was chosen, then I keep telling them I wasn't chosen, leave me alone.

I think situations such as being trapped somewhere or being in a situation out of your control (e.g. me in a plane crash) are suppose to show a sense of having no direction in your own life, and my appearance in Norway possibly reflect how I desire a change...my telling of people that I'm not special probably comes from a fear of failing to meet up with people's expectations of me.

As you can see, most dream interpretations are worthless because they could have many interpretations and yet still mean absolutley nothing - I might also have consciously directed this dream, rather than it being a hidden manifestation. My dreams mean a lot to me, but worry sometimes that I'm trying to escape reality . If you have the Freudian interpetation of your dream done, it will no doubt refer to some hidden sexual lust - interpretations vary from psychologist to psychologist, because of their own personal bias.

[Not A Communist Shill]

I've just been looking at wikipedia, as you do , and the article on dream interpretation is quite interesting, especially this bit:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dream_interpretation

Jung believed that archetypes such as the animus, the anima, the shadow and others manifested themselves in dreams, as dream symbols or figures. Such figures could take the form of an old man, a young maiden or a giant spider as the case may be. Each represents an unconscious attitude that is largely hidden to the conscious mind. Although an integral part of the dreamers psyche, these manifestations were largely autonomous and were perceived by the dreamer to be external personages. Acquaintance with the archetypes as manifested by these symbols serve to increase one's awareness of unconscious attitudes, integrating seemingly disparate parts of the psyche and contributing to the process of holistic self understanding he considered paramount.

According to the article on the Shadow, the shadow is unconscious, but is not the same as your anima (if your're male), animus (if your're female), though that's unconscious too. It seems that the Shadow correlates with the Id (7th +8th functions), and your anima\animus correlates with your SuperId (5th+6th functions), both unconscious.

According to his theory, the most basic desires come from the "id", the childlike portion of the unconscious, and as such often contained material that would be unacceptable to the super-ego. As the text was written relatively early in his career, he does not use the terms "ego" and "id", but rather "preconscious" and "unconscious", respectively. These terms themselves are not introduced until the seventh chapter of the book, until which his system of dream interpretation is incrementally constructed and argued.

Freud further claimed that the counterintuitive nature of nightmares represented a clash between the super-ego and the id: the id wishes to see a past wish fulfilled, while the super-ego cannot allow it; he interprets the anxiety of a nightmare as the super-ego working against the id. (He further claimed that in nearly all cases these anxious dreams are products of infantile, sexual memories.)

According to this, your Id clashes with your conscious SuperEgo functions (3rd+4th), this seems bizarre, because they are shared Quadra values (maybe the clash arises because they are not Ego + SuperId functions.

It seems that your Ego\Persona + Id have the same gender as you, and your SuperEgo + SuperId have the opposite (I'm going to have to sleep on this ).

[Angel von Himmel]

Woah! I think I am going to have to go look over that stuff ... rather ... interesting.