What's in a Dream?

I've been having some weird dreams lately. So much so that I (ironically) wanted to try to find some solace in psychoanalysis. Specifically the granddaddy of it all - Freud.

I figure, while I'm in Vienna, who better to turn to? Of course, many of Freud's theories have (rightly) fallen out of favor; but, many of his discoveries on sleep patterns and hypotheses of how dreams come to be are still the mainstay for psychiatrists and dream interpreters.

The interesting thing about Die Traumdeutung is that, with little more than a hunch, Freud's theories on dreaming ended up being proven in clinical trials - for example, dreaming in sequential order; the idea that a person cannot invent new faces, but uses faces that already exist for "dream people" be they familiars or strangers; colors and objects as symbols rather than literal. Though Freud did have a penchant toward interpreting things phallically.

Freud was also the first to point out that mere seconds elapse during a dream. The feeling we often have of a dream (especially a nightmare) going on forever is, simply put, an illusion. It only feels like hours - or days, or weeks - have passed. Most dreams do not last more than one minute, though they can be linked in our subconscious, which is why in your dreams you may be sitting on a bus in one instance and be "magically" transported to the beach in another. Although dreams do have a beginning and an end, the brain does not make the distinction.

Lucid dreams happen when the dreamer realizes, or remembers, that he or she is dreaming. I often have dreams of this type, and, according to this website (also where I got the lovely photo at the beginning), that means I am highly evolved. That's kind of neat!

Although the text of Die Traumdeutung is sort of a snore (pun intended), it is good to remember that Freud was writing for the 19th century science crowd - most anyone picking up his book during his lifetime would have been a fellow doctor. Thus, the language is a bit outdated, cumbersome and - ahem - Austrian. That is, more convoluted than it has to be. Still, I hope to find new insight into my subconscious self, now that I know the theory behind it.