Avery Alexander
English III
Mr. Tarr
26 April 2015
Dreams
Throughout our dreaming experience, we feel different sensations, emotions, and thoughts interpreted through images in a person’s mind. During our unconscious process, the meanings of our inner thoughts are experienced through dreams. Some psychologists believe dreams are connected to our real emotions and others may see dreams as a specific meaning related to one’s life (Young). Dreams can put us in touch with our real motives in life due to the connection they have to reality, but other opinions are believed to be that dreams are simply processing memories letting go of emotional thoughts throughout your day (Hamilton-Parker).
For hundreds of years, people have been questioning why they are dreaming what they are. Dreams incorporate deeper meanings and past experiences to express the information in the form of visual images. Through the process of dreaming and imagining, we as humans have the ability to experience the world and use our mind to explore our imagination (Berman). Dreaming is a way to stabilize our thought process and cleanse the mind. We discover that every aspect in a dream is manifesting itself in some way in our everyday lives (Springett).
There are many different theories evaluating the meaning of our dreams and how they are generated. In the 1900’s Sigmund Freud developed a way to interpret our dreams through a process of understanding symbols that appear in our dreams (Young). He explained
A dream is a succession of images, ideas, emotions, and sensations that usually occur involuntary in the mind during certain stages of sleep. Dreams can mean anything. They can mean something for anybody, someone else, or just imagination. What a person dreams in life is usually different than sleeping dreams. Shakespeare’s play, “Midsummer Night’s Dream” is represented of dreams in historical and modern theories.
A dream is a sequence of pictures, ideas, emotions, and sensations which is mainly based on the events which you have experienced at the same day or the events from the past and the contents of the dreams are not completely understood. And don’t forget to go through some of the interesting and unknown facts about dreams. So moving on, everyone have noticed this I
Why do we dream? What do our dreams mean? Dreams are a sequence of images, ideas, and feelings that involuntarily occur most commonly during the REM stage of sleep. They come in a wide variety of types, from the peculiar to the downright terrifying; the dreamer has no control over what they experience in their dreams. Though neurologists have been studying the human brain for decades, we still don’t fully know why we dream or what their significance is. Some psychologists theorize that dreams are closely linked to our subconscious mind, expressing our deepest fears or desires, allowing us to be what we cannot be. Others believe that dreams serve no function at all and are simply our imaginations running wild. In the words of Sigmund Freud, the founding father of psychoanalysis, “The dream is the liberation of the spirit from the pressure of external nature, a detachment of the soul from the fetters of matter.” (The Interpretation of Dreams)
Dreams have long fascinated the human race. This alternate reality, separate from the conscious world we see around us, has captured the interest of many people throughout history. In fact, mankind has been studying dreams since the invention of the written word. Perhaps the lure of dreams is that there seems to be some significance behind them. Most reject the idea that dreams are just random meaningless fragments of data. The vivid sensations that dreams create are just too powerful to ignore. The world of dreams is filled with peculiar phenomenon and unexpected events that beg our attention. Consider the following example of a dream:
When looking into the meanings of dreams, a variation of things can be found. Most people believe that dreams are a reflection of people’s inner thoughts and feelings. Most of these feelings are too private to be expressed in the real world and that is why they are expressed in a fantasy type way through dreams.
Dreams are scenarios your mind creates which represents who you truly are, were and are destined to be. You 're mind creates illusions that either further enhance your knowledge on what your purpose in life is or could make you fear it. Dreams are essentially part of the foundation of a persons life. Rudolfo Anaya in the novel Bless me ultima uses the concept of dreams to demonstrate the growth and the loss of innocence Antonio faces from beginning to end.
To many people, dreams are the thoughts that occur while sleeping, having almost mystic qualities. For millennia the significance of dreams has escaped even the brightest of philosophers and intellectuals. Many people have speculated about why people dream and what meanings the dreams have but in recent times two theories have gained credibility in answering those questions. The first theory is Sigmund Freuds and the other is known as the cognitive theory of dreams also known as biological determinism.
Everyone in the world has had at least one dream in their lifetime. Most people do not think much about the dreams that they have, unless they are recurring. Dreaming is “a series of images, ideas, emotions, and sensations occurring involuntarily in the mind during REM sleep.” Most people today wake up from a dream or nightmare saying, “thank god that was a dream,” or “too bad that was just a dream.” Many times these dreams or nightmares have more meaning than we may think. If people took more time to consider the meaning behind the dreams they have, then dream interpretation could be used as a means to help resolve issues in our awaken lives, including helping to
Sigmund Freud, the inventor of psychoanalysis, once said that “most dreams are a sort of way for the unconscious mind to express its desire” (Freud). Sigmund Freud thought as dreams to be an idea that people strive for in life or the answer to a problem. He also concluded that dreams are “the fulfilment of a wish” (Freud). Freud thought as a dream to be something that people desire in life, or want to conquer in life. To him, dreams were something that could fulfill one’s life. However, Freud also noticed “punishment dreams and anxiety dreams” (Freud). Instead of these dreams doing something good for a person, they could be doing the opposite. Overall, one belief is that dreams can complete peoples lives, or deteriorate lives.
“The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams” (Roosevelt n.p.). One’s ambitions and dreams can indeed be very beautiful things. If one has ever drifted into a deep sleep wondering into a colorful world that defies all logic, then one has probably wondered where one’s dreams come from. Most everyone has woken up and wondered what in the world caused them to dream about that one specific thing or person. It is important to know what causes people to have dreams in order for one to be able to understand what one thinks about, to help one realize one’s desires and a person’s ambitions, and to aid one in processing events that have taken place in a day.
I believe that dreams can have meaning but not all dream do. Just as Freud had cautioned sometimes, "A cigar is just a cigar." Some dreams seem as they did not relate to day-to-day life, problems or conflict, or desires. Nonetheless, in my experience I have had dreams that very strongly really to my normal cognitive thought process, as well as, my problems and conflict.
Oprah Winfrey once said, “The best thing about dreams is that fleeting moment, when you are between asleep and awake, when you don't know the difference between reality and fantasy, when for just that one moment you feel with your entire soul that the dream is reality, and it really happened.” But, what actually is a dream and what do dreams really have to do with one’s everyday life? In essence, a dream is a series of mental images and emotions occurring during slumber. Dreams can also deal with one’s personal aspirations, goals, ambitions, and even one’s emotions, such as love and hardship. However, dreams can also give rise to uneasy and terrible emotions; these dreams are essentially known as nightmares. In today’s society, the concept
“Dreams are a series of images, ideas, emotions, and sensations occurring involuntarily in the mind during certain stages of sleep.” This is the true definition of what dreams are according to Free Dictionary.com. Although many people are unaware of how dreams actually work there are two psychologists that have been able to pinpoint the true meaning of dreams. These two men are Carl Jung and Sigmund Freud. There are many different perceptions on how people dream, what dreams mean, and why people dream.
Dreams have been around as long as the first civilization came to be and have been a normal part of human existence. One third of your life is spent sleeping, and of that third, on average you will have spent a total of about six years of it dreaming. Most people dream on average two hours every night, but you can have anywhere from four to seven dreams in one night. According to research, the most common setting for a dream is in your own house. In our dreams we can do anything we want and be whoever we want to be. Our dreams are an escape from reality. While we dream we are unable to control our actions and choose our surroundings. We let our minds take over. Sometimes dreams can be understood in the context of repressed thoughts. Dreaming serves as an outlet for those thoughts and impulses we repress during the day. When we go to sleep at night and slip into our dream state, we feel liberated and behave in a manner that we do not allow ourselves to in our everyday life. Visions and ides can come from your dreams. Often, authors, screenwriters, and even poets turn to their dreams for inspiration. The think quest oracle library goes on to tell about the most well-known of the modern dream
Dreams are “hallucinations of the sleeping mind” (Loftus & Ketcham). Dreams can be very vivid, loud, and even emotional. This is why it is easy to confuse them with reality. Dreams are kind of like taking all of a person’s wishes and emotions and putting them all in a little “shadow world” (Bynum) when they go to sleep at night. “What is common in all these dreams is obvious. They completely satisfy wishes excited during the day which remain unrealized. They are simply and undisguisedly realizations of wishes.” (Freud). A person may be experiencing an emotion or wishing for something without even realizing it at all. Dreams can sometimes show a person how they are truly feeling without even their own awareness of these feelings or wishes. A lot of a person’s reality and emotions are used in their dreams, however, this is not always the case. Dreams can also be extremely bizarre, confusing, and even repetitive. This is where the interpretation of dreams comes into action. Many people find it hard to believe that when they have a dream over and over again that it does not mean anything. These types of dreams are called recurring dreams. Recurring dreams happen