Shamans have a special relationship with the dreamworld, and through dreams are
able to look into the future, communicate with spirits, and clarify the meaning of
other’s dreams.
In 1900, Sigmund Freud wrote The Interpretation of Dreams and proposed that dream-
ing might represent a unique avenue by which unconscious motivation could be
explored. Freud’s theory was that dreams were disguised wish fulfillments of infan-
tile sexual needs, which were repressed by censors in the waking mind. Freud’s pro-
tege, Carl Jung, believed that humans were spiritual rather than instinctual and saw
dreams as a compensatory mechanism with the function of restoring psychological
balance. Jung said that the conscious and unconscious minds speak entirely differ-
ent languages. The conscious mind is analytical, critical, and rational while the
unconscious mind thinks metaphorically, in similes, symbols, and intuitively.
In a society that discounted dreams, Sigmund Freud introduced the concept of thera-
peutic dreamwork. He and his followers, however, began to associate dreams with
illness rather than wellness, and reserved dream interpretation for professionals,
who were deemed the only people competent to understand the latent content of
dreams. This approach said, in effect, that individuals were not the experts on their
own dreams. In contrast, Carl Jung stated that he “avoided all theoretical points of
view and simply helped the patients to understand the dream-images by themselves,
without application of rules and theories. .... That is how dreams are intended.”
Many contemporary therapists believe that dreams belong to individuals and they
are the final authority on the meaning of their own dreams. This viewpoint is not to
minimize the fact that the meaning of many dreams is obscure and that other peo-
ple may be able to help unlock hidden meaning.
Dr. Nathaniel Kleitman is considered to be the father of modern scientific dream
research. In 1957, he and Eugene Aserinsky identified rapid eye movement (REM),
demonstrating the activity of the brain during sleep. This active sleep stage has con-
sequently been called REM sleep. Today hundreds of sleep clinics operate in the
United States, and sleep disorders constitute the second most common health com-
plaint after the common cold.
How Does Dreaming Work?
At any point during sleep, our sleep can be characterized as either quiet or active
changes in brain waves. Eye movements, muscle tone, and the presence of dreams
are used to define the two states. The quiet state is divided into three stages. Stage
one is the transitional state between drowsy wakefulness and light sleep. Trans-
itional sleep can be characterized as slow drifting eye movements and vivid, brief
dream images. Stage two is genuine sleep and is characterized by unique patterns
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