The Mysteries of Dreams
The visions that come to us in the night can be so puzzling, informative, frightening, or interesting that virtually every major culture has lent them great significance. Some peoples determined that dreams were caused by demons; others, by divinities. Dreams were explained as memories of the temporarily detached human soul’s wanderings during sleep; as messages from deceased relatives; as pure creative fantasies; even as the mind sorting through recent events during sleep. At least one early culture found that dreams were subconscious “soul” urges brought to the conscious mind during sleep.
What can we make of this welter of conflicting concepts? Perhaps we should begin by examining the nature of human consciousness.
The Two Minds
Mystics throughout the ages have postulated that we possess two minds: the conscious mind, which we use during our daily activities, and the subconscious (or psychic) mind, which is in control during sleep. (Recent theories regarding the separate functions of the brain’s two hemispheres seem to be in harmony with this theory.)
The conscious mind is proficient at adding figures, reading, theorizing, instructing the body to perform exacting tasks, driving, and for other activities. It awakens with us and slips into repose during the night. It is concerned with the material world, with verbal and written communications, financial matters, and other mundane concerns.
Our society places great importance on the conscious mind. By it, we’ve created our civilizations, customs, languages, technological advances, legal systems, and every other aspect of our daily waking lives. Education is largely a matter of training our conscious minds to act in harmony with other conscious minds. The subconscious mind is far more mysterious. It resides within the realm of sleep, dreams, spirituality, psychic awareness and intuition. The psychic mind usually rises from its daily sleep only when we lie still in the night (though hunches may be messages from this realm of consciousness).
When we’re awake, the conscious mind blocks communication with the subconscious mind. It simply doesn’t allow information from the other mind to intrude into our waking life. This is a direct result of many of the teachings that we receive early in life: “Don’t daydream.” “Pay attention.” “Concentrate!” “There’s no such thing as psychic awareness.”
Some individuals are able to utilize their psychic minds during waking hours: psychics, sensitives, mystics, artists, and writers. There can be no doubt that the psychic mind is also at work during spiritual and religious rituals. Still, we’re usually not even aware of its presence—except within our dreams.
Dreams are often perceived to be irrational or fantastic, precisely because they aren’t under the control of the conscious mind. The dream-state is not limited by time or space; it operates within an alternate reality. In our dreams, the dead may appear; we may visit distant places and move through water like a fish or fly like a bird. Freed from all physical laws, the subconscious mind takes us on deeply symbolic journeys.
Symbolism
Symbolism is the language of the subconscious mind. Thus, though we may walk, speak, and perform many other actions in dreams, symbols usually appear as veiled messages. The origin of such symbols may be the subconscious mind itself, psychic impulses received during sleep, even the deity or deities whom we worship.
These dream symbols (rain, circles, numbers, animals, plants, colors, etc.) usually bear important messages or information that would be blocked during wakefulness. All psychologists and mystics are aware of this phenomenon, although they have differing opinions as to the nature of these messages. The interpretation of dreams is largely a matter of examining the symbols that appear within them (see Chapter 14).
Our personal dream languages differ from those we use in everyday communication and thought. Fortunately, they possess their own structures and logic. Each person’s inner being, emotions, spirituality, and personal experience determines the nature of her or his dream symbols. Not all dream symbols are meaningful, but all meaningful dream symbols are direct attempts to speak to our conscious minds.
Types of Dreams
Dreams have been classified in a number of categories. The following sections briefly describe these major categories. Further information may be found in Chapter 14.
Natural Dreams
Natural dreams are also known as wish-fulfillment, fantasy, and entertainment dreams. They bear no deep messages, no hidden meanings, no prophecies of the future. Natural dreams are created by our wishes and hopes. Information derived from movies, television, books, and magazines may also be integrated into natural dreams. Such dreams may be interesting, but they’re of little weight.
Psychic Dreams
One of the most famous American psychic dreams occurred to Abraham Lincoln. One night, asleep in bed, he dreamed of his impending death. Not long after this disturbing incident, he went to the Ford Theater where he was fatally wounded.1
Psychic dreams are those which present information regarding future events from as-yet unexplained sources. These messages aren’t received through any of the five “normal” senses, but through the subconscious (psychic) mind.
Such dreams are quite common among persons of all educational backgrounds, races, and religions. They occur to persons of all ages.
The theory is quite simple: psychic information is received by the subconscious mind during sleep. The mind then translates the information into meaningful symbols, perhaps by constructing a mental image similar to that revealed in the message: a plane crashes; an earthquake jars the house; a friend visits; or a long-awaited letter arrives. Alternately, the message may be received in the form of words spoken by a familiar or unknown person. Psychic dreams are rather rare, but most of us have experienced at least one.
Telepathic Dreams
The possibility of what we would term “telepathic” dreams was expressed by the Greek scientist Democritus, who wrote that dreams could be the result of “emanations” from other persons and objects entering the consciousness during sleep.2 This view is still highly regarded by non-scientists, although it is usually limited to the penetration of other person’s thoughts during sleep. Telepathy (the direct transference of thought between humans) remains a controversial area of study.
Telepathic dreams could, in part, explain psychic dreams. Thought messages received from dying relatives or endangered friends could trigger dreams. Much study remains to be done.
As an aside, some studies have shown that sixty to seventy percent of those who claim to have experienced telepathy stated that they did so in dreams.3
Astral Projection Dreams
Most ancient cultures saw sleep as a period when the human soul was temporarily released from the body. In sleep, the soul wandered, exploring this and other worlds, meeting with deities and with other human souls. This ancient concept is today known as astral projection. Some feel that certain dreams may be the remembrances of unconsciously controlled astral projection. Such dreams are often highly fictitious, for we see what we wish to see in the astral realm.
Divine Dreams
Divine dreams are those that are given by the sleeper’s personal deity (or deities). Dreams have always been linked with spirituality. Sleep is the perfect time for our divinities to make their presence known and to offer comfort or guidance. The doubting mind is stilled. The body is motionless. The subconscious mind is in full operation, and thus can easily receive messages from the divine.
Divinely inspired dreams aren’t merely relics of Pagan religions. Early Christians accepted that “God” could inspire dreams. Origen, St. Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas, and many other early Christian figures wrote that interpreting the future through dreams wasn’t spiritually unlawful, for God instructed humans through dreams. The Bible is filled with accounts of divine dreams.4
Divine dreams could occur on any night, without warning. Some cultures also supported the use of magical/religious rites designed to create divine dreams in times of need. And finally, such dreams could be inspired by sleeping in temples.
Dream Incubation (Sacred Sleep)
Dreams were so highly valued as divine messages that dream temples enjoyed enormous popularity in the ancient world. Egypt, Babylon, Greece, and Rome supported thousands of temples devoted to this art.
Dream incubation (from the Latin: incubare) is a technical term describing the creation of sacred dreams for a specific purpose: healing, advice, glimpses of the future, protection, conception of children, battle plans, and a host of other reasons. Every free citizen of these nations could visit a temple, make an offering (or an animal sacrifice), and spend the night on divine ground. The fortunate awoke in the morning in the possession of a dream from the deity that answered her or his prayers.
The theories underlying the once widespread practice of dream incubation are clear.
The origins of dream incubation (also known as temple sleep and sacred sleep) are unknown. It might have been independently developed in Sumer and Egypt. There can be little doubt that the practice of temple sleep later spread to Babylon and Assyria, then greatly influenced similar practices in Greece and the Roman Empire. Similar forms of dream incubation were in common use among many Native American tribes (see Chapter 7), pre-Christian Hawaiians (Chapter 6), Australian aborigines, and throughout Africa. Dream incubation continues as a structured religious practice in contemporary Japan. Sacred sleep was once a worldwide practice.5
Modern Dream Theories
In 1899, Sigmund Freud published The Interpretation of Dreams, in which he stated that all present pathological mental conditions could be explained by inner sexual conflict and frustration. (He later altered this to include all manners of conflicts and frustrated wishes.) Freud soon realized that one method of unlocking these buried memories was through the analysis of his patients’ dreams.
For years, his book was largely ignored and his theories were dismissed.6 Still, Freud continued and developed psychoanalysis as we know it today.
Scientific research into the nature of dreams was rare until the late 1950s and the early 1960s. Then a group of scientists studying sleep discovered a possible correlation between rapid eye movement (REM) and dreams during sleep. This discovery was widely hailed as the first physiological evidence linking the body with dreams.
However, later studies showed that the correlation between REM and dreams was insignificant. By awakening patients in both REM and non-REM states, researchers discovered that dreams could occur at many points in sleep: REM wasn’t necessary for the production of dreams.7
Studies continued. Theories were advanced regarding the nature of dreams (usually divorced from physiological factors). Among the currently accepted theories are: dreams represent the assimilation of anxieties; they are nighttime struggles to overcome problems; dreams depict the integration of new information (from books, newspapers, television, movies); or are methods by which the mind releases useless information.8
1. MacKenzie, Dreams and Dreaming, p. 10.
2. Ibid., p. 47.
3. Domhoff, The Mystique of Dreams, p. 2.
4. MacKenzie, op. cit., p. 68.
5. Ibid., p. 43.
6. Evans, Landscapes of the Night, p. 76.
7. Domhoff, op. cit., p. 103. For a fascinating survey of the findings of contemporary dream researchers, see Domhoff, Chapter 6.
8. Ibid., p. 97.