An abstract visual of dream interpretation, symbolizing the connection between the conscious and unconscious mind in decoding dream meanings.

A dream can be about a current situation, a persistent past concern, an emerging future issue—or a combination of these. For example, a dream may deal with anxiety regarding a new job, guilt about an event that occurred during one’s adolescence, or a spouse's future retirement.

The Frame of Mind for Dream Interpretation

The best way to understand a dream is to try to avoid any prejudgments about it. We should approach it from a naive standpoint with no assumptions about what it might mean. As Jung (1960) put it:

"So difficult is it to understand a dream that for a long time I have made it a rule, when someone tells me a dream and asks for my opinion, to say first of all to myself: 'I have no idea what this dream means.' After that I can begin to examine the dream."

Apparently “Meaningless” Dreams

Sometimes we have dreams that involve repeating some everyday task like typing, cleaning, or talking on the phone. They seem so commonplace that we want to dismiss them as too trivial to have any meaning. But for Jung (1954b), even such seemingly innocuous dreams can be fruitfully explored and understood as a comment about the dreamer’s life. He said:

"No amount of skepticism and criticism has yet enabled me to regard dreams as negligible occurrences. Often enough they appear senseless, but it is obviously we who lack the sense and ingenuity to read the enigmatic message from the nocturnal realm of the psyche."

The “Correctness” of Dream Interpretations

Earlier, we discussed the problem of knowing whether one approach to a dream interpretation or another was “correct.” Even interpreters using the same system can come up with different interpretations. Jung, however, did not see this as a serious problem. For him, the final assessment of an interpretation is not an expert’s judgment; rather, the dreamer’s subsequent dreams, behavior, and demeanor will demonstrate the accuracy and relevance of an interpretation. Jung (1966) put it this way:

"If we have made a wrong interpretation, or if it is somehow incomplete, we may be able to see it from the next dream. Thus, for example, the earlier motif will be repeated in clearer form, or our interpretation may be deflated by some ironic paraphrase, or it may meet with straightforward violent opposition."

For example, a psychotherapist and her client agreed that a dream the client reported indicated that her symptoms were connected with her current fears and anxieties rather than early childhood events. Psychotherapy would therefore focus on her everyday stress and conflict. That night, the client dreamed that she was trying to kill a vampire by stabbing it through the heart with a silver knife. As she raised the knife, the vampire said, "You can’t kill me that way. You must come at me from a different angle!" This dream stimulated a major change in the therapeutic approach, one that proved very fruitful.