Rev. Geoff Nelson, DMin

Dreaming in Church

This paper presentation will report on the project of conducting four dream groups over a year-long period in four churches in Southern California: three Presbyterian Churches and one Unitarian-Universalist church. The method for setting up the groups and the process that each group went through will be discussed. The topics of dream, group, and church will all be covered. Four elements of using dreams in spiritual life will be explored briefly, showing the particular benefits that can come to spiritual life as well as some benefits for the non-religious person as well. The dynamics of working with dreams in a group will be discussed, with special emphasis upon those aspects of the Reformed tradition within Christianity that are applicable to dream groups. The relevance for the Christian Church will be seen in discussing the need for spiritual renewal within the church and the way that dreams can aid that renewal. Dreams speak the same language of image and symbol that religion does, in its sacred texts and its liturgical activities. We have a rich heritage in the Bible and in parts of our Christian history that has valued dreams. Alas, for much of the past several centuries, dreams have not had much of a valued place in the faith practices of Christians. I hope that the current dream work movement, of which IASD has a great role, will make a change in that direction, both in the spiritual lives of individuals, as well as congregations and the Christian Church as a whole. The results of this study project will be discussed, covering the educational component that was added to each meeting and the re sponses of the participants. Some observations of the leader will be included as well as some possible future directions that this work can take. In an expansion of the theme of this conference, Dreams Without Borders, there will be some discussion of the applicability of this work for Christian Churches wherever they might be found.

 

Rev. Geoff Nelson, DMin

Dreaming with Martin Luther & John Calvin

Martin Luther and John Calvin were the major figures of the Protestant Reformation in 16^th-Century Europe. They changed the direction of the Christian faith from then until this day. Their attitude toward dreams, though not a major part of their theological thinking, can be helpful for us as we work with dreams in our day. The principles they use to consider dreams are not greatly different from some of the principles used today among members of IASD. There may be some surprises for us as we examine their comments upon the dream texts of the Bible. The Bible contains several dream stories and this presentation looks at the comments of Luther and Calvin upon these Bible texts. We can gain some insight from their comments and move forward in our work using dreams in our spiritual lives, whether we are inside or outside of the Christian Church. Luther and Calvin remain major influences upon those Christian denominations descended from them, Lutheranism and the Reformed family of churches. Protestantism became the dominant form of Christianity in the USA. The attitude towards dreams of these two major figures continues to influence major segments of Christianity. Increased knowledge about Luther 's and Calvin 's perspectives on dreams can help those in the dream movement spread the news and excitement about dreams and using dreams in our personal spiritual lives. We will also see some of the characteristics of Luther 's and Calvin 's personalities and styles of thinking as we look at their comments on the dream texts of the Bible.

 

Tore Nielsen, PhD

Normal and Pathological Dreaming: Current Research from the Montreal Dream & Nightmare Laboratory

Dr. Nielsen will speak about the latest research findings from his dream laboratory dealing with both normal and disturbed dreaming. Some of these studies include: the effects of virtual reality exposure on dreaming; tests of an emotion-regulation function of dreaming; the epidemiology of bad dreams in preschoolers; the pathophysiology of nightmares in adults; and the Baby-in-Bed (BIB) nightmares of new mothers.

 

Tore Nielsen, PhD

Interactivity in a Virtual Maze Task Produces Day-Residue and Dream-Lag Incorporation Effects

Introduction. Several studies indicate that waking-state experiences can influence dream content on the subsequent night (day-residue effect) and about a week later (dream-lag effect). Using a 3D maze task, we studied how a spatial stimulus influenced both of these effects by varying the stimulus attributes of interactivity (active, passive) and visual display (virtual reality: VR, wide-screen television: TV).

Methods. 57 healthy subjects (45W, 12M; 24.53.25 yrs) were randomly assigned to 1 of four 20-min 3D maze tasks: 1) VR-Act (n=15): wore VR goggles and interacted with the maze; 2) VR-Pas (n=14): wore VR goggles and passively viewed maze movements; 3) TV-Act (n=15): watched TV and interacted with maze (via mouse); 4) TV-Pas (n=13): watched TV and passively viewed maze movements. Subjects then rated task-related sense of presence and cybersickness and, for 14 days, wrote out their dreams and rated each (on 9-pt scales) for degree of reference to any maze elements. To maximize N, dream scores were averaged over successive pairs of days, producing 7 post-maze time periods per subject: D1-2, D3-4, D5-6, D7-8, D9-10, D11-12 and D13-14. A grand mean was also calculated (D1-14). 2 X 2 ANOVAs (interactivity X display type) were used to assess changes in maze references by condition; polynomial curve-fitting was used to assess fluctuations in references over time.

Results. An interactivity effect (F1,53=3.9493, p=0.052) revealed higher D1-14 scores for Active (M=2.101.42) than for Passive (M=1.500.64) groups. Bimodal polynomials with approximate circaseptan morphology fit quite well to both VR-Act (3rd-order; R²=.989) and TV-Act (4th-order; R²=.962) groups. VR-Act peaks were D1-2 and D9-10; TV-Act peaks were D3-4 and D11-12. Lagged cross-correlation between the two curves (r=.566, p<.05) suggested a 1-day delay of the entire circaseptan process for TV-Act. The TV-Act group was also associated with more cybersickness symptoms (p<.07). Day-residues (D1-2), but not dream-lags, were found for both VR-Pas and TV-Pas groups.

Conclusion. Interactivity in a spatial maze task facilitates delayed dream incorporations with an approximate circaseptan morphology. This bimodal profile may reflect two steps in the hippocampus-mediated consolidation of new spatial memories. Analyses of dream content (see companion abstracts: Popova, et al.; Levrier, et al.) suggest that the same maze-specific memory elements are being processed at the two time points whereas some general content features (e.g., increase in dreamed groups) may be activated in the delayed condition. Results also suggest that under some conditions (in this case, over-stimulation sufficient to produce cyber-sickness symptoms in the TV-act group) a 1-day phase delay may be introduced into the complete circaseptan process. The memory implications for such an effect remain unknown but might be related to hippocampal function. For example, in mice acute stress produces a transient 1-2 day suppression of LTP induction and performance on hippocampally-mediated tasks (Garcia, Musleh, Tocco, Thompson, & Baudry, 1997).

Garcia R, Musleh W, Tocco G, Thompson RF, Baudry M. "Time-dependent blockade of STP and LTP in hippocampal slices following acute stress in mice." Neuroscience Letters 1997;233:41-44.

Supported by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada

 

James F. Pagel, MS, MD

Dreaming While Awake

Dreaming consciousness is both similar to and different from waking. Researchers focusing on variations occurring in brain and mind during sleep tend to view waking consciousness as a state independent of sleep and dream. Yet waking is not an undifferentiated state. It is an extremely variable state, and because of that variability, in some ways more difficult to study than states associated with sleep. Creative associative thought, meditation, psychiatric and drug-induced dissociative states, and daydreaming occur during waking. These states share many characteristics with dreams that occur during sleep.

Milosiva Karamova has recently published data on the differences and similarities between dreaming and waking thought. The differences appear greatest between focused waking and dream thought, while the types of thought occurring during creative thinking are difficult to distinguish from those of sleep-associated dreams. Ross Levin (2007) working with Tore Nielsen has presented the evidence that a primary function of dreaming is in the integration of waking emotional experience. In waking, the creative individual can utilize this same system in creative process, a state dreamlike in its patterns of thought, disorientation to time and place, and alternative focus.

Known behavioral changes do occur across the waking day that can be detected using psychological tests of short-term memory, cognitive performance and subjective alertness. It is postulated that these changes in waking thought occur as physiological brain functioning changes secondary to variations in circadian, sleep, or ultradian (REMS) cycles. The effects of these cycles on sleep are well described and during the day these biological cycles affect waking as well. Ernest Hartmann as early as 1966 argued that REMS-cycling persists into waking affecting thought, alertness and the tendency to enter dream-like states. Recent research has emphasized how waking behavior is affected by both sleep need and circadian rhythms, tending to ignore evidence suggesting how such ninety-minute REMS ultradian cycling is likely to affect waking.

Recent work (Pagel 2008) suggests that during napping REMS dream recall is maintained across the waking day as would be expected if ultradian REMS cycling occurred, affecting waking consciousness as well as sleep. This work, based on dream recall during Multiple Sleep Latency Testing in the sleep laboratory, also indicates that NREMS dream recall declines across the day. This finding indicates that the recall of dreams from naps during waking is affected by different variables depending on the sleep stage from which the dream is recalled. Increasing sleep need and circadian rhythm affect NREM dream recall while having little effect on REMS dreaming.

Historically, dream-like states occurring during waking have been used in attempts to better understand dreaming. In the last few years, cognitive scientists have been able to clarify at least some of the variables affecting dreaming during sleep. This presentation demonstrates that knowledge of dreaming during sleep can help us better understand at least some of the dreamlike states of waking consciousness.

 

James F. Pagel, MS/MD

Creating Artificial Dreams

There are clear brain-based correlates for many areas of cognition. The experience of dreamingincludes visualimagery, emotions, and memories. The visual components of dream can be artificially created in the process of filmmaking. Filmmakers can create artificial constructsof these systems that have more capabilities than biological systems. Dreaming likely utilizes the same neuroprocessing systems used for these processes in waking. One way of approaching filmis as a projected dream. Films have the potential to affectthe same biological systems of imagery, emotion and personal memory involved in the actual experience of dreaming.

The process of imagery has been described as a cinematographic operative series that includes the following:

1) Picture - develop your pattern and configuration map of the image

2) Find - use attention to shift image properties and coordinate patterns

3) Put - focus on the description and relationship of a part to the whole image

4) Image - establish object names, size, location, orientation and level of detail

5) Resolution and re-generation - delineate the comparative detail of this image

6) Look-for - integrate relevant memories

7) Scan, zoom, pan and rotate - your presence, your operative attention in the image

8) Answer-if - Do properties associated with the image answer an already developedcognitive search parameter (Kosslyn 1994).

This imagery operative cascade is at least a partial descriptive paradigm of the cognitive process involved in the process of imagery -visual processing occurring without actual perceptual input. This is the reduction of imaginative seeing  to a brain-based operative cascade. Such an approach does parody in some ways the visual experimentation of the impressionist and post-impressionist artists. It was Picasso that stated, It would be interesting to preserve photographically &the metamorphosis of a picture. Possibly one might then discover the path followed by the brain in materializing a dream.  (Ler, F., Fonctions de la peinture, Gothier, Paris, 1938).

PROPOSAL

Film a series of scenes based on a step-wise application of the above-described cinematographic operative cascade. Repeat operative series wi th the addition of other layers of cognitive processing - first emotion, then memory. Discuss how the resultant film imagery is both like and unlike a dream.

Scene 1 - Operative cascade of items

Scene 2 - Operative cascade of items with verbal and/or musical addition of emotional in-put.

Scene 3 - Operative cascade of items with a verbal description of an applied (preferably frightening) memory.

 

Wendy Pannier, with Tallulah Lyons

New Developments in Dream Work with Cancer Patients: An IASD Project

This presentation will discuss new developments in the IASD Dream Work with Cancer Patients Project, which was started by Tallulah Lyons and Wendy Pannier in 2005. Today, four additional IASD members are helping expand the work in cancer centers across the country.

Dream work is one of the oldest healing traditions, yet dream work as an integrative medicine practice is virtually unknown. Our work is demonstrating not only the benefits of dream work, but how using dream imagery can enhance other accepted integrative medicine practices such as support groups, specialized exercise programs, yoga, tai chi, meditation, guided imagery, art therapy, Chinese medicine and even nutrition.

Basic components of the project include a three-hour workshop, The Healing Power of Dreams and Nightmares,  and ongoing dream groups. Work with dream imagery falls into two primary categories: 1) facilitating the evolution/transformation of disturbing dream experiences (e.g., those from nightmares); and 2) facilitating the integration of the evolved positive imagery and also the integration of positive imagery from spontaneous healing dreams. Participants are encouraged to embody and integrate their personal dream imagery through relaxation and meditative visualization techniques.

Psychoneuroimmunology (PNI) research has confirmed the impact of the mind and emotions on the immune system, and also provide s evidence for the role of dreams in healing. Biophysics and physiology researcher Candace Pert discovered neuropeptides, which she calls the molecules of emotion,  that connect all systems of the body including the immune system. At the level of neuropeptides, the body and mind are neurologically connected. Every emotional state involves the release of neuropeptides and other biochemical messengers. Our emotions are thus connected to our physiology. Pert emphasizes that for maximum functioning of the immune system, it is important to free blocked emotions and to find constructive expression for all emotions.

Dream work is a process for achieving that goal and pairs well with other integrative medicine practices. As our dream work project expands, our growing data reveal that dream work does indeed bring about: 1) decreased feelings of anxiety and stress; 2) an increased sense of connection to others; 3) an increased sense of connection to inner resources; 4) increased understanding of healing at multiple levels; 5) an increased quality of life - particularly emotional, social and spiritual; 6) increased feelings of control over life and health issues; 7) increased feelings of hope; and 8) an understanding of how to live fully now, despite cancer. Research shows that each of these conditions impacts physiology in positive ways.

Our new course for health-care professionals teaches basic dream work principles and ethics, providing questions and techniques they can use with patients during limited interactions. Through case studies they learn how dreams can show where patients are at dis-ease in their lives and how dreams can point the way to everything from diagnosis and choice of treatment to nutrition and lifestyle changes. Since patients are usually in treatment over a period of months, health care professionals will have the opportunity to observe how the evolving dream imagery of patients corresponds to the transformation of emotions, attitudes and health.

 

Wendy Pannier, with Tallulah Lyons

Tapping the Healing Potential of Dream Imagery

This presentation will be based on the work that Tallulah Lyons and Wendy Pannier do with cancer patients through their workshops and ongoing dream groups. The work is relevant to anyone interested in the healing potential of dreams and how dream work can be used with other forms of integrative medicine.

Work with dream imagery falls into two primary categories: 1) facilitating the evolution/transformation of disturbing dream experience (e.g., those from nightmares); and 2) facilitating the integration of the evolved positive imagery and also the integration of positive imagery from spontaneous healing dreams. Participants are encouraged to embody and integrate their personal dream imagery through a variety of relaxation and meditative visualization techniques.

Psychoneuroimmunology (PNI) research has confirmed the impact of the mind and emotions on the immune system, and also provides evidence for the role of dreams in healing. Biophysics and physiology researcher Candace Pert discovered neuropeptides, which she calls the molecules of emotion,  that connect all systems of the body including the immune system. At the level of neuropeptides, the body and mind are neurologically connected. Every emotional state involves the release of neuropeptides and other biochemical messengers. Our emotions are thus connected to our physiology. Pert emphasizes that for maximum functioning of the immune system, it is important to free blocked emotions and to find constructive expression for all emotions.

Dream work is a process for achieving that goal and pairs well with other integrative medicine practices.

 

Dr. Krijn Pansters

Dreams in Late-Medieval Franciscan Literature

Reading the oldest biographies of St. Francis, one notices the significant part that dreams play in his life. Again and again, they appear during crucial stages of his life. This fact has encouraged us to pay special interest to St. Francis ' dreams, but not in the strict sense of the word. With theologian Bertulf van Leeuwen, we are convinced that all situations in which St. Francis gains clarity of his life and grows spiritually through images (dreams, visions, parables) have to be included. St. Francis was a man of images, and the language of these images has to be understood to be able to understand the dreams of this saint, and the medieval interpretation of dreams in general.

 

Tyna Paquette, MSc with Tore Nielsen, PhD; Ani Popova, Katia Levrier, Christine Brochu, Kieran Fox

Dreams of Adult Nightmare Sufferers Are More Anxious and Inhibited

Background: Nightmare (NM) sufferers often retrospectively report poor sleep quality and dreams that have negative affect or outcomes which ultimately cause arousals. However, prospective and qualitative evaluations of their dreams in relation to the dreams of people free of nightmares (CTL) are lacking.

Objectives: This study set out to evaluate the quality of sleep and dreams in the home setting prior to the laboratory visit. It was predicted that NM subjects would report poorer sleep quality, recall more dreams, and recall more negative dream content than would CTL subjects.

Methods: NM sufferers ("e1/wk for 6 months) (n=18) and adults free of NMs (<1/mo) (n=15) were recruited by advertisements and word of mouth. They did not differ in age (NM: 30.210.5; CTL: 26.15.8; p=0.19) or gender (NM: 5M, 13F; CTL: 3M; 12F; p=0.70). They completed home diaries from 4-14 days prior to sleeping in the lab. They daily answered standardized questions about sleep (how well, #wake-ups, how rested they felt) and dreams (recall, vividness, emotional valence, anxiety, personal impact, ineffectuality/inhibition), each on scales from 0 to 9 (0=being no recall, 1=not at all to 9=extremely). Subjects then filled out questionnaires (including Spielberger state-anxiety) and slept 3 consecutive nights in the lab with dream sampling (not presented here). Diary days with no recall were eliminated, and scores were prorated to a standard of 1 week for each subject. Variables were compared using t-tests when normally distributed; Mann-Whitney tests were used otherwise.

Results: NM subjects had higher state anxiety (37.6512.73) than did CTL subjects (27.933.85; p=0.010). NMs subjects reported that they slept more poorly (NM: 4.701.89 vs CTL: 6.541.40; p=.0037), tended to wake-up more often (NM: 2.001.00 vs CTL: 1.481.33; p=.086) and woke up feeling less rested than did CTL subjects (NM: 3.931.96 vs. CTL: 5.751.55; p=.018). Groups did not differ in their level of dream recall: NM subjects recalled an average of 5.691.11 dreams/wk and CTL subjects 4.891.54 (p=0.148). Groups also did not differ in how clearly dreams were recalled (p=.371), their vividness (p=.823), their emotional valence (p=.270) and their personal impact (p=.814). The only dream variables that differentiated groups were dream anxiety and ineffectiveness/inhibition of dreamed actions. NM subjects had more anxious dreams (4.541.96) than CTL subjects (2.291.31; p=.0029) and felt more ineffective/inhibited in their dreams (3.941.80) than did CTL subjects (2.081.62; p=.0036; z=-2.910; Mann-Whitney test).

Conclusions: Prospective measures confirm NM subjects ' complaints of poor sleep and dreams. However, they also suggest that NM sufferers possess a basic disturbance in the content of their everyday dreams and not in the recall or vividness of their dreams. That disturbance, while needing more study, implicates an increase in dream anxiety (but not in general dream negativity) and in the ineffectuality/inhibition of dream actions. The disturbance mirrors the elevated state anxiety shown by NM sufferers and raises the possibility that ineffectuality/inhibition may be an important component of the waking psychopathology of NM sufferers as well.

Supported by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada.

 

Cynthia Pearson

A Review of Precognitive Dream Studies Conducted Over 17 Years: Comments and Observations

In 1989, Dr. Marcia Emery published an article in Dream Network Bulletin on "Programming the Precognitive Dream." It described how volunteers had been provided with incubation instructions to dream of a future cover of Newsweek magazine, with intriguing results. I decided to adapt Dr. Emery's procedure for use with the dream awareness class I was teaching at the time. The results were so exciting to my students and myself that I decided to try it with larger populations. My first-ever presentation at an IASD conference, "A Public Experiment in Precognitive Dreaming," recounted the results of inviting some 50 bookstore customers to try to dream ahead of time of the front page of the local Sunday paper. The results were provocative, and engendered a series of such studies held throughout the 1990s. I learned from each experience and made adjustments, moving from the classroom to a newspaper audience and eventually to the Internet.

The newspaper-as-target approach was changed when the first Psiber Dreaming Conference was held in 2002. (Although it would seem that a newspaper 's front page should be impossible to predict days ahead of time, that proved to be not always the case.) I decided to provide a single image as a target for Precognitive Dream Contest, which would lead to a target selection process that has been refined over time. Working with partners on the conte st over the last 6 years including Robert Waggoner, Ed Kellogg and Beverly D'Urso -led to exciting and sometimes passionate discussions as we weighed the process and its outcomes. The contests have provided a kind of lab in which we have been able to benefit from feedback from our dreamers, make adjustments to the process, and speculate on how we might refine the process in the future.

In reviewing 17 years of experience, this presentation will cover:

•  making sure we're studying precognitive, rather than telepathic, dreaming;
•  seeking target pictures that are both dramatic and appropriate;
•  addressing the challenges presented by judging the entries; and,
•  discovering "surprise hits," i.e., dreams found to be precognitive, but of something other than the target.

   

   

Cynthia Pearson with Marcia Emery, David Kahn, Art Funkhouser, Ernest Hartmann and Bob Van de Castle

Recording Dreams as We Age: A Long-Term Journal-Keeping Panel

When the first panel on long-term journal keeping met at ASD-13, chair Dennis Schmidt noted: ". . . In the tradition of the naturalists whose patient observations prepared the ways to elegant understandings of physics, chemistry, and biology, home journal keepers record and discover events and regularities that astonish and enlighten &the personal journal is a uniquely sensitive instrument that may enlighten not only the individual dreamer but the whole field of dream study."

Since then, journalers have met at every IASD conference to discuss long-term record-keeping and continue our cross-fertilization. In 2008, the theme will be "Recording Our Dreams as We Age," a subject that excited a great deal of response when it erupted on the IASD board's list serve. Wit h this panel, we hope not only to stress the importance of journal-keeping , but also to promote and foster it throughout the life span.

In "Changes in the Aging Brain," David Kahn will review pertinent research, including the changes that occur in the normal aging brain. Recently, diffusion tensor brain imaging has shown that there is a large-scale reduction in communication between front and back regions of the aging brain. Does this normal change affect our dreaming as we age If so, how It is also interesting to speculate on the reduction in communication between front and back regions of the brain during dreaming in general.

Ernest Hartmann will discuss changes in his own dreaming over the years. He will also present the results of a survey he is doing of frequent dream recallers -- including especially dream journalers and other members of IASD aged 50 and over.

 In "An Octogenarian's Observations about Personal Experiences with Dreaming Over His Life Span," Robert Van de Castle will report on reviewing his personal transcripts (from laboratory awakenings in 4 different sleep laboratories) as well as his personal dream journals to learn whether his dream recall has changed over a period of 4 decades. Some observations about dream content over 30 years of journaling will also be presented.

 In "Dreams and Aging," Art Funkhouser will cite research showing how the themes of our dreams, along with daily concerns, change with age: fewer nightmares; less frequent aggressive dreams; a shorter average length of dreams; and, less frequent dream recall. But while the latter two can be partly explained by the fact that memory no longer functions as well as it used to, the largest drop-off in dream recall occurs at a relatively young age, suggesting that other factors must be involved.

 Once a prolific dreamer of primarily precognitive dreams, Marcia Emery has found herself struggling to reel in even fragments from the dreaming pool. In her presentation, "Cracking the Case of the Disappearing Dreamlife," she will share her thoughts on what has caused this deficit and what she has been learning about how to hook her dreams again.

Cynthia Pearson will moderate the panel and facilitate discussion with audience members following the presentations.

 

Maria Silvia Costa Pessoa, PhD candidate

Dreams and the Symbolic Process in Brief Couple Therapy - A Jungian Approach

This study focuses on the use of dreams as an effective tool of symbolic intervention when working with conjugal conflicts, through analyzing the oneiric contents. Dreams as a revealing instrument and the voice of the unconscious favor an understanding of the dynamic developed between couples.

When dreams are shared within the therapeutic setting, they provide an important opportunity for different forms of unconscious communication to manifest and be explored.

According to the Jungian approach, conflicts mobilize psyche energy, but when conflicts remain unconscious, they can create a field for conjugal chaos, preventing symbols from being discriminated and integrated.

The proposal of this study is based on studies by Jung (1945) and Gallbach (2000).

Initially, the couple is asked to have contact with the dream brought to the setting, free of any judgments, and respecting the contents observed. It is important that the internal resources and the timing of each partner are respected.

The dream is read aloud in the present tense, enabling the dreamer to hear it and share it with his/her partner. The partner is asked to hear the dream as if it were his/her own, enabling a feeling of empathy, considered important within couple therapy.

Then the couple is asked to choose a title for the dream. This is the first opportunity to make the dream more objective, enabling the couple to look at it as a whole, and validate it as a dream belonging to the couple. These procedures enable the other partner to enter the oneiric context. As a result, both partners are now able to see it as something differentiated that is at the service of the relationship.

According to Jung, dramatic analysis involves four moments: exposition the initial situation that introduces the theme or problem; intrigue development of the problem, complication or tension in the situation; culmination apex of the dramatic development and outcome solution or conclusion offered by the dream.

After observing the dream within its intrinsic context, expressive techniques such as human sculpturing and drawing may be used. Adopting these techniques, each partner is asked to express their relationship based on what was observed in the dream. This enables the couple to experience other ways of appropriating the symbolic expressions of the dream and connect them to questions arising within their conjugal life.

The couple is then asked to reflect on the underlying complexes of the egos action, observing and considering whether it is at the service of the relationship. Possibilities for transformation and creating new ways of relating within the marriage are also explored.

Finally, each partner shares his/her experiences and insights related to the personal and conjugal dynamics. Within this context, the dream is at all times processed by the husband-wife-therapist triad, and clinical experience suggests that this therapeutic resource helps partners to enrich their relationship and develop greater intimacy.

 

Ani Popova with Tore Nielsen, PhD; Tyna Paquette, MSc; Katia Levrier; Sastien Saucier; Kieran Fox; Josianne Perron

Virtual Maze Task Exposure Produces Both Day-Residue and Dream-Lag Effects

Background. Numerous studies replicate the finding that access to dream memory sources follow a U-shaped curve: 1) a day-residue effect which describes correspondences between daytime events and dreams on the next night; and 2) a dream-lag effect which describes event/dream correspondences occurring about a week apart.

Objectives. The present study further explored these effects by examining specific features of a virtual environment to which all participants had been exposed. A U-shaped curve was expected, with peaks of maze incorporation reflecting the day-residue and dream-lag effects. Further, differences between the two effects in the qualities of specific elements incorporated were examined.

Methods. 57 participants went through a virtual maze procedure and then wrote down and rated their dreams for 14 days (see companion abstract for participant and methods details; Nielsen et al.). For the present analyses, sample size permitted comparison of all participants combined and interactive ' and passive ' groups separately.

Participants rated each dream on a 1-9 scale for degree of incorporation of any aspect of the maze task. A grid for scoring dream incorporations of the maze stimulus was developed by consensus among the authors. Visual, auditory and metaphoric attributes for each environment were included, with lists of potential attributes provided (e.g. lava for volcanic environment, snow/ice or wind for winter environment, etc.). Elements were scored either on 1-5 scales, as dichotomous present/absent variables or as simple item counts. Because of very low frequencies of many attributes, the latter were assessed by superordinate dichotomous categories, e.g., presence/absence of any visual, auditory or metaphoric incorporations, or presence/absence of incorporations from any of the 4 environments. Additionally, dreams were coded for the presence/absence of a ny navigation/orientation themes (e.g. explore, follow path, looking for one 's way, etc). For example, the statement I found myself in a WAIS-III maze & running frantically, avoiding lots of obstacles  was scored 5 on navigation (maze, obstacles).

Participants rating their dreams as at least 4 (out of 9) on subjective incorporation were selected for each of 3 time periods: days 1 to 4 (D1-4; N=56), days 5-8 (D5-8; N=54) and days 9 to 12 (D9-12; N=53). Two judges independently rated all of the dreams using the scoring grid. Overall incorporation levelsfor the 3 periods were compared using chi-square tests. Incorporation rates for specific categories (present/absent) were calculated only for D1-4 and D9-12 to determine differences between day-residue and dream-lag incorporations.

Results. Compared with D5-8 (18.5%), more subjects scored their dreams as "e 4 on D1-4 (35.2%; Chi-sq₁=3.36, p=0.067) and marginally on D9-12 (30.0%; Chi-sq₁=1.98, p=0.159). Similarly, when the interactive ' groups only were considered, compared with D5-8 (22.2%), more subjects scored their dreams as "e 4 on D1-4 (48.2%; Chi-sq₁=4.13, p=0.042) and on D9-12 (50.0%; Chi-sq₁=4.58, p=0.032).

However, no significant differences between the D1-4 and D9-12 groups were found for any of the incorporation categories evaluated for all 4 groups considered either together or separately.

Conclusions. The U-shaped curve of incorporation values observed, especially for the interactive groups, replicates previous work demonstrating both day-residue and dream-lag incorporation effects. The fact that no qualitative differences between maze-related incorporations at the two time periods were found supports the possibility that both day-residue and dream-lag effects are expressions of a single underlying memory consolidation process extending over time.

Supported by the Canadian Institutes of He alth Research and the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada.

 

Victoria Rabinowe with Freya Diamond

The Art of the Dream: Expressive, Interdisciplinary Journal Projects for Dream Groups

By creating new links in patterns of symbolic thought, the expressive arts can build a strong, connective bridge between the paradox of the dream and the clarity of understanding. Each dream is a journey, a rite of passage. Yet most dreams are filled with mysteries that the rational mind can rarely penetrate. The Rabinowe Method offers a process of dynamic translations in which collage and creative writing reveal physical, spiritual or psychic levels of consciousness.The Art of the Dream  invites the dreamer to create journals, books, altars, mandalas, collages, and body maps in which the dreamer is encouraged to explore the emotional landscape of their dreams. In projects that areallegorical, mythical, religious, magical or spiritual,dreams morph into museums of memory, labyrinths, fairy tales, and mythic journeys. Projects are embellished with poetry, prose and found text.

Non-threatening and non-invasive, the Rabinowe Method promotes full immersion private work in a group setting. Featured dream group projects have been deconstructed and realigned in response to thought provoking questions that unite universal, archetypal workshop themes with the dream of the individual. The dreamwork is playful, intuitive, & experimental. The resulting dream journals are written & illustrated in a language that is at once narrative, symbolic and mythic. The work is carefully guided to shift the dreamer 's relationship to frightening or out of control imagery with gentleness and humor. Sorrow, confusion, grief and disappointment are transformed into bittersweet joy. Directed, creative arts act as a bridge to memory and emotion where obstacles are crossed over and solutions to difficulties are explored. The Art of the Dream  offers guidance into the realm of enchantment, the landscape of myth and the genius of the night mind.

 

Victoria Rabinowe with Freya Diamond

Creative Projects for Dealing with Emotional Content in Dreams

It takes courage to record and acknowledge the high-key emotional content of dreams. Often the dreamer is confronted with crazy, complex narratives that can be confusing, disturbing, or frightening. The dreamer may feel conflicted by inappropriate thoughts, antisocial behavior, and temptations. Forbidden love, regrets, obsessions, cravings are often presented with feelings of being trapped, manipulated or frustrated.

The Art of the Dream  invites the dreamer to create journals, books, altars, mandalas, collages, and body maps in which the dreamer is encouraged to explore the emotional landscape of their dreams. In projects that are allegorical, mythical, religious, magical or spiritual, dreams morph into museums of memory, labyrinths, fairy tales, and mythic journeys. Projects are embellished with poetry, prose and found text which invite the dreamer to sing out, to holler, to explode with a Janis Joplin voice that quivers with excitement, or whispers with the voice of the vulnerable, open, childlike spirit.

Creative projects move the dreamer into the original voice of the dream without the intervention of "interpretation". Authentic feelings arise when the rational mind is quiet. The natural rhythms and patterns of dream re-entry allow emotions to surface where stream of consciousness becomes the guide that waits beneath the threshold of normal perception.

The courageous dreamer is an individual who is willing to face the emotional carousel presented in their dreams. In the Art of the Dream  studio workshops, journals become a safe place to practice open rebellion against the tyranny of self-judgm ent.

Guided workshops in the Art of the Dream  honor the privacy of dreamers while inviting them to safely express themselves through the transformative wellspring of personal metaphor and symbolic thought.

The spirit is innocent & vulnerable.

It can be tossed & turned, elevated & hurt

on the tides of your emotions and feelings.

But the soul can never waiver or be harmed.

Clarissa Pinkola Estes

 

Valley Reed with Nick Cumbo, Heidi Guttman, Erin Langley, MA, Teresa MacColl

Dreaming Across Borders with Indigenous Peoples

Opening the Portal of Quetzalcoatl and Crossing Over with Valley Reed

In response to a healing prayer formy teenage son, a powerful dream came through, includinginformation about my father who now faces a terminal case of cancer. The dream brought me to the Aztec ancestral grounds of the Pyramids in Mexico where I connected with the mythical god of Quetzalcoatl from Pre-Hispanic Aztec and Mayan Culture. Prompted by the dream, I embarked on a healing pilgrimage to the ancient Pyramids in Teotihuacan, Mexico to offer prayers of healing for my family during the Dias De Los Muertos Celebration.

Lost Friends with Nick Cumbo

I will share a dream of a Wadja woman that provided me with a bridge into the culture of the Aboriginal people - the first people of Australia. The story the woman told me in my dream brought to focus the issues of relationship between our differing cultures and echoed a sadness and strength that left me determined to le arn more. Four years later, I was able to visit the land to which she belonged traveling thousands of kilometers from my home to undertake a three-week teaching placement in the remote Aboriginal community of Woorabinda.

Reviving the Celtic Spirit: A Dream Journey with Erin Langely

I will explore the relationship between our dreams, our ancestors, and ourselves by citing experiences from my own process of recovering my European indigenous mind. Decolonization plays a role in the healing of our lineages, and magical occurrences begin to happen when we heed our ancestors' call. I will discuss ways to connect with our genealogical ancestors and how to proceed when they reach out to us through the dream world.

 

Richard Russo with Bernard Welt, PhD; Bjg Bjarnadottir; Fariba Bogzaran, PhD; Lisa Madelle Bottomley; Marco Zanasi, MD; Olaf Gerlach Hansen, MA; Pietro Rizzi: and Umberto Barcaro (Symposium)

Bernard Welt

Fellini's Semi-Divine Comedies

Almost all of Federico Fellini's films may be considered "dream-like", but in 8 1/2, Juliet of the Spirits (Giulietta degli spiriti), and City of Women (La Cittdelle donne), Fellini uses the dream to explore his own vivid, modern theory of the muse and creative process.

Bjg Bjarnadtir

Icelandic Dreamer on an Italian Pilgrimage

Dreams have always held a very high status in Icelandic culture and literature. Although inhabit ing an isolated island in the North Atlantic, Icelanders have traveled widely and been great explorers and seafarers. In one of the first written accounts of sea routes in Medieval Europe, one finds the Icelandic King's Mirror - Konungs Skuggsja - in which dreams are regarded as one of the guiding lights for the seafarer to rely upon.

Italy has always been the dream of our writers and many have drawn great insights in their writing from their Italian experience. Whether dreams are regarded as vehicles of change foretelling fate and keys to the Other World as in the Sagas, or as vehicles of consciousness to connect to the deeper layers of ourselves and the surreal aspects of existence as in modern writings, it is clear that the dream lives on the bridge between time, space, and dimensions in Icelandic literature.

Fariba Bogzaran

The Dreamscape of Giorgio de Chirico

Giorgio de Chirico (Greek-Italian ,1888-1935) is one of the best known painters of the 20^th century. The first artist to be published in La rolution surrliste, his early metaphysical paintings (1911-1919) became the main subject of study and influence for the surrealist writers and painters. This presentation discusses the symbolic narrative of these early enigmatic dreamscapes in relation to de Chirico 's writings and thoughts on dreams.

Lisa Madelle Bottomley

Dreams, Poetry and the Archetypal Imagery of the Divine Comedy

Mythical and fantastical imagery is the stuff that dreams are often associated with, much to our dismay. Describing deep internal experiences of insight, pain, longing, joy and growth require metaphor and odd imagery to convey a complex message. Dante's journey in the Divine Comedy describes going down intoa weird and archetypal world of imagery akin to a dream experience. Dante's allegory evokes the same type of imagery and insight as that of profound dreams and illustrates a dream like landscape.

Marco Zanasi

The Idea of Dreaming from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance

Olaf Gerlach Hansen

Significance of Dreams in Masterpieces

Works of art that are considered masterpieces have acquired a normative function in cultural history, being landmarks as they are. In addition to their unique artistic value, masterpieces have a significant function in education and identity formation due to their canonical status.

Dreams feature in many masterpieces of art, both historic and contemporary works. Studying dreams in masterpieces may open new insights on the relation between dreams and art, between individual and society, as well as on how dreams can be used for human development and the common good and also misused for ideological or other purposes when inscribed in a text that achieves canonical status.

Pietro Rizzi

Aspects of Dreams in Italian Popular Movies

The best Italian movie directors with a few exceptions including Fellini do not like to show dreams in dramatic movies or in comedies. They have a realist approach. However, we can find dreams in popular comic or satirical movies. Those dreams have two features: They can represent the realization of a big wish food, sex, money as in a sort of funny Freudian theory. On the other hand, a dream is often seen as a bridge between dreamer and dead parents. They come to the dreamer in order to prevent dangers, or to communicate how to win at a lottery. Funny situations or misunderstandings derive from these beliefs, and cinema exploits them. In fact, similar popular beliefs were present in Mediterranean countries in the past. Younger directors, however, are using dream representation in their movies for other purposes. Moreover, we can also find oneiric features in the movies of a famous director, Bertolucci (e.g. The Dreamers), who has a good knowledge of psychoanalysis.

Umberto Barcaro

Dreams and Visions in the Frescoes of the Upper Basilica of Assisi

The lower part of the nave of the Upper Basilica of Assisi contains a series of 28 frescoes that represent major events in the life of St. Francis reported in the Legenda Maior, the biography written by St. Bonaventure. The attribution to Giotto is controversial; according to Vasari, they were painted between 1296 and 1304. A number of these frescoes represent visions and dreams: the vision of a palace full of weapons, Innocence III 's dream, the vision of the fire-cart, the vision of the chairs, and the apparition to the Chapter of Arles. The content and representation of these dreams and visions is interesting from several points of view: the idea of dream in the society of the time, the correspondences with the personal experiences of Francesco d 'Assisi, the cultural and economic needs of the society of that time, the new artistic attitudes that emerged towards the end of the 13th century.

 

Dr. Mohamed Omar Salem; Dr. Ammar El Banna; Dr. Ali Younis; Dr. Bader Saleh; and Mr. Said Yousif

The Effect of Dreams on Psychiatric Patients in a UAE Study

Background: Dreams are affected by many psychological factors and could play an important role in the emotional life of psychiatric patients

Aims: To study dream experiences and attitudes among psychiatric patients attending psychiatric facilities in the UAE.

Method: Descriptive cross-sectional epidemiological survey of all new patients attending the psychiatry outpatient clinic, and all patients admitted to the psychiatric wards of Al-Ain and Al-Amal Hospitals, for one and a half years starting from October 2005.

Results: The sample included 258 patients. 54% of the sample reported having some nightmares, and 44.6% reported paying special attention to their dreams. In 31% their dreams affected their personal life, and 16 % changed their daily plan in response to dreams. 42.7% reported some dreams that made them worried or distressed. 12% noticed a relation between their dreams and certain life events. 40.6% had an experience from themselves or from relatives related to dreams that come true.

Conclusion: Dreams are important personal experiences that can affect psychiatric patients in many ways. They deserve the appropriate attention from all mental health professionals in assessment and therapy.

 

Linda Schiller, MSW, LICSW

Getting Unstuck: Using Dreamwork to Heal Traumatic Memory

The use of dreamwork in clinical practice has been part of our royal road  to healing and understanding since antiquity. In addition, treatment of trauma began to evolve in the 1800 's, and has reappeared in a large body of research, scholarship and treatment methods in the last 25 years. Even more recently, the field of neurobiology has added to our understanding of how the brain functions in both waking and sleeping life, and how traumatic memory is stored differentially in the brain than non-traumatic memory.

This workshop will explore the interface between these three areas of knowledge, with the goal of informing our dreamwork practices to assist in providing an integrated treatment approach to healing and recovery from trauma. We will briefly examine the nature of traumatic and non-traumatic memory storage in the brain, and then discuss the gold standard of phase oriented trauma healing. Once this groundwork has been laid, we will examine a number of dreamwork styles and techniques that can aide in this healing process.

In specific, we will e xamine both how and when to use dream re-entry techniques, active imagination techniques, extended art and writing and dream dialoging from the dream material based on the phase of healing that the dreamer is in, so as not to retraumatize them through the work. We will also attend to careful assessment and distinction between symbolic representations in dreams, and what may potentially be memory bursts  through dream material, and how to work ethically with each type of material. We will address the differences between symbolized nightmares and traumatic reenactments, being careful to acknowledge the emotional veracity of the material even when it is in symbolized form. I will share with the workshop participants methods and techniques to enhance safety, containment, working through, and bringing closure at various times in the process of trauma healing through dream work.

 

Patricia Schmieg, EdM, CAS

Call of the North: Peregrine 's Pilgrimage

Two years ago in dream, a phoenix swoops me up from a dungeon, carries me above an inflamed earth to show how my inflamed brain, my hypersensitivity to toxic chemicals reflects the body burden of the Earth. Any shift in my personal energy must include the Earth.

Last July, nine days before cataract surgery, I dream I lie in a field, knees bent, when a tundra peregrine falcon hangs, suspended above me, wings outstretched, then flops down besides me, sides heaving with her labored breathing. What is your name Kikkikkik. I hold my breath, turn my head, and she's gone.

Four months later, I sit awake on a boulder swept by an older ice from Canada to Massachusetts, at the edge of earth and water, at the edge of dusk and night. A hawk lands on a maple to the West, then flies North. Please come back! I want to see you! He circles, returns to spread his wings: I am Sparrowhawk. Then he flies off to hunt, as the stars of Orion wink i nto light above me. A week later, two huge swans catch the waning sun before stars come. A recent dream transported to deep space, I ask an alien Elder how to love. My heart's love expands, dreaming and waking to live my vision quest.

My dreams and waking life dissolve borders the way Kikkikkik migrates from South America to the Arctic Circle, changing from brown-gold to white. Awake, I have wandered from the Amida Daibutsu in Kamakura to Saint Joseph's Oratory of the Sacred Heart in Montreal, to megalithic mounds in Ireland, and glens in Nova Scotia. The first time I saw Montreal at 12, my hair cropped short like Jeanne d'Arc, everyone greeted me in French. Years later, I regressed to a Provenl Cathar knight tortured for my beliefs, ending my days tongueless, a village healer. To Montreal I come, peregrine, to lose this old terror, honor my unknown French and Irish ancestors, and follow Kikkikkik's call to the North.

In this paper I show how the migration of peregrine, swan, and heron, sacred to Celtic, Japanese, and Inuit cultures dissolves borders. Peregrinus means wanderer, pilgrim. I honor the waking and dreaming challenge of Elders in human, animal and Other forms to migrate from a self-involved to a universal soul.

Two years ago, I dreamed of whales diving deeper to avoid the boiling oceans. This summer I found great silence beneath Atlantic waves, eyes wide open. Today ice melts in Nunavut villages, the Arctic Circle. Peregrine falcons are riddled with DDT and their number grows fewer. I dream less and less, but dreams cross borders to challenge me: What am I doing for the Earth How do dreams call us to heal the Universe I will walk North to the pond in waning light to honor the birds, the stars, combing the hair of the Goddess Sedna with no hands. I follow the call North to the royal mountain and beyond.

 

Lauren Z. Schneider, MA, MFT

Dreams and Tarot: Innovative Approaches to DreamWork and Depth Therapy

There were considered to be three worlds: the world of matter below, the world of spirit above, and the world of image in between - each realm entirely real. Today I see the prototype of this intermediate realm in the world of dreaming. - Robert Bosnak

This psychotherapeutic method called Tarotpy utilizes the rich symbolic imagery of Tarot, Dream Cards, Soul Cards, and other representational images to actively engage deeper unconscious processes and lay the imaginal world out on the table. Strephon Kaplan-Williams, the renowned Jungian therapist, created the Dream Cards for this purpose: to understand symbolism, dreams and the application of dreams to life. [They will] help you create strong bonds between dreaming and waking consciousness.  Using this method of Tarot Therapy, we can gain greater insight into our dreams and into the psyche that dreams; the archetypal patterns, psychological and interpersonal dynamics that influence our life come into clearer view.

Tarotpy enhances dream work and vice versa. I use Tarotpy with a client to contemplate and gain further insight on a specific night dream; or to stimulate imagination that may be otherwise blocked in some clients - for instance, with those clients who do not remember their dreams. Often, I find that a Tarotpy session will be followed by reports of more vivid dreaming. These archetypal symbols represent a universal language of imagery, which is cross-cultural, perhaps birthed from the same collective and psychic pool from which emerges the dream. In her book, Jung and the Tarot, Sallie Nichols states that these old cards were conceived deep in the guts of human experience, at the most profound level of the human psyche. . . . Studying a specific card seems to unlock hidden stores of creative imagination so that sudden insights and ideas can burst forth into consciousness - seemingly from nowhere. 

As with dream work, the core principal of Tarotpy embodies a profound respect for the inherent wisdom, creativity and wholeness of the psyche. Unlike traditional Tarot readings in which there are set formats and definitions, this method is a hands-on interactive process with the client: I carefully attend to the individual 's verbal and non-verbal cues as the client selects the deck, the number of cards, the form and name of each placement. On the one hand, the therapeutic use of Tarot cards is a highly effective projective tool or Rorschach, for assessment and exploration. This simple method relaxes the vigilant ego and provides a safe and effective medium to discuss issues, often revealing the client 's deeper concerns and truth without engaging resistance. The metaphoric imagery creates a bridge for unconscious material and intuition to flow between client and therapist. On the other end of the spectrum, there seems to be an unconscious mastermind at play in the random  selection of a specific deck and particular imagery. Like the genius of the dream, it appears more intentional than random to bring into consciousness information about our relationships, environment and ourselves that is vital to emotional, physical or spiritual growth. Through Tarotpy, we may get a glimpse of the dreaming mind as part of a greater Universal Psyche.

 

 

Michael Schredl, PhD

Dream Content in a Representative German Sample: Gender Differences and the Effects of Other Socio-Demographic Variables

Up to now, only one representative study of dream content has been reported in the scientific literature. Since the generalizability of findings obtained in student samples is limited, most recent dreams of a representative German sample were analyzed.

Method. Overall, a representative sample of 1380 persons was drawn from German households that include persons over 14 years old. The response rate was 74.9%. The sample size was reduced to 1033 (550 women, 483 men). The mean age of the sample was 47.9 years (SD = 18.3). Of the persons participated in the interview, 36.8% were able to report a most recent dream to the interviewer.

Results and Discussion. The mean length of the 380 dream reports amounted to 23.1 words (SD 14). The analyses of these most recent dreams showed that almost none of the socio-demographic variables like age, gender, marital status, education, income, nor town (or city) of residence size was significantly related to general dream characteristics like dream length, bizarreness and intensity of dream emotions, thus indicating that dreaming is a universal phenomenon shared by all humans is experienced in similar ways. On the other hand, dream content - in contrast to the general dream characteristics - is determined by waking-life experiences. This is clearly shown by the gender differences found in the present study: more work-related themes and physical aggression in men 's dreams. Male/female percentage of the dream characters depended on gender, age and the marital status of the dreamer.

In order to generalize these findings, it will be necessary to apply other dream collection methods like dream diary or laboratory awakenings in large, representative samples in order to obtain and analyze dream reports of persons who do not often recall their dreams and who are not able to report a most recent dream to an interviewer.

 

Mark A. Schroll, PhD with Curtiss Hoffman, PhD; Ryan Hurd, MA; Judy Gardiner; and Jorge Conesa-Sevilla

Ecopsychology, Cross-Cultural Big Dreams, and Shamanic Lucid Dreams

Becoming lucid during dreaming is less about controlling image content and more about increasing the actors' awareness in the drama of the dream. This is true in three separate but overlapping areas cross-cultural big dreams,  shamanic lucid dreams, and the phenomenological perspective of lucid dreaming in which an expanded awareness increases the communicative ability of our dreams, whether this is experienced as a collective transpersonal archetypal unconscious, spirits of the landscape, or our own colonized/repressed multiplicity as persons being-in-the-world. Specific examples and practical applications of this expanded awareness toward understanding methodology and ecopsychology will be discussed.

 

Ryan Hurd, MA

Lucid Dreaming: Participating in Our Inner Wilderness

In my eco-psychological critique of lucid dreaming, awareness and control are often conflated with one another due, in part, to a deep historical bias in which nature is viewed as a wilderness that is separate from, and at war with, humankind. I will present a phenomenological methodology from lucid dreaming that has helped me to bridge this conflict within myself, centered in receptivity and connectivity

 

Jorge Conesa-Sevilla, PhD

Dreaming with Bear

Lucid dreaming continues to be a source of personal, spiritual, and scientific interest, curiosity and even obsession. In the backdrop of these diverse efforts and foci, a more ancient connection between lucid dreaming (spontaneous or induced) deserves renewed scholarly interest. Specifically, there is anthropological evidence that lucid dreaming (and dreams in general) had specific biosemiotic and ecopsychological functions, at least in shamanism and other healing arts. Even though Paul Shepard (1993/2007) does not use these terms, he does employ the word kenning to suggest an intimate biosemiotic journey and cognitive positive feedback loop between our experiences in nature, how we interpret and express these experience s, and their ultimate psychological impact, which includes dreaming big dreams.  Thus, lucid dreaming is one more meaning-system within a grander biosemiotic coda which integrates our intimate learning of natural history with a psychological orientation that must adjust to these real and natural demands an ecopsychology. Specific to Shepard 's term, kenning, this presentation focuses on the significant loss of telluric meaning and the demise of an ecopsychology. Even with this demise, lucid dreaming remains an ancient door to a Paleolithic mind disturbed and confused by its synthetic and meaning-less modern surroundings.

Reference

Shepard, P. (1999/2007). The biological basis of bear mythology and ceremonialism..  The Trumpeter 23:2, 74-79.

 

Mark A. Schroll, PhD

Cross-Cultural and Methodological Insights from an 11-Year Recurring Big Dream

The cross-cultural and methodological significance of an 11-year recurring dream that constitutes what Jung referred to as a big dream  will be discussed. Most of these dreams took place from 1973-1983, ending in 1984 after a workshop on Myths, Dreams and Shamanism  with Stanley Krippner. I began to consciously analyze this dream using the tools obtained from Krippner 's workshop from 1982-2000 and periodic discussions with Krippner from 2001-present. I experienced a slightly different version of this dream in 2007 whose significance to not only methodology, but also insights to cross-cultural life lessons, continues to seek conscious acknowledgement.

 

Richard Schweickert and Zhuangzhuang Johanna Xi

Theory of Mind Activities and Metamorphosed Characters

Someone inferring something about the perceptions, thoughts or feelings of a person is said to be using a Theory of Mind. Previous research has shown that Theory of Mind activity is frequent in dreams. Sometimes in a dream, one character metamorphoses into another. We investigated whether such transformations prompt the dreamer or other characters to attend to the minds of the metamorphosed characters. Dream reports with metamorphoses were selected from the Dreambank.net archive of Schneider and Domhoff. For each report with a metamorphosis, a control report without a metamorphosis was randomly selected for the same dreamer, with word length within 12 words of the report with a metamorphosis. Characters in the dream reports were coded by one investigator. Two other people coded Theory of Mind events in the dream reports, noting which characters had perceptions, thoughts or feelings attributed to them. The main finding is that Theory of Mind events occur with the same frequency in dream reports with a metamorphosis and those without. We conclude that dreamers attend to Theory of Mind events at a certain rate (not necessarily periodic). The rate does not depend on whether or not a metamorphosed character is present.

Metamorphoses also occur in literature. In some stories, such as Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde  by Robert Louis Stevenson, the inner activity of the metamorphosed characters is largely ignored. In others, such as The Metamorphosis  by Franz Kafka, the inner activity of a metamorphosed character is presented in detail. Both of these authors had an interest in dreams. Our results show that each type of metamorphosis story has a counterpart in metamorphosis dreams.

Fred Jeremy Seligson

Dream of the Golden Boy Buddha in Water

What is a spiritual dream Where does it come from What is this one's significance My presentation is an analysis of the following dream:

 . . . I go on and eyes rolling up focusing strongly and steadily on my 3^rd Eye I fly swiftly away into the sky. I fly to a mountain up steep cliffs and into a cave. I am in a cave with a door closed behind me. Perhaps this is part of a monastery. Before me on a raised platform is a display of Buddhist treasures. All sorts of small carvings of Buddha in gold and silver, mostly gold. They are neatly laid out in rows or 8 or so and about 10 rows going up. The carvings are about a centimeter thick and charmingly innocently done. I look at them for a while then decide to take one. Soon I have taken many of the finest ones and put them in my bag. Then to the right there is a raised pool rectangular of water. Perhaps under glass. In the middle is gold childlike carving of Buddha, harms and legs spread out and other objects around. While looking I am concerned someone might come and also I decide to put the objects I took back. I climb down and take them out of my bag and set them not so neatly tho I try back on the platform. Then I find I have a bag of sugar and other food bags in my bag and decide to donate them to the Buddhas. I pull out the sugar bag but a lot pours out on the floor. A small pouch with more little Buddha statues comes out that I had overlooked, so with one hand I am setting that back on the platform and with the other I am scooping up sugar. I am almost done but the flurry of both activities is enough to wake me up.

In the dream, there has been a spiritual transformation that I can take back to waking life, but the significance of the Buddha in the water is the crux of the matter. To discover this, the outer, living dream offers evidence over the next couple of years in Seoul and in various places in India.

 

Alan B. Siegel, PhD

Cultural Issues in Understanding and Working with Dreams

Exploring dreams in psychotherapy can transcend cultural barriers, build rapport in therapy and provide a vehicle for exploring sensitive issues related to acculturation, cultural identity, biculturalism and bilingualism, and discrimination of individuals who are minorities in a culture. This workshop is geared to psychotherapists but open to all, and will provide clinical practice guidelines for dreamwork with individuals whose cultural, religious, or other beliefs are different than the therapist 's.

Concepts and findings from anthropology such as culture pattern dreams, journey dreams, the Dream Time of the Australian Aborigines and other examples will be used to illustrate the unique and different ways of understanding and interpreting dreams. Relevant concepts from the dream work and psychotherapy literature will also be presented to provide a background and basis for introducing ethical practice guidelines for working with cultural issues and cultural difference in dreams.

Principles for introducing and working with dreams in therapy and clinical supervision will be reviewed with a special focus on awareness and sensitivity to cultural issues. These include: clarifying the dreamer 's cultural identity and cultural beliefs about the meaning and interpretation of dreams with a special focus on nightmares, big dreams, and PSI and metaphysically oriented dreams.

Vignettes for participant discussion will be presented from existing literature and from the presenter 's clinical experience. Vignettes will be solicited from participants during discussions and exercises to make the workshop more relevant to the needs of the participants.

Issues to be explored include interpretive versus non-interpretive models; how the awareness and clarification of one 's own cultural beliefs and interpretive philosophy is more crucial when working with culture issues in dreamwork; and how the IASD Ethics Statement addresses issues of cultural sensitivity in dreamwork.

 

Alan B. Siegel, PhD

Recurring-Dream Sharing Hike

This workshop/event is intended to have a recreational and social component to balance and de-stress from the continuous indoor presentations at the conference. A 1.5 to 2 hour long hike will include a short semi-structured discussion and dream-sharing ritual focusing on one recurring dream from each participant that will occur midway through the walk. The dream-sharing exercise will follow the format described by Montague Ullman. Due to the size of the group and time limit, dreams will not be interpreted or explored in depth but used as a stimulus for further understanding and exploration of recurring dreams. This awareness may be relevant to psychotherapists, and individuals interested in understanding recurring dreams. Patterns and universal themes in recurring dreams will be summarized and reinforced with a two-page handout which will be provided to participants to illustrate common recurring dreams, journal writing, and dream sharing strategies to deepen understanding of recurring dream patterns and interpretive approaches.

 

Valie Simard Psychological Treatment for Nightmares in 6 to 11 Year-old Children

Dr. Carlyle Smith with Dr. Teresa L. DeCicco and Carole Moran, BA, MSc candidate

Can Individuals Dream about the Personal Problems of Others

Introduction: There have been numerous anecdotal reports about the ability of individuals to dream about the personal details of others. However, there do not seem to be any formal experiments concerning this question. These studies were performed to try to shed some light on this possibility.

Procedures: Participants were members of a senior class (Dreams and Dreaming 373) offered at Trent University, Department of Psychology. The mean age was approximately 22 years and students were of both genders (N = 66). Initially, they were asked to provide 2 dreams for a section of the course which were used as baseline dreams. They were then invited to dream about a target individual, a copy of whose picture was given to them. Considerable time was spent in convincing the participants that they were capable of doing such a thing, as it was generally considered somewhat unusual. Instructions were given on how they might incubate a dream about the target individual. Two post-target presentation dreams were then collected. The dreams were analyzed using the Hall-Van de Castle scoring system and pre vs. post content was compared statistically. A control experiment was run in which a computer generated, non-existent individual was presented to another class (N = 54), following baseline dream collection. Again, dreams were scored using the Hall-Van de Castle method and inter-rater reliability was performed.

Results: Results indicated that for the real target, approximately half of the students provided post presentation dream content that related to the problems of the individual, often quite accurately. The Hall-Van de Castle category of Misfortune was significant in Post dreams, but not in Pre dreams (p < .05). Pre- vs. post-dream content for the control experiment showed no comparable differences. More detailed analyses of the experimental group was done using the Wilcoxon Signed ranks test and comparing pre- vs. post-dream content. Specialized categories were included in these analyses as there were none comparable in the traditional Hall-Van de Castle scales. In individuals that felt that they had dreamed of the target, there were several very significant hits  concerning the problems of the target (p < .001). No such differences were observed in the pre vs. post comparisons of the Control experiment dream content.

Conclusions: When asked to dream about the personal problems (completely unknown to them) of a target person whom they only know from a picture, some individuals appear able to do so. The degree of accuracy varies from very close in a few to substantial but less precise in others. Many individuals, although they tried, did not believe that they had dreamed of the target. These participants did not show significant changes from pre- to post-dream content.

 

Elizaveta Solomonova, BA with Tore Nielsen, PhD; Philippe Stenstrom, MSc; Jessica Lara-Carrasco, MSc; Christine Brochu; Marie-Eve Ross

Enhanced Dream Reports and Better Identification of Dream Memory Sources Following Training in an Introspective Technique

Background: Since Freud's publication of The Interpretation of Dreams, it has been recognized that dream elements are intrinsically linked to real-life events. Uncovering these links has been a vital part of psychoanalytic and introspective practice, but has been given less attention by empirical science. A major difficulty has been that researchers rely upon participants' spontaneous reports of dreams and memories, without controlling for participants ' levels of introspective expertise.

Objectives: This study evaluates whether it is possible to increase participants' capacity for more detailed reports of dreams and identification of memory sources associated with specific dream elements by training participants with a simple introspective technique.

Methods: 21 healthy subjects (9 male; 11 female) with good dream recall ("e4 dreams/week) were recruited through online advertising and word of mouth (mean age=27 3.7; range: 21-34). They spent 1 night in the laboratory where they were randomly divided into training (TR) and control (CTL) groups. The TR group received detailed instructions on how to report dreams and link dream elements to real life events. These instructions were then practiced with a film clip and with dream recalls after 4 sleep onset awakenings and a morning REM awakening. The CTL group did not receive any particular instructions concerning dream recall but underwent the same exposure to the film clip and the same awakenings. Both groups kept a dream diary for 4 consecutive days prior to the laboratory visit and 10 days after. They were asked to pay closer attention to and write down the last 60 seconds of their dream first and then to write down the remainder of the dream. They were also asked to record any memory sources associated with particular dream elements.

Results: The number of content-bearing words in dream reports (last 60 seconds and full dream) were counted, as were the number of memory elements that participants were able to identify. Paired samples t-tests were applied to test whether pre- and post- laboratory dream reports differed. A total of 232 home dream reports were collected (Mean=11.23 dreams/subject; range: 5-14). Following the laboratory visit, subjects in the TR group showed a significant increase in word count of the last 60 seconds of their dreams (pre=182.3135; post=284.7118.6; p<.05), a trend increase in the total word count of their dreams (pre=321.5190; post=454.1167.7; p=.15) and a significant increase in the number of elements they could link to specific memory sources (pr e=3.21.1; post=4.31.6; p<.01);. Subjects in the CTL group did not show significant differences on any of these variables.

Conclusions: Results suggest that a laboratory training technique is effective in eliciting more detailed home dream reports as well as in priming participants to pay closer attention to specific memory sources linked to dream elements. This validates the idea that training research participants in introspective techniques may be a useful research tool. It might be used for enhancing overall dream recall or for eliciting more detailed and focused reports of study-specific dream elements and modalities which otherwise might be de-emphasized or overlooked by untrained participants.

Supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

 

Christopher Sowton, ND, FCAH 

Dreams and Homeopathy

Miasm is a term much used in homeopathic circles, but often not well understood. Here, we will define miasm as a disease root that is more fundamental than the presenting disease and thus prevents or blocks the improvement of the patient 's condition, even when all the right healing factors seem to be in place.

People who are caught in the influence of a miasm will have characteristic dream elements of that miasm, which the practitioner can pick out with some training.

In this presentation we will look at several videotaped dreams which contain elements indicative of the sycotic, tubercular, cancer and syphilitic miasms four of the most prevalent miasms seen in modern western practices. Dream segments will be shown that clearly illustrate the characteristic feeling tones of these miasms. Participants will also be encouraged to review their own dreaming histories from this vantage point.

 

Patricia Spangler, MA

Working with Dreams in Psychotherapy: What Do Psychoanalytic Therapists Report That They Do

Forty-seven psychoanalytic therapists completed a questionnaire about dream work. Overall, results indicated that therapists had very positive attitudes toward dreams, worked with their own dreams, sought out dream training, and felt competent working with dreams. Therapists estimated that they worked with dreams with about half of their clients about half of the time in psychotherapy. They were most willing to work with dreams when clients had recurrent or troubling dreams or nightmares, were psychologically minded, were seeking growth, were interested in dreams, and were willing to work with dreams.

 

Philippe Stenstrom, MSc with Kieran Fox; Tore Nielsen, PhD; Elizaveta Solomonova, BA; Jessica Lara-Carrasco, MSc; Isabelle Godin

Recurring Elements in Dreams Elicited from Multiple Sleep-Onset Awakenings

Background

Current research has confirmed Freud 's observation that certain elements of dream imagery can be traced to specific memories. However, it is still unknown how memory sources evolve throughout the night.

Objectives

The objective of the present study was to examine the manner in which memory sources of hypnagogic imagery collected from multiple awakenings at sleep onset (SO) evolve and interact across the night.

Methods

A single participant (age 23, male) was awakened multiple times at sleep onset from 11 PM to 6 AM in a sleep laboratory for two non-consecutive nights. The participant had good dream recall and had been practicing identifying memory sources of his dreams 3 weeks prior to the first night. Recordings were made from C3, C4, O1 and O2 electrodes applied according to a standard 10-20 technique. Awakenings were made during Hori SO stages 4 (alpha drop) and 5 ( low voltage theta wave bursts) when an experienced investigator visually determined on a polysomnogram that at least 5 seconds of one of the stages had elapsed. The participant gave a detailed verbal report of his preceding dream, followed by any memory sources he could identify for specific dream elements.

Results

The subject was awakened 16 times during Night 1 and 18 times during Night 2 for a total of 34 mentation reports. Three awakenings gave rise to thinking activity and where discarded. The remaining 31 mentation reports contained hallucinatory activity that defined dreaming ' for the present study.

Recurring elements (n = 18), ranging from general themes (e.g., China) to specific objects (e.g., a white cube), could be located across several dreams within a single night. In contrast, only 2 recurring elements were found across the two nights and these related directly to current concerns of the participant (Buddhism and University). Overall, recurring elements appeared in 2 to 5 (M = 2.47, SD = .70) different dreams and could be traced to specific memories 77% of the time (n = 14). When the memory sources of recurring elements could be identified, in all cases they could be traced back to distinct and unrelated memories sometimes separated by several years. Recurring elements were distributed equally throughout the night, with an average distance of 3.82 (SD = 2.37) dreams between each reappearance.

Recurring elements could also be found within single dreams. In 32% (n = 10) of reports, memory elements with similar semantic properties, yet stemming from distinct memories separated by 2 days to 15 years, appeared simultaneously in a single dream.

Conclusion

Together, the findings are consistent with the idea that a possible mechanism by which the content of sleep onset imagery is selected consists of a targeting of common semantic features across multiple unrelated memories. These common ele ments are then extracted and merged within a single dream or distributed throughout several dreams during a single night. The fact that elements recurring across several dreams are not grouped together but are well distributed across the night suggests that multiple instances of semantically related elements across multiple dreams are not simply a function of semantic priming.

Supported by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada.

 

Bonnelle Lewis Strickling, MA, PhD, RCC

Dreams, Philosophy and the Inner Other

In my paper of last year, Dreams, Existence and the Structure of Being,  I argued that even philosophers one would expect to take an interest in dreams, such as continental philosophers, fail to do so. This appears to have a number of causes, chief among the metaphysical unmanageability of dreams. Dreams mean  in a different way, taking us into a different metaphysical realm in which means are associative rather than logical. If we embed dreams as part of the structure of being, we have a permanent aspect of ourselves that resists incorporation to the image of human beings as essentially rationally explicable. However, suppose we insist on incorporating dreams as part of the structure of being. This will not only give us a permanent source of hope for continuing and deepening understanding of ourselves and for some, connection with the divine, it will also acknowledge the permanent existence of the inner Other, that aspect of ourselves which is ultimately unknowable in any final sense. Karl Jaspers argues that, as well as existence, human beings have Existenz, an unfinished and unfinishable (until death) project of self-development and self-understanding similar to Jungian individuation. For Jaspers, human life is, ideally, the elucidation of Existenz. Though Jaspers is resistant to taking dreams seriously, nevertheless I will argue that dreamw ork can be a unique and crucial aspect of the elucidation of Existenz, offering us special access to that inner Other in a way that nothing else can. Admitting that dreams which are not amenable to rational analysis, are an important aspect of the structure of Being and a crucial aspect of the elucidation of Existenz, may be particularly difficult for philosophers because this requires humility with respect to the limitations of empiricism and reason in the description of reality. Thus attitudes to the place of dreams in the structure of Being are a kind of litmus test for the willingness of philosophers to venture into the imaginal world in order to find ways of representing the complexity of human reality.

 

Gloria Sturzenacker

Tikkun, Jorbor, Beseta: Three Dream Words from Beyond Borders

I 've seldom traveled beyond the borders of the United States; my minimal ability to speak another language faded quickly after studying Spanish in high school; and my dream settings are generally local. Yet three dreams widely separated in time have somehow managed to begin coalescing a sense of meaning, each with a different foreign word to which I don 't recall ever having been exposed previously.

Curiosity about the words led me to search online for them. Although I assumed, at first, that my dreaming mind had simply made up the words, each of them appears on Web sites in more than one language, from Swedish to Maltese to Tahitian. In some cases, the words are indeed made up, by individuals compressing their own names to make an email address or online nickname, for example. In other cases, the words actually appear in documents ranging from European Union legalese to postings about the paranormal; yet the specific definitions remain elusive. Inquiring among people familiar with the languages, I 've mostly been told the words in those instances are made up or misspelled. So even in their waking appearances, the words retain their dream-like ambiguity, ripe for projection.

Two projections of meaning are suggested by context: the context within the dreams, the context of the time at which the dreams occurred, or the context of the words ' use on the Web. Those two meanings have to do with emotional boundaries and environmental sustainability.

I present the dreamwork in progress of exploring three words from beyond borders.

 

Gunnar Sundstr

The Montague Ullman Approach of Working with Dreams in a Group Setting: A Workshop

A workshop will be presented in which approximately 10 persons can join and work with a dream in the way outlined by Montague Ullman. The Montague Ullman method of working with dreams in a group setting can be described as a four-step-process in a group of people gathered to share dreams with themselves and the others.

 

The work goes as follows:

I. One person, the dreamer, shares a dream with the group. The group listens to the dream as told and memorize it.

II. The group pretends it is their dream, and, 1, identifies and connects to the emotions aroused in 'their ' dream. 2, The group members also search for metaphorical meanings of different parts, images, actions, etc, in the dream.

III A, The dream is given back to the dreamer who is free to give as much or as little response as he/she wants to.

III B 1, If the dreamer would like to, the group starts a dialogue with the dreamer around the dream, with the purpose of further connecting the dream with the dreamer 's life situation. The group asks the dreamer of recent whereabouts, thoughts and feelings experienced in the evening before the night when the dream was dreamt, and/or the days before.

III B 2, The dream can be read to the dreamer, who has the opportunity to make further connections in the light of what has been discovered during the process so far.

III B 3, If the dreamer so wants the group members can share their conclusions of the meaning of the dream, or parts of it in a so-called 'orchestrating projection '.

IV, In a group which meets on a regular basis, a session starts with looking back on the session before, and the foregoing dreamer can share thoughts with the group that might have arisen since the last meeting

 

Since this is a 'one-time-meeting ', the group will be given time for evaluation of the work and experiences around it.

Key concepts in the process will be presented and discussed:

*Non-intrusiveness - protection of the dreamer 's safety,

* Safety-factor and curiosity-factor

*The dreamer should be in control of the process

*Projections in the process of experiencing and/or interpreting another 's dream

 

 

Christine Swint, MA, RYT

Yoga Nidra: Yogic Sleep and Hypnogogic Visions

Yoga Nidra is a meditative process. The practitioner, while lying or sitting comfortably, meditates on a succession of body parts with the intent of relaxing tense muscles. The idea is for the body to sleep while the mind remains alert, traveling through the inner space of consciousness. At this point, hypnagogic visions and lucid dreams may occur.

In order to ease muscle tension before the meditation, I will guide the participants in a series of gentle, restorative yoga postures performed while seated on the floor. The postures are suitable for all people, and can be adapted for those wishing to sit in a chair.

The stretching loosens and calms the body. Afterwards we will practice beginning Pranayama breathwork, to further relax the nervous system. I will introduce Ujjayi I and II and Viloma breathing. When the practitioners are completely still and serene, I will begin the naming of the body parts, and then a creative visualization. During the meditation I will play a recording of shamanic drumming music in the background.

My most memorable vision while in Yoga Nidra was of a giant crow sweeping toward me out of a clear blue sky. My mind was awake, but my body was asleep. I later wrote a poem and a story based on this dream.