Sigmund Freud was an Austrian neurologist who founded the psychoanalytic school in psychology. He was born on May 6, 1856 and died on September 23, 1939. During his 83-year life, he has found many novel theories in many fields. The analysis of dreams is one of the most interesting teachings among them. Since it is a broad topic, this article is about what we can basically understand about the scientific literature of dream problems by reading his book “Interpretation of Dreams”, which was published in 1913.

When we hear the word “dream”, a feeling that cannot be expressed in words (mental processes) comes to mind. It is something that we cannot feel in the real world or in our waking state. There is a mysterious feeling about dreams. Therefore, we have become very curious to know what really makes us see dreams and how it happens.

People who were in the past also had this puzzle about dreams. They had their conceptions of the universe and of the soul. By mixing the idea of ​​sleep with this type of conception, they believed that sleep is something supernatural that predicts the future and they also believed it as a message from God. They thought of two kinds of dreams. One is dreams that are influenced only by the present or the past. The other is instead, the one that determines the future. This belief was there for many centuries.

But in later periods, scientific interest in dream phenomena improved.

There is a problem about the relation of sleep to the waking state. After we wake up, we feel that the dream we saw is from another world, even though it is not. We feel this way because the dream is something completely different and alien to the things that concern us in the waking state. Or, there may be a few items that we had in the waking state. Our normal behavior and consciousness are completely lost in the dream state, therefore dreams reveal the complete unfettered isolation of the psyche. Also, at least a small part has to be somewhere in our actual experiences.

Sometimes we can see the dreams that we feel that we have never known in the real world. It can be a place or a person or anything that we cannot remember meeting in the waking state. Not only that, but there can be so much knowledge in dreams that we can’t remember in our real life. That is the knowledge and memory of our unconsciousness. The things we see in our dreams may be the materials that entered our memory in our childhood. Most of them are caused by interesting “hypermnesic” dreams.

When it comes to the stimuli and sources of dreams, a dream is said to be the result of such disturbance occurring to disturb our sleep. Sleep is a reaction of our mental processes against that disturbance. There are four categories of stimuli.

1) External sensory stimuli.

It means objective stimuli. For example, a strong light can fall on the eyes while we sleep well. Since it disturbs our sleep, it can be a stimulus for a dream. In our dreams we can be made to see how we walk alone on the beach on a sunny day.

Sometimes we can see different dreams for the same stimuli. It is because there are some memory images in our mind at that particular moment that we get the stimuli and the most suitable image is taken that goes with the objective stimuli to produce sleep.

2) Internal sensory stimuli.

A dream cannot be produced by external sensory stimuli alone, because all the external sensory input that comes during sleep cannot cause a dream or support to cause a dream independently. There must be some internal facts as well. Therefore, we must also consider internal sensory stimuli. The subjective sensations that we see or hear in our waking state are important in the illusions of dreams. Subjective stimuli are independent of external accidents. They are, so to speak, available for interpretation whenever required. The main evidence of these stimuli is hypnagogic hallucinations. They are very obstructive but changing images that people see while falling asleep. Some may linger for a while even after we open our eyes. If someone wakes up shortly after having such an experience, it will often be possible to trace back to the dream images the ones he saw before he fell asleep. It can also be taken as a “hypnagogic” hallucination. Not only that, but auditory hallucinations can also occur and can then be in the dreams.

3) Internal physical stimuli (organic).

Our internal organs remind us of their existence. That also causes the creation of a dream. If there is a disease, it can become a source of most painful sensations. The psyche becomes more aware of its physicality than the waking state and receives some stimuli that originate from our body parts. Diseases of the heart and lungs may be subject to nightmares. The stimuli that come from inside the body, from the nervous system, have at most an unconscious effect on our mood during the day. But, at night, that effect of the impression that was made during the day is no longer active. The impressions that arose are capable of forcing themselves to get our attention. They are drowned out by the other external effects during the day.

4) Psychic sources of excitement.

People dream about what they do in a waking state and about their interesting things. That interest is not only a psychic link, but also unites the dream with real life. If an interest that we have during our waking state, together with the internal and external sensory stimuli that occur during sleep, would suffice to cover the entire etiology of sleep. But the interests in our waking state are not very influential to say for sure that everyone who dreams continues with these waking state interests.

We have all experienced that dreams are forgotten upon waking. They vanish when we wake up. We can remember it after waking up, but most of the time we can’t remember all the complete and exact dream. Sometimes we know that we have dreamed during sleep but we do not remember what we dreamed. But dreams manifest a peculiar power of being in memory. Some dreams last in memory for a long time, for example 35 years, without forgetting a small part of it. And also without losing the freshness of that dream.

This forgetting is a complex phenomenon. Factors that cause forgetfulness in the waking state may be the cause of dream forgetfulness as well. In the waking state, we forget many things, it may be because they are difficult to remember or there may be a small amount of emotional feelings. But we can remember the strong and important things, obviously. This is true for dreams as well. In dreams, most scenes are messy and meaningless. This also causes forgetfulness because we easily forget things that are not in order and do not make sense. The relationship of sleep to the waking state is also important in dreams of forgetfulness. If that dream has a great relationship with the waking state, it will not be forgotten. Also when we are awake, our attention suddenly rushes to sensations in the real world. Therefore, only a few dream images can be forced into memory in such a hurry. But people who are especially interested in dreaming can remember dreams more easily and also dream more than other people.

As we know, hypnogogic hallucinations (even in their content) are identical to dream images. The transformation of an idea into a hallucination is not the only deviation of the dream from the corresponding waking thought. You can make a suitable situation out of a hallucination. It shows us something like today.

In this book, “Interpretations of Dreams”, Freud also discusses the ethical meaning in dreams. He considers about the dream as a subproblem, to what extent the feelings and moral ties of the waking state affect the dream life. Some writers claim that moral obligations do not influence the dream life. But some, instead, emphasize that the moral ties that relate to man persist even in dream life. Of course there are such immoral dreams that no one denies. But we have to know how they originate. All who reflect on this problem have recognized a special psychic source for the immorality of dreams. We are not responsible for our dreams. Dreams lead us to the reality of our lives. But if someone can morally clear his mind before sleeping, that person might not have immoral dreams.

Since dreams have become a biological thing, there were many incomplete theories about dreams such as; “Sleep is something that was sent by God to man…” The favorite theory of scientists and medical writers is that only a fragment of the psychic activity paralyzed by sleep finds expression in dreams. It can be identified as the most popular theory of dreams.

The relationship between dreams and mental illness is another important section that Freud has discussed here. When we talk about this relationship, we have to worry about three things.

1. Etiological and clinical relationships such as when a dream represents a psychotic state.
2. The changes that dream life undergoes in cases of mental illness.
3. Internal relationships between dreams and psychosis, analogies that point to an intimate relationship.

After having an idea about these things, an abnormal morbid phenomenon can be considered as an increase from time to time of the normal sleep state that recurs. The unmistakable agreement between dreams and mental illness goes also to the characteristic details.

According to Freud; “It is very likely, however, that a modified conception of sleep must also influence our views about the internal mechanism of mental disorders, and therefore we can say that we are working towards the explanation of psychoses when we endeavor to elucidate the mystery of dreams”. (p. 102)

Freud has explained this topic in a really interesting and comprehensive way with many experiences as examples. When we study about these things, our curiosity and interest in the subject develop. You are encouraged to continue the study.