Existential Dreamwork

 Dreams have been taken seriously for thousands of years, yet most conversations about dreams still tend to fall into one of two camps. Either dreams are dismissed as meaningless brain activity, or someone on the internet claims they can tell you exactly what your dream means.

I don't believe either of those approaches is particularly useful.

Dreamwork is not about dream dictionaries, universal symbols, or having someone else tell you what is happening in your unconscious mind. The same image can mean something completely different from one person to the next.

I once saw someone claim that dreaming about police officers means protective figures are appearing to help the dreamer. But what if the dreamer has a painful history with police? What if they have experienced discrimination, injustice, or fear in relation to law enforcement? What if their parent was a police officer and the relationship was difficult? The image may be the same, but the meaning is not.

Dreams emerge from your life, your relationships, your memories, your fears, your values, and your experiences. To understand a dream, I first need to understand you.

 My approach to dreamwork is informed by existential, Jungian, psychodynamic, and other depth-oriented traditions. I view dreams as another way your inner life speaks. They often bring forward aspects of yourself that have not yet found words, tensions that are developing beneath the surface, questions you are avoiding, possibilities you have not yet considered, or experiences that have not been fully digested.

I am not interested in reducing every dream to hidden anger, repressed sexuality, or a single neat explanation. Most dreams are far more complex than that. They deserve curiosity rather than certainty.

Dreams are not separate from your life. They grow from the same relationships, concerns, fears, hopes, memories, and questions that shape your waking experience. Paying attention to them can sometimes reveal things that have been difficult to see, difficult to name, or difficult to face.

The goal is not to arrive at the correct interpretation. The goal is to deepen your understanding of yourself.

 When we work with a dream, we slow down. We explore the images, emotions, people, places, and events that appear. We look at your personal associations rather than relying on universal interpretations. We pay attention to what feels alive, surprising, unsettling, or meaningful. Over time, patterns often begin to emerge that help us understand something important about how you are living, what you are struggling with, and where your life may be asking something of you.

Dreamwork is offered within the context of psychotherapy and can be integrated into ongoing therapy sessions whenever dreams arise. It can also be explored through phone sessions or by email for those who prefer to write about their dreams and reflections. This work is personal and integrative and as such does not need to be offered synchronously or on a regular schedule; having said that, it is important to acknowledge that as with all psychotherapy, more frequency does tend to improve results. With dreams, intentional time spent writing details and themes improves dream recall over time, so while dreamwork with a psychotherapist does not need to be held as frequently, you will get the most out of your dreams if you set aside time each morning to write them down, even if you sit down initially with nothing to write!

You do not need to be someone who remembers dreams every night. You do not need to believe dreams contain hidden messages. You do not need any prior knowledge of dream theory or psychology. All you need is a willingness to become curious about your own experience.

Click here to get in touch if you’re interested in starting dreamwork with me. While I sometimes use dream dictionaries, symbols, tarot cards, and archetypal images to deepen this work, the main focus will be on your own ideas and associations, including how you recall your dreams, and any creative work you may do like painting, sketching, music, etc.