The Interpretation of Dreams by Freud

The Interpretation of Dreams by Freud: Sex, Lies, and videotapes

The first person to begin a systematic study of dreams in modern times was Freud. Sigmund Freud was born on May 6, 1856, to a Jewish merchant family in Freiburg, Moravia (present-day Czech Republic). In 1881, he received his medical degree from the University of Vienna, and for the next 10 years he practiced medicine in a psychiatric clinic, treating neurosis in his own practice, while devoting himself to the study of physiology. Freud's psychological ideas developed gradually. In 1895 he published his first book, Essays on Hysteria; His second book, The Interpretation of Dreams, published in 1900, is one of his most creative and meaningful. When the Nazis invaded Austria in 1938, Freud, fearing persecution because he was Jewish, fled to London at the age of 82, where he died of cancer on September 23, 1939.

Freud made great contributions to psychology. He emphasized the importance of unconscious thought processes in human behavior. He showed how this process affects the content of dreams, and how it can cause common misfortunes such as slips of the tongue, forgetting names, injuries, and even illness. Freud invented psychoanalysis to treat mental illness. He systematically discussed the theory of the structure of human personality, and also developed and popularized some psychological theories. He is an extremely great figure in the history of human thought. His psychological views shook our conception of the human mind to its core.

Freud's first work on the subject of dreams was The Interpretation of Dreams, completed in 1899, which contained Freud's way of interpreting dreams. Although some of Freud's theories were difficult to accept, his work on dream interpretation is a treasure trove of knowledge that we all now draw upon as a bible for studying the world of dreams. Even those who have strayed from this path and taken a different path are awestruck by his work.

According to Freud, personality can be divided into id, ego and superego. The Id is the most primitive, obscure, and difficult part of the personality; it is composed of all innate instincts and impulses; it is the place where mental energy is stored, and it acts according to the principle of pleasure. The ego is a realized instinct, a part of the self that has been separated from the ID by the repeated lessons of reality. The superego, also known as the ideal self, the ego model, is the part developed from the self, the moralized self, the part differentiated from the self capable of self-criticism and moral control. It is considered to be the last and most civilized part of the personality. It is the representative of all moral codes, and its main function is to supervise the actions of the self in accordance with social moral standards.

The essence of a dream is 'a kind of wish fulfillment'. Although the desire is suppressed in the unconscious (subconscious), but it is still unconsciously active, seeking satisfaction, because there is a 'inspector' at the door of consciousness - the inspection of the superego can not be satisfied; However, when people are sleeping, due to the lax inspection function, the unconscious (subconscious) desire can bypass the superego and break into the consciousness in the form of makeup (that is, camouflage). Therefore, even the content of the dream is not the true face of the desire, and it must be analyzed and explained in order to find the real root.

Freud coined two terms - 'manifest dream' and 'implicit meaning.' The so-called manifest dream, similar to the mask, is 'what the dream describes', 'the explicit content of the dream'. Implicit meaning is desire masked by a mask, 'that hidden thing which we can reach only through conceptual analysis,' the 'implicit dream thought.' Dreaming is like making up a riddle, the manifest dream is the content of the riddle, that is, the answer to the riddle, and the hidden meaning is the answer to the riddle. In this way, Freud divided the dream into two parts - manifest dream and implicit dream.

How did Freud interpret dreams?

The first is 'sex', as far as the development of sex is concerned, Freud believes that the ID plays a role. Because sex is one of the most intense human pleasures, Freud theorized that sex is the most important driving force for humans in most given circumstances. Freud did not limit sex to the genital experience, but included everything that produced pleasure in such an all-encompassing view of sexual desire. The basis for measuring all experiences and emotional interactions is their ability to move us closer or further away from satisfying our pleasure-seeking needs.

The second is 'lies.' Freud always said that the ego and the superego are the least honest, only the id is honest, but it is repressed by the first two. The id and superego are often in conflict, and the ego becomes the peacemaker. Therefore, people with a strong ego are often seen as people who adhere to the 'golden mean'. The healthiest person can combine the ID, ego, and superego so that each of the three can live in harmony with the other two. The most unhealthy person cannot harmoniously combine the three, so that neither of the ID, ego, or superego can live in harmony with the other two and share the pleasure. This is where 'lies' become important. The side of the personality most in need of compensation often tries to manipulate the other two aspects in the sleep state, subconsciously achieving purposes that cannot be achieved in the current waking state.

Finally, there is 'videotape.' Freud always liked to compare the brain to a sponge in a way. He believed that the earliest childhood experiences were recorded by the brain and preserved in memory in order to explain events in later life. For Freud, a dream is a scene from childhood that has been adapted and then evolved into an adult experience.

According to Freud, dreams are sort of like riddles and jigsaw puzzles. To understand dreams, Freud encouraged the use of free association methods between dream imagery and waking consciousness. In this way, he hopes to interpret dreams by capturing the subtle meanings and conflicts that have been projected into the subconscious world.