Discuss the history of dream-work in counseling. How do you plan to use this technique as a counselor?

What will be an ideal response?


?Interpretation of dreams is another mainstay of some analytic approaches to therapeutic work, perhaps most notably in Freudian and Jungian analysis. Freud called dreams the “royal road to the unconscious,” and Jung suggested that the unexamined dream is like the unopened letter. They both had great respect for dreams and worked extensively with people to help them decipher the meaning of their dreams.
?Freud and Jung developed different ways of thinking about dreams and their meaning and different methods for interpreting their importance, but both valued the dream experience’s capacity to tie conscious and unconscious aspects of the self more closely together.
?Some counselors believe that dreaming is an attempt to finish the unfinished business of the day, and suggest that all counselors make working with dreams an integral part of their work. Other counselors approach dreams a little differently, less intellectually.
?For example, Gestalt therapists believe that the importance of the dream lies in how we project aspects of ourselves into different dream components. Working in this framework, a counselor might assume that different dream characters represent different parts of the dreamer’s personality, or of her “unfinished business.”
?The Jungian analyst June Singer (1972) believes counselors and psychotherapists should track a client’s dreams as much as they track the ongoing events of the client’s life. She believes that most human difficulty exists because of the split between an unexamined inner life and an overly active outer life, and she suggests that dreams have the greatest potential for healing that split. She is a strong advocate for helping clients to befriend their dream lives.
?Rather than more formal dream work, you might prefer to explore the client’s own personal take on the dream. “So what do you think it means?” could be your approach. If obvious symbolisms or meanings occur to you, you might carefully share and check the meaning of those with this client. Dreams are a rich, potent source of material for counseling discussion and work. They may shed light on

Counseling

You might also like to view...

Sometimes a helper must challenge inadequate participation in the helping process. Which of the following is the most predominant reason that a client fails to participate adequately?

A. The client is always reaching outward to others. B. The client is reluctant to change. C. The client is too introspective. D. The client has set too many goals.

Counseling

Answer the following statement(s) true (T) or false (F)

1. Historical and intergenerational trauma contributes to the high levels of social and individual problems in Native communities. 2. It is perfectly all right to “treat” the symptoms or manifestations of historical trauma by using only conventional Western psychological and psychiatric approaches. 3. In many Western cultures, the past, present, and future are viewed as being unified and continuous. 4. Counselors should avoid any utilization of Native traditional healing methods, as these healing methods have often been stolen by the culture at large. 5. Counselors should respect the use of silence when working with Native clients.

Counseling

Card sorts have been used almost exclusively as a substitute for paper and pencil interest inventories

Indicate whether the statement is true or false.

Counseling

Anticipated Result: Clients will go more deeply into their emotional experience. They may correct the ________ with another word. With some clients, the brief acknowledgment of ________ may be more appropriate

a. encourage/restatement b. paraphrase c. reflection of feeling d. summary

Counseling