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| Page 2 of Field of Dreams (Jungian Dream Interpretation), Page 1, 2 Signs
versus Symbols Signs
My example of using road signs has gotten even better over the years with the now common advent of using picture images on road signs.
It's an image treated as a sign. If you happened upon the picture of a deer when skimming through a magazine - you (most likely) wouldn't immediately think "Danger A Deer Crossing."
The image of a deer, looked at as a symbol, is pregnant with meaning, amplifications, and associations for each one of us. And no one has to tell you what the image of a deer means to you... For most of us, the answers we'd give regarding the qualities (and our various mental associations with the image) of a deer are rather similar and typical. Of course, the personal amplifications for someone who once had the misfortune to hit a deer with their car - their personal associations with a deer would probably be quite different than most of us. These folks might associate a deer with death, blood, destruction... Yep! A deer might have any of a whole host of unpleasant meanings for them... Freud / Jung
Freud believed the unconscious was purposely hiding the meaning of the images from our conscious minds. He believed that dreams contained a secret, hidden key - and the lock had to be broken into by force. For Freud - almost everything ultimately had a connection with sex, death, taboo and incest. Further, Freud obviously didn't much like or trust the unconscious. He saw the unconscious as primarily being a dark, forbidden wasteland and trash dump...
For Jung, our nightly dreams weren't trying to hide anything from us. Jung believed our dreams were trying to communicate with us. Jung believed the language of images and symbols, that our dreams utilize in communicating with us, is actually the very best possible method our unconscious has of imparting (getting across) the vast, myriad of their meanings to our conscious, waking minds. Dream
Symbols - A Sacred Open Secret Similar to our dreams, the Greek mysteries were "unutterable." They defied rational, logical description. It wasn't that the stories, symbols, and images were hiding the Greek mysteries, but that they [the mysteries] couldn't be spoken. The symbols and/or imagery of the Greek mysteries were in fact the best way of expressing what was otherwise impossible to express. Like the Greek mysteries, the symbols and/or imagery of our dreams are in fact the best way our unconscious has of expressing to us what is otherwise impossible to express. Problem is, though, that the right-brained mode of communication that our dreams utilize - images and symbols - is archaic, primitive, and generally unfamiliar territory to our modern, left-brained mode of thinking. And that's why their meaning often seems so hidden and mysterious...
The Top Ten Rules of Thumb to use Click The Thumb To See The Top Ten Rules Dream Dictionaries?
Does the dictionary treat dream images as signs or as symbols?
But never, ever embody a dream dictionary with the authority of being the "final answer" to the meaning of a dream symbol. Suggested Reading:
This article - Field of Dreams, Page 1, 2 |
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Take
for example the old traditional road signs such as "Speed Limit 65" or
"Nashville 25 miles." These are signs that have no meaning in themselves.
Years ago, they were as-'sign'-ed agreed upon meanings - and over time
we all come to learn what they mean. 
This
is a sign with, for example, the picture of a deer. It treats the image
as a sign, because we've as-'sign'-ed the picture of a deer with the specific
meaning of "Danger A Deer Crossing." 
Jung,
on the other hand, treated dream images as life giving symbols intent
on bringing
much needed healing to the psyche. Images, when treated as symbols, are
images that have meaning in and of themselves. Jung believed the unconscious
was
purposely
trying to speak to us in our dreams, in order to bring forth a sense
of wholeness and added meaning to our lives. 