An Evening With Max McDowell: Analyzing a Dream

If you are a therapist working with a patient and their dream, you must use their associations. But, as a result, you cannot distinguish how much of the interpretation is from the dream text itself, how much is from the dreamer’s associations, and how much is from not only your prior knowledge of the dreamer but also the dreamer’s self-knowledge.

This presentation will include an experiment to test a hypothesis. The hypothesis is that the dream text alone is a coherent message about the dreamer’s development, told in a symbolic language that we can decipher. First, in discussion, we will analyze a dream text, knowing nothing of the dreamer (beyond age and gender identity) or of the dreamer’s associations. Then we will test our interpretation by hearing more about the dreamer. I hope to show that we must listen closely to the dream’s specific details and that internal repetition makes it possible to interpret the text alone. A dream is like a hologram in that the overall story is told in each part.

We will not work with the dream of any attendee. I will email attendees when they register, asking them to email to me the text only of an interesting dream from a person they know well who has given them permission. Because dreams are personal and can be unexpectedly revealing, this program will not be recorded.

Maxson J. McDowell, PhD, is a senior Jungian analyst and group therapist in private practice in New York City. Former President of the C.G. Jung Foundation for Analytical Psychology, he is also a longtime faculty member. He has taught courses in dream interpretation online and in person for over 25 years. He has published numerous papers on dream interpretation, Jungian psychology, narcissistic injury, systems theory, and autism. Previously he did research in molecular biology at MIT.