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I Dream of Meaning

According to the awesomely named and Oklahoman-powered website NewsOK, an understanding of the symbols in your dreams can engender positive change in your conscious life. Quoth Ivy Norris, the field director for the Oklahoma Schools of Metaphysics: "If people know what the symbols represent, then they..

Patrick James
By Patrick JamesJan 07, 2009
Patrick James
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According to the awesomely named and Oklahoman-powered website NewsOK, an understanding of the symbols in your dreams can engender positive change in your conscious life. Quoth Ivy Norris, the field director for the Oklahoma Schools of Metaphysics:"If people know what the symbols represent, then they know what part of themselves that they're running from or that they need to face or need to embrace."Fair enough. But who's to say what the symbols represent? Well, per to NewsOK and Norris, "Dreams are a universal connection ... because almost everyone dreams and a 'symbolic universal language of mind' applies to anyone at anytime."Operating within that all-encompassing universal mind language, cars represent the physical body and deteriorating health. Flying represents freedom. Teeth falling out of one's mouth (this is apparently quite a common dream) represents being ill-equipped or differently-equipped to break down knowledge. And dreams about public nudity reveal your (positive or negative) take on self-expression.I don't have beef with any of these symbols in and of themselves, but can we really assign fixed meanings to images that appear in our many subconscious minds? What would Jung say about this?If there's a psychologist (or, um, metaphysicist) out there who can enlighten me, please do so in the comments.(Photo: Freud - Exploring the unconscious mind, by Flickr user One From RM.)

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