We have all had dreams that seem significant, the imagery is so elusive though that we have difficulty in making sense of it. I will be the first to admit that sometimes our dreams are the result of our brains just playing with us or perhaps eating bad clams.
When a dream seems significant and you are just not able to decipher its meaning, hypnosis may be a way to gain understanding into what it is trying to help you process. Sigmund Freud viewed dreams as “the royal road” to the unconscious and developed dream analysis, or dream interpretation, as a way of tapping into this unconscious material. While I do not agree with many of his interpretations (sometimes a cigar is just a cigar), I do agree that using analysis through hypnosis is very useful because it allows a kind of experiential or Gestalt approach to figuring out what the dream is trying to tell you.
In my practice as a hypnotherapist I have helped with smoking cessation, weight loss, anxiety, stress, low self-esteem, trichotillomania (pulling out of eyelashes), test anxiety, stuttering and Dream Interpretation. Dream-work in Gestalt therapy is implemented somewhat differently than in psychoanalysis and Jungian analysis. Gestalt therapists believe that dreams are existential messages we send to ourselves. Through hypnosis these messages are actively explored to bring dream content into a person's actual life. While in trance the client is taken into the dream to look at it from a third person point of view. This sometimes illuminates significant symbology that then helps them to unlock the meaning.
Hypnosis gives you the added benefit of greater self-awareness. You know yourself whether something is relevant, you can feel it and then process whatever it is relating to with better clarity. It is important to note that dream symbology books are working from a very general place. Your dream symbols are unique to you and your life. If you would like help discovering the meanings of any dreams, particularly those that are recurring, I am happy to help and you may contact me at one of the means listed below.
"To sleep, perchance to dream" Shakespeare