People are learning to feel more comfortable hearing one another's dreams. It used to be that if you told a dream in public, someone had to make a joke to relieve the tension introduced by that alternative reality.
Henry Reed
Henry Reed Quote
From the earliest days of humanity, dreams have occupied a mysterious space in people's lives. To many listeners, sharing a dream was often a source of embarrassment. As psychologist Henry Reed points out, this discomfort might have provoked one to pen a joke to change the subject to "alleviate the tension" created by the dream and allow everyone to move on.
But that worldview is already changing today. Those who speak about dreams are now met with acceptance as chances to hear and learn about one another's inner lives instead of as socially strange oddities.
Dreams in past
In past centuries, dreams were often dismissed as random neural firings or, if fears were invoked, irrational, or even malignant. With the advent of psychology, and as cultural openness progresses, we are increasingly amenable to considering dreams somehow important to us.
Over time, instead of recapping dreams as meaningless, people are beginning to appreciate them as significant contributions to self-discovery, creative inspiration, and emotional understanding. Sharing dreams evolved from something that people cleared the air about to sharing multifaceted inner thoughts, and expressions of connecting feelings.
The psychological worth of dreams
Perhaps one prominent avenue that can rationalize this swift sea change is the increased familiarity and consciousness about the psychological worth of dreams. They seem to intimate what the conscious mind dodges and sometimes provide clues to shrouded emotional issues, fears, or wishes.
Many therapists now recommend their clients share and delve into their dreams as part of therapy as a process beneficial in providing them more clarity of their emotional worlds. This influence has begun to trickle down into people's lives outside of therapy where more and more people recognize the value of their dreams and the point of just listening without judgment.
The interesting fact is that the media today have provided an unprecedented opportunity for people to open up about sharing dreams. The boom of online memory boxes dedicated to dream interpreting and personal storytelling provides safe spots where people can express even the wildest of their dreams and get thoughtful input.
Hence, allies become comfortable witnesses and circumspect listeners, helping the dreamer see elements of commonality despite the cultural variances. The commonality of acceptance is what is slowly normalizing the process of sharing dreams as making sense instead of posing as something somewhat awkward.
The relationship of dreams to creativity
Dream-sharing groups are popular not only for their benefits but mainly as a part of artistic inspiration. Artists, writers, and other creatives have often drawn from their dreams in some form or other to produce new ideas and insights. By sharing dreams, creatives find an uncommon yet purposeful mode of brainstorming. These groups allow them to outrun the inhibitive inner voice, embracing the dream state that fuels creativity and insights into the realm of myth.
This appears to be part of a social shift towards embracing vulnerability and honesty. Sharing dreams opens up spaces for someone to peer-audit and express parts of an individual that one might normally want to keep sublimated. Here is a rare opportunity for honesty and empathy to emerge when sharing, with the listeners welcoming sharing as an expression rather than viewing it with disdain as childish.
Conclusion
Henry Reed's insight on the discomfort around dreams reminds us that we have come a long way in making space for acceptance of this unique human experience. As people become more comfortable sharing and listening to dreams, they function to deepen ties and help nurture self-discovery within the sharing community. What once bound into nervous laughter engages one with an expedition to the subconscious, reflection, and connection with others anew.
