A Note on dad Dreams

I typically make a point not to post dreams with people I know; still, in some ways, all the people I know who appear in my dreams are metaphors for psychological and emotional components inside me, especially parents.

Up till now everybody has been convinced that the idea “my father,” “my mother,” etc., is nothing but a faithful reflection of the real parent, corresponding in every detail to the original, so that when someone says “my father” he means no more and no less than what his father is in reality. This is actually what he supposes he does mean, but a supposition of identity by no means brings that identity about. This is where the fallacy of the enkekalymmenos (‘the veiled one’) comes in. If one includes in the psychological equation X’s picture of his father, which he takes for the real father, the equation will not work out, because the unknown quantity he has introduced does not tally with reality. X has overlooked the fact that his idea of a person consists, in the first place, of the possibly very incomplete picture he has received of the real person and, in the second place, of the subjective modifications he has imposed upon this picture. X’s idea of his father is a complex quantity for which the real father is only in part responsible, an indefinitely large share falling to the son. So true is this that every time he criticizes or praises his father he is unconsciously hitting back at himself, thereby bringing about those psychic consequences that overtake people who habitually disparage or overpraise themselves. If, however, X carefully compares his reactions with reality, he stands a chance of noticing that he has miscalculated somewhere by not realizing long ago from his father’s behaviour that the picture he has of him is a false one. But as a rule X is convinced that he is right, and if anybody is wrong it must be the other fellow.