THE INTERPRETATION OF DREAMS: VII. ON THE PSYCHOLOGY OF
DREAM PROCESSES (C. ABOUT THE FULFILLMENT OF DESIRES"; "E. THE PRIMARY PROCESS AND THE
SECONDARY PROCESS. REPRESSION) (556-59; 581-92)
Sigmund Freud (1900)
Summary:
C. ABOUT WISH FULFILLMENT
So far, we have explored desire in dreams, deriving it from the unconscious and unraveling its link with the diurnal remains, which
may be desires, other psychic motions, or recent impressions. This perspective allows us to consider the possible influence o f the
work of conscious thought on the formation of sleep, even in extreme cases where sleep seems to continue an unfinished task o f
wakefulness.
However, we have not yet solved why during sleep the unconscious is mainly limited to the fulfillment of wishes. To understan d
this, we need to consider the psychic nature of desire, going back to the development of the psychic apparatus. We suppose th at,
in its initial stages, the apparatus mainly sought to remain free of stimuli and discharged sensory arousal reflexively.
However, bodily needs soon challenged him, giving rise to the search for emotional satisfaction. This led to the development of
desire as a way to restore the perception associated with satisfaction. At a primitive stage, this desire could have led to a type of
hallucination where psychic activity sought to repeat the perception linked to the satisfaction of need.
A bitter life experience has changed the activity of primary thought into a secondary one, more adapted to the ends sought. This
transformation is due to the fact that the internal perceptual identification does not produce the necessary satisfaction since the
need persists. To equate the value of internal identification with external identification, it would be necessary to maintain it
permanently, as in hallucinatory psychoses and hunger fantasies.
To achieve a more efficient use of psychic energy, it is necessary to stop the complete regression and allow the arousal to b e
diverted into other pathways that can establish the desired perceptual identity from the outside world. This inhibition of regression
and the diversion of excitation are functions of a second system that controls voluntary motility, using it for previously recalled
purposes.
The complex activity of thought leading from the mnemic image to perceptual identification with the external world represents a
detour to the fulfillment of desire, necessary because of past experiences. Therefore, thought functions as a substitute for
hallucinatory desire, evidencing that the dream, by fulfilling desires through regression, retains a vestige of the primary mode of
functioning of the psychic apparatus, abandoned as inadequate.
The dream presents itself as a revival of the infantile life of the soul, now superseded, while, in psychoses, these modes of psychic
functioning show its inability to satisfy its needs in the face of the external world.
Unconscious desire motions also aspire to rule during the day, as evidenced by transferences and psychoses. The censorship
between the Ice and the Prcc acts as a guardian of our mental health, but during the night, when this censorship is relaxed, the
motions of the Ice can be expressed. However, the critical guardian does not sleep soundly and ensures safety by blocking motility.
In pathological cases, such as psychoses, the weakening of censorship allows unconscious arousals to dominate, resulting in a loss
of control over speech and action, or even hallucinatory regression, thus characterizing the psychotic state.
E. THE PRIMARY PROCESS AND THE SECONDARY PROCESS. THE REPRESSION
We have succeeded in integrating the various findings of previous authors into our doctrine of sleep, although we still face a new
contradiction. On the one hand, we have established that dream thoughts originate from a normal mental process, but we have
also discovered a number of abnormal thought processes that affect the content of the dream. This leads us to question the qua lity
of mental performance during sleep.
For clarity, I emphasize that sleep replaces thoughts from our daytime life, which have perfect logic. However, it is not necessar y
to assume that this thought work took place during sleep, as it would contradict what we know about this psychic state.
It is more likely that these thoughts originated during the day, went unnoticed by our consciousness from the beginning, and
continued during sleep, being already prepared when we fell asleep. This suggests that more complex intellectual performances
are possible without the intervention of consciousness, as demonstrated by analyses of people with neuroses.
1
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DREAM PROCESSES (C. ABOUT THE FULFILLMENT OF DESIRES"; "E. THE PRIMARY PROCESS AND THE
SECONDARY PROCESS. REPRESSION) (556-59; 581-92)
Sigmund Freud (1900)
Summary:
C. ABOUT WISH FULFILLMENT
So far, we have explored desire in dreams, deriving it from the unconscious and unraveling its link with the diurnal remains, which
may be desires, other psychic motions, or recent impressions. This perspective allows us to consider the possible influence o f the
work of conscious thought on the formation of sleep, even in extreme cases where sleep seems to continue an unfinished task o f
wakefulness.
However, we have not yet solved why during sleep the unconscious is mainly limited to the fulfillment of wishes. To understan d
this, we need to consider the psychic nature of desire, going back to the development of the psychic apparatus. We suppose th at,
in its initial stages, the apparatus mainly sought to remain free of stimuli and discharged sensory arousal reflexively.
However, bodily needs soon challenged him, giving rise to the search for emotional satisfaction. This led to the development of
desire as a way to restore the perception associated with satisfaction. At a primitive stage, this desire could have led to a type of
hallucination where psychic activity sought to repeat the perception linked to the satisfaction of need.
A bitter life experience has changed the activity of primary thought into a secondary one, more adapted to the ends sought. This
transformation is due to the fact that the internal perceptual identification does not produce the necessary satisfaction since the
need persists. To equate the value of internal identification with external identification, it would be necessary to maintain it
permanently, as in hallucinatory psychoses and hunger fantasies.
To achieve a more efficient use of psychic energy, it is necessary to stop the complete regression and allow the arousal to b e
diverted into other pathways that can establish the desired perceptual identity from the outside world. This inhibition of regression
and the diversion of excitation are functions of a second system that controls voluntary motility, using it for previously recalled
purposes.
The complex activity of thought leading from the mnemic image to perceptual identification with the external world represents a
detour to the fulfillment of desire, necessary because of past experiences. Therefore, thought functions as a substitute for
hallucinatory desire, evidencing that the dream, by fulfilling desires through regression, retains a vestige of the primary mode of
functioning of the psychic apparatus, abandoned as inadequate.
The dream presents itself as a revival of the infantile life of the soul, now superseded, while, in psychoses, these modes of psychic
functioning show its inability to satisfy its needs in the face of the external world.
Unconscious desire motions also aspire to rule during the day, as evidenced by transferences and psychoses. The censorship
between the Ice and the Prcc acts as a guardian of our mental health, but during the night, when this censorship is relaxed, the
motions of the Ice can be expressed. However, the critical guardian does not sleep soundly and ensures safety by blocking motility.
In pathological cases, such as psychoses, the weakening of censorship allows unconscious arousals to dominate, resulting in a loss
of control over speech and action, or even hallucinatory regression, thus characterizing the psychotic state.
E. THE PRIMARY PROCESS AND THE SECONDARY PROCESS. THE REPRESSION
We have succeeded in integrating the various findings of previous authors into our doctrine of sleep, although we still face a new
contradiction. On the one hand, we have established that dream thoughts originate from a normal mental process, but we have
also discovered a number of abnormal thought processes that affect the content of the dream. This leads us to question the qua lity
of mental performance during sleep.
For clarity, I emphasize that sleep replaces thoughts from our daytime life, which have perfect logic. However, it is not necessar y
to assume that this thought work took place during sleep, as it would contradict what we know about this psychic state.
It is more likely that these thoughts originated during the day, went unnoticed by our consciousness from the beginning, and
continued during sleep, being already prepared when we fell asleep. This suggests that more complex intellectual performances
are possible without the intervention of consciousness, as demonstrated by analyses of people with neuroses.
1
Made by MatyBuda
