Commentary on Levy and Finnegan

This very interesting clinical material gives us a welcome opportunity to reflect on the meaning of dreams in analysis and the ways we address and think of them—particularly when the patient is silent about them or is otherwise reluctant to engage directly with the analyst. The paper is offered as a commentary on the possibilities of dreams as a means of working through trauma. For me, though, what seems in play with these dreams is not so much trauma and its resolution, but rather how the dreams depict the psychoanalytic process itself. I think of the dreams as a reflection and commentary on the ongoing psychoanalytic process, representing the patient's internal world as it plays out in the workings of the transference and countertransference. I think more of how the dream functions than of what it might “say.”

The analyst describes his sensitivity to his patient's sense of fragility, a sensitivity that from the outset, I think, exerts a particular grip on the analysis. With that in mind I was particularly interested in the state of mind the dreams arouse in the analyst. For example, the analyst's response might take the form of an overriding and inhibiting concern about trying to get it just right with his patient. The patient's dreams, then, would not only depict her anxieties and fantasies, but would also transmit those anxieties to the analyst. The analyst may unwittingly enact these anxieties by taking an overly careful approach to the dream material.

I don't accord dreams a privileged place in the analytic work. Once a dream is told, I think immediately of how both the dream and its telling are used by the patient. Does she allow the analyst room to think about the dream? Do interpretations excite her or shut her down? Does the analyst feel he has to fit in with the patient's requirements? I don't think we should treat dreams as unique modes of expression. Like everything said