This article makes a brief contribution to the ongoing dialogue on dreams between neuroscience and psychoanalysis by linking several converging lines of evidence. Recent evidence indicates that the default mode network (DMN), a highly interconnected set of “hubs” in the brain, is active during sleep. In addition, activity in the DMN is strongly associated with mental imagery that is not directly tied to current perception (“stimulus-independent thought”), which is also a central feature of dreams. Finally, the elimination of dreams is correlated with lesions in areas that have a high degree of overlap with two regions of the DMN, the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) and the temporo-occipital junction. Given that the vmPFC is a key node in brain circuitry regulating motivation, these converging lines of evidence support the basic psychoanalytic idea that dreams arise from wishful impulses and other emotional motivations.