Chapter 4 The Active Exploratory and Assertive Self as Manifested in Dreams

In this chapter I will look at the use of dreams in psychoanalysis from the perspective of the psychology of the self, and I will suggest that one of the central functions in both dream formation and dream interpretation is the restoration of a sense of active mastery to the dreamer. Support for this hypothesis comes from an extension of Kohut's concept of self-state dreams, from child observation studies that posit a motivational system organized around exploration and assertiveness and the search activity concept of Rotenberg, which is derived from experimental/empirical studies in man and animals.

Kohut's (1971) concept of a vigorous, firm, and cohesive self as the center of initiative and experience represents the most systematic and consistent study of the self in normal and pathological development. In Kohut's metapsychology, the healthy assertiveness of the self is presented as an alternative to Freud's pseudobiological concept of an aggressive/destructive drive. Although the self is an experience-near concept derived from empathic immersion in the patient's subjective experience, it is also used in the more abstract sense, referring to an intrapsychic structure. Clinically, the condition of loss of vitality (empty depression) is the antithesis of vigor and assertiveness, which is experienced as joy. Kohut describes the pathological defenses and