This being the case, then a dream directed by TDI and geared toward self-efficacy is likely to be successful as an influence on waking behavior if there is an experience of success in the dream and if the successful outcomes are readily apparent and even measurable. In other words, the ego needs to be quite active in setting the stage for the dream of self-efficacy. Transactional themes might be of great value if they can be enacted adjunctive to the TDI preparation. The fundamental question becomes: can a dreamer influence the overall theme of a dream as well as one of its specific intentions? The M.I.T. researchers are likely to issue a negative response to this question, given that TDI only seems to work when seeking to introduce a specific topic.
Dream Theme III: Introverted vs. Extraverted
While Carl Jung (1971) used the terms extraversion and introversion to identify differing personality types, these terms can also be used to identify two different kinds of dream themes. There are the extraverted types of dreams in which an external event interacts with, inspires, and stimulates internal dream content. By contrast, there are introverted dreams in which energy and content emerge from inside one’s psyche and are then conveyed (if at all) to the outside world via the reports and (often creative) productions of the dreamer.
Extraverted Dreams
Most of the analysts of dreams differentiate between the dream content that is generated inside the dream (or at least inside one’s psyche) and what they identify as the day residue that influences at least the “superficial” content of the dream—what is usually identified as the “manifest content” of the dream. The extraverted dream relies heavily on this latter source. While the manifest content might be dramatically changed during the dream, there is still the influence of the external world on this modified content. Put simply, extraverted dreams are considered to be fundamentally extra-psychic. In some way or another, these dreams offer a portrait of the external world as interpreted by the dreamer. Much as the real world in which we live is juxtaposed to an envisioned (dreamed about) world in novels (Samuel Butler’s Erehwon), in movies (Shangri-La) and in political rhetoric (“I had a dream”), the real world interplays with the envisioned world (good, bad, and bizarre) that is created in the dream.
There are actually two types of extraverted dreams. One type begins with external events and relationships. These, in turn, precipitate the content and provide the motivation for the events and relationships portrayed in the internal dream. The second type begins with the internal content—often a portrayal of some desired future state—which is transferred forcefully and compellingly into the external world: “I have a dream . . .” I first consider dreams that move from the external world to the world that exists within our psyche.
External to Internal: An exceptional example of the first type of extraverted dream is offered in Wild Strawberries, the acclaimed movie prepared by Ingmar Bergman, the Swedish moviemaker. Izak Borg, the protagonist in this movie, is an old man who is “trigger-happy.” Contemporary events and interpersonal interactions in his life trigger memories in his waking hours (daydreaming) and in his dreams. As I mentioned in a previous essay on dreams among older people (Bergquist, 2026b), the boundaries between one’s previous life and one’s current life are often quite permeable. We easily slip between nostalgia and awareness of our present surroundings when we are awake. External events also often trigger the internal processes of our dreams when we are asleep. This certainly was the case with Izak in the four dreams that were featured in Wild Strawberries.
