It is time to focus on the “real” content of all (or most) dreams. It is time to focus on sexuality in dreams. Some readers might suggest that I am a prude or perhaps sexually repressed since I have been writing about everything in dreams except sexuality. After all, the premier of dreams, Dr. Freud, declares that any significant dream is ultimately a disguised expression of sexual wishes.
While I greatly admire the genius of Sigmund Freud’s interpretative work in his seminal study of dreams (S. Freud, 1900/2010), I beg to differ with him regarding the universality of sexuality in dreams—and am joined in this counter perspective by many interpreters of dreams. I might even include Dr. Freud’s daughter (Anna Freud) on this list—but I will get to this later in this essay.
Sigmund Freud’s Perspective: All Dreams Are Ultimately Sexual!
For Freud, the entirety of our life (waking and sleeping) ultimately concerns the addressing of sexual urges. This task was quite challenging for Freud as someone who lived in the highly repressive society of Vienna Austria. According to Sigmund, it seems that sexuality was on the “back burner” of the minds (and bodies) of every human being living during the Victorian Era in Europe during the late 19th Century and early 20th Century. This being the case, then all dreams must serve somehow as an indirect expression of this back-burner sexuality. While Freud acknowledged later in his life the role played by aggression as a powerful primitive instinct, the “die was already caste” – dreams were primarily if not exclusively devoted to the indirect expression of forbidden sexual desires.
Given the brutal nature of sexual repression in Victorian/Viennese society, the expression of sexuality in dreams usually had to be deeply hidden and creatively expressed. Freud was himself in full denial regarding the actual sexual behavior of Viennese men and women (especially men). Male members of their own family sexually molested many Viennese women—and these women were beginning to acknowledge this molestation. Sigmund Freud thought this abuse to be impossible given that “decent” Viennese men would never violate a female member of their family. Freud preferred to believe that women actually were wishing for and fantasizing about these sexual encounters.
In alignment with his psychoanalytic theory, Freud was being pulled in multiple directions by his own psyche. There was his liberating recognition of active sexual desires in both men and women. This Id-based perspective in Freud’s psyche existed alongside his repressive denial of sexual abuse. A strong Super-Ego would not allow for this abuse by the men Sigmund Freud encountered. It seems that Freud was correct in emphasizing early life influences. Perhaps, he should have been more cognizant of his repressive upbringing, resulting in his oppressive moral judgments as an adult (Rieff, 1979).
To kick off this exploration of sexuality in dreams, I will report specifically on dreams that were recounted by my colleague—who I will call “Frank” (because of his remarkably frank recounting of dreams related to sexuality). Frank is a 78-year-old retired college professor. He went through several marriages during his lifetime and had a healthy sex life when married and when not married. His latest wife died several years ago after a brief bout with cancer. Frank now lives alone.
