On behalf of discovering or creating a dialogue between the two collateral worlds, I propose that it is not only that our awake world is primarily constructed by the society in which we live (Berger and Luchmann, 1967) and that we can’t objectively observe this world that has been constructed for us. I would similarly propose that a new world integrating the two collateral worlds of awake and asleep/dream cannot be independently observed. For, once again, the observer of these two worlds is living in and experiences both worlds. The observer is being observed. The dialogue between these two worlds is inherently embedded in an intersubjective awareness that an integrative reality involving both worlds is always a construction that increases understanding rather than a validation process that confirms some “truth.”
Furthermore, it is important to affirm that we can’t dismiss our sleep/dream world as somehow “less” than our world when we are awake. For our total experience in life contains both worlds. We are “real” in both our dreams and the place where we work when awake. Our relationships with real and fictious people are just as “real” and impactful as our relationship with a loved one when we are awake.
Conclusions
A dialogue that can take place between these two “real” worlds is, indeed, an invaluable source of exploration, testing and growth. As emphasized by ego psychologists, the fundamental point to be made here is that dreams can be of great value, even critical, in the adaptation to a constantly changing environment. As Breger, Hunter, and Lane (1971, p. 188) note, dreams “provide the possibility of integrating contemporary material into . . . adaptive ‘solutions’.” This use of dreams to integrate adaptive solutions is critical in our mid-21st-century environment, where constant change is intertwined with volatility, uncertainty, complexity, ambiguity, turbulence, and contradiction (Bergquist, 2026).
Under these challenging VUCA-Plus conditions, adaptivity requires an agility (“dancing between the raindrops”) that is fortified by clarity and purpose. It is in the venue of dreams that we can find a safe place (a “play space”) for the exploration and envisioning of ways in which agility with clarity and purpose can be achieved. It is in the dynamic intersubjectivity of the conversation across a collateral chasm that we find a valid pathway to a fully integrated world of multiple realities.
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References
Adorno, Theodore et al. (1950/1964) The Authoritarian Personality. New York: Wiley.
Atwood, George and Robert Stolorow (1979/1993) Faces in A Cloud: Intersubjectivity in Personality Theory, Northvale, New Jersey: Json Aronson, Inc.
Barrett, Deirdre (2001) The Committee of Sleep. New York: Crown.
Berger, Peter and Thomas Luckmann (1967) The Social Construction of Reality. New York: Anchor Press.
Bergquist, William (2022) The Nature and Function of Dreams I: An Overview. Library of Professional Psychology. Link: https://library.psychology.edu/the-nature-and-function-of-dreams-i-an-overview/
Bergquist, Willliam (2023) Dreamer Beware: The Insightful Dreams of Sarah, Dan and Katherine, Library of Professional Psychology. Link: Dreamer Beware: The Insightful Dreams of Sarah, Dan and Katherine | Library of Professional Psychology
