On How Dreams Differ From Vision- A Jungian View

Discovering your True Personal Vision is something that would have far-reaching effects in a change agent’s life: both on the personal and professional fronts. An innate vision which is distinct to you, True Personal Vision acts as a never-depleting fuel which helps you reach for even higher success. All you have to do is discover it within yourself.

But therein lies the problem. The discovery of True Personal Vision is harder than one may imagine(We discuss more on the reasons later.) One of the major reasons is its hazy nature of its existence. In that sense, a vision has more in common with dreams than one may have thought.

It’s worth inspecting these similarities closer to gain better understanding of vision.

Dreams

Dreams may be heartfelt but confusing them with vision is folly

Dream logic versus vision logic

Your vision is not a “dream” in the prosaic sense of the word. It’s not something you see in your sleep like an ephemera and forget all about once you are awake. But it is similar to a “dream” in the sense we use that term to mean a deep aspiration.

There’s yet another way in which true personal vision and the notion of dreams correlate. Both could be hard to discern in its purest form. This happens with dreams you see in sleep because of the near-impossibility in revisiting them in memories. In the case of vision, this happens because you get lose of your vision- as innate as it is- when you are bombarded with distractions. And as many who live in the 21st century know, distractions have unfortunately become practically a way of life these days.

There is one more manner in which a dream and vision could hold similarities. It’s in the way in which the two express themselves. According to Jungian philosophy, dreams are a way for the psyche to communicate important things to you.

But the psyche is an economical communicator. Meaning, it tries to communicate the most meanings using as limited a number of images as possible. This is why symbols form a huge part of many dreams.

Symbols as a means to unlocking meaning of vision

One of the most common symbol-types seen in dreams is that of a humanoid figure. This figure could be scary- think of an eight feet tall man clad in black, oozing blood from his eyes yet grinning happily like a child eating ice cream. The figure could also be benevolent- like an angelic being, white and radiant, floating down from the sky with the promise of bringing you solace.

Now, these two figures could be considered as symbols of good and evil. Instead of having someone speak in your dream that “Good things are going to happen to you!” or “You are in for some bad time!” the dream throws up symbols which mean these things and more, using symbols that makes a direct and fast impression on your mind.

But this concise manner of psyche’s communication is also what makes interpreting dreams hard at times. For example, how could you be sure that the man in black in the example mentioned above is truly out to hurt you?

Maybe you are working at a job which is extremely stressful but which also demands you to be smiling and generally appear happy at all times in front of your co-workers. The black figure then becomes symbolic of your present self- drawing your attention to the grotesqueness of your situation, and thereby becoming a call to take action and remedy the situation.

Conversely, the angelic being with the promise of peace might be representative of someone you trusted recently but who betrayed you for some reason.

In other words, the symbols that appear in a dream may not be as straightforward as they may look at first. Their real meanings may depend on the current context in which the person lives.

This sort of interpretative challenges are often encountered in relation to True Personal Vision as well.

Your vision may not be as symbolically reliant as a dream. But still, there are nuances in it which needs to be brought to clarity. This requires interpretative methods that would combine both subjective and objective views.

Influence Maps

TVL- combining subjective and objective analyses to bring vision to the fore

Temenos Vision Lab(TVL) is a session developed by Temenos+Agility which helps you discover your True Personal Vision. Based on 25 years of business consultancy experience and psychological insights, TVL is conducted by some of the best leadership coaches in business. Their assured guidance is something you could rely on to help bring clarity to your vision.

Also, TVL has steps in which you create and share your personal mythology with your team members. This would help you form a narrative of your progress so far and in turn discern the ideas and actions that helped you progress in the past. Later, this in turn helps you identify the nuances in the vision that’s hidden in you- whether they correlate to any of your previous experiences and if they do, what are the strategies you could adopt to attain the vision.

Temenos Effect Gathering

Temenos Effect Gathering 2018- Bengaluru, India(Dec 29, 2018)

An event dedicated to the idea of personal mastery, for nurturing your beautiful self, for change agents and leaders to become their true selves.

For more details, visit our website: https://www.visiontemenos.com/events


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