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Dreamwork and Self-Healing: Unfolding the Symbols of the Unconscious

Author(s) : Greg Bogart

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Scott Kiser on 11/06/2010 17:42:59

(5 out of 5)

Bogart passionately affirms the immense value of therapeutic dreamwork. Far from being merely an academic treatise on Jungian dream analysis, this book is particularly successful in a much more crucial dimension, that of practical life-application. While it provides a substantive and compelling presentation of Jungian dreamwork, this presentation is grounded in application to a broad range of vignettes that demonstrate profound life-transformation. The important role of dreamwork within the psychotherapeutic process is clearly evident throughout the book, an emphasis that is especially significant for clinical practitioners who will find it of great value to their work. Bogart also moves beyond an exclusively individual focus by providing a chapter on the healing impact of dreamwork within the context of relational problems, a much-needed perspective regarding an application of dreamwork that is usually not given adequate attention. Perhaps the strongest contribution of the book is Bogart's discussion of core Jungian concepts and their application to case examples. His articulation of such concepts as archetypes, complexes, persona and shadow, anima/animus, synchronicity, the mandala, and individuation reveals their essential meaning through the dynamic lens of individual dreams and their healing messages. These conceptions come to life, taking on vivid and urgent form as the reader is led to a deeper understanding of their transformative purpose in the dreams of everyday people who struggle for greater wholeness. The central focus on dreamwork as a catalytic facilitator of individuation, and in turn, of individuation as an inherently spiritual process of death and rebirth, represents one of the most crucial and important aspects of the book. For the reader, this affirms and heightens the critical awareness that much is at stake regarding dreamwork, that beyond surface-level interpretations of dream imagery his or her life hangs in the balance, or rather the condition of imbalance that must be sacrificed and left behind on the path of healing. Bogart passionately calls us to unify our inner opposing forces and tensions, to become more fully integrated, balanced, and whole human beings through surrendering to the summons of individuation within our dreams.
- Scott Kiser, Ph.D, Saybrook University