Introduction to Psychoanalysis

Chapter 26 The Satisfaction of Desire (2)
So in general, although you oppose the theory of "desire-fulfillment", I have never compromised; we have never been willing to prevaricate the task: to prove that there is a desire-fulfillment in every disguised dream.Let us now return to the analysis of a dream which has been interpreted before, that of a florin and a half who bought three tickets for bad seats, from which we have learned a great deal about dreams.Hope you remember it.One day, the wife heard from her husband that her friend Alice, who was three years younger than him, was engaged. That night, she dreamed of going to the theater with her husband, and the seats on one side of the theater were almost empty.The husband told her that Alice and her fiancé were supposed to come, but the reason why they didn't turn up was that they didn't want to spend a florin and a half to buy three tickets for bad seats.She said that it was no loss for him, but a bargain.We learn that she was dissatisfied with her husband in the hidden meaning of the dream and regretted that she married too early.How, we may wonder, did her thoughts of regret turn into gratifications of desire?How to reveal many clues in the manifest content of the dream?We already know that words such as "too early" and "too hastily" are invisible by censorship; the seats in the theater are now the allusion to this element. The phrase "a florin and a half buys three tickets for bad seats" is originally ambiguous; but when we understand symbolism, it is easy to see that "three" is in fact a man's representative, so it is clear that this part of the dream The obvious meaning can be translated as: "Use a dowry to buy a man to be a husband", "Such a rich dowry should buy a man ten times better". "Going to the theater" is clearly a symbol of marriage. "Buy tickets too early" implies getting married too early.This process of substitution is the work of desire fulfillment.Although the dreamer is dissatisfied with getting married too early, it is not always as strong as the day when he heard that his girlfriend was engaged.She once boasted that she was happier in her marriage than her girlfriend.We often hear, too, of young women, when the day of their betrothal comes, filled with joy at being able to see plays of every kind which they were not allowed to see before.

Undoubtedly, the display of curiosity and the desire to "voyeuristically" stem from the sexual "stealing urge", especially with regard to parents, and this urge is a powerful motivator for early marriage in children; become a substitute for marriage.Now that she regrets marrying too early, she recalls that marriage also satisfied her "voyeuristic impulse", and under the control of this primitive desire, she replaces the idea of ​​marriage with the idea of ​​going to the theater.

It may seem to you that the previous example does not seem easy to explain the latent desire-fulfillment; indeed, we are compelled to make such a circuitous interpretation of any pretended dream.We cannot go into detail here, we can only state that this method of research must have been highly accomplished.From a theoretical point of view, however, I would very much like to have this point explored in greater depth; we know from experience that this is the most contradictory and misunderstanding point of view in the whole theory of dreams.And you may feel that I have retracted part of my theory because I have said that dreams are the fulfillment of desires, and can also be the opposite of desire fulfillment, such as anxiety or punishment; you may also feel that this is also a good opportunity to force me to do more. concessions.At the same time I was reproached with presenting the facts I had adopted so briefly as to be unconvincing.

You have carried out your study of dream analysis to this point, and have accepted our theory to this extent, but you are still perplexed about the question of "desire fulfillment", and you may ask: We admit that every dream has its own meaning. Why, despite the denial of all evidence to the contrary, do we reluctantly place this meaning in the formula for the fulfillment of desires, which psychoanalysis can discover in dreams?Why are our thoughts not as colorful in the night as in the day?Why isn't the same dream sometimes a desire-fulfillment and sometimes the opposite of a desire-fulfillment, like panic, and sometimes a resolution, a warning, the opposite of a problem, or a condemnation , a pang of conscience, or a preparation for a certain cause, or something else?Why insist on calling it a desire, or at best the opposite of desire?

Perhaps we can say that it does not matter if we agree with any other point and disagree with only one point.Now that we know the meaning of dreams and the method of analyzing their meaning, are we not satisfied?If we try to limit the meaning of dreams too much, all the achievements we have made in the past will be for naught.But this method is obviously not correct.Since the misunderstanding of this question is so important in relation to our knowledge of dreams, the consequences of this question will threaten the value of this knowledge for the understanding of neuroses.Another point is that "obedience to others" is valuable for life, but it is harmful to science.

Why aren't dreams multifaceted?The first answer to this question is quite general, that we do not know why this is so, nor do we object that it is so.For me, they may not be the same.There is, however, a small obstacle to this very broad conception of dreams, the fact that the meaning of dreams is not multifaceted.My second answer will focus on the fact that dreams represent various assumptions about thought and intellectual functioning, which I do not think is an illusory notion.Once when I was researching the pathological development history of a disease, I recorded a dream that lasted for three nights and then did not reappear.According to my interpretation at the time, this dream expressed a determination, and when the determination became a reality, dreaming was no longer necessary.Afterwards, I published another dream, which was analyzed to express a kind of confession.Now why am I contradicting myself, always saying that dreams are just the fulfillment of desires?
I would rather contradict myself than admit a foolish distortion which might cost us all the results of the study of dreams; The same must then be true of the manifest content of the dream.It is true that dreams can express or be reduced to many of the above-mentioned manifestations of thought, such as determination, warning, introspection, and preparation and planning of behavior.However, if you observe carefully enough, you will know that these are just various hidden meanings converted into dreams.From the experience of dream analysis, you can understand that people's subconscious processes have many such determinations, preparations and reflections, and the dream work becomes the "raw material" of the dream.Whenever your interest is centered on people's subconscious processes rather than dream-work, you can ignore the constituent material of the dream and say that the dream itself represents a warning, a resolution or Other things, in fact, are not the same.It is also frequently used in psychoanalytic studies: generally speaking, we only seek to break down the representation of the dream and replace it with a rather latent content from which the dream arises.

Therefore, when we discuss the latent meaning of dreams, we inadvertently realize that the advanced and complex psychological activities we just mentioned can be completed in the subconscious mind. in conclusion.

But now we shall return to business: you think that dreams represent modes of thought, and if you replace this statement with a more abbreviated expression, which does not regard these modes of thought as the main quality of dreams, you will of course be quite right.When speaking of a dream, you mean either the manifest content of the dream, which is the result of the dream-work, or the dream-work itself, the psychic process by which the latent dream-content is transformed into the manifest dream-work.If you think that there are other meanings, you are trying to confuse your thinking and make mistakes.If what you want to talk about is the hidden meaning of dreams, you must express it clearly, and don't use vague words to increase the obscurity of the question.The latent dream-content is the material with which the dream-work forms the manifest dream.Why do you confuse materials with methods of making them?Some people only understand that the final product of dream work is manifested dream, but they cannot explain its origin, that is, the origin of dream and the process of dream creation, that is, dream work.If you cannot distinguish manifest dreams from latent thoughts, your fault is the same as theirs.

The only point of the dream itself is the dream-work which deals with the material of thought, and we have no right to ignore this matter in terms of theory, although in some practical cases it is not necessarily impossible to ignore it.Furthermore, analytical observations have shown that the dream-work has always been more than a translation of the latent thoughts into the primitive, degenerate forms of expression mentioned above.On the contrary, there will always be something attached to it "which is not part of the hidden meaning of the day, but which actually becomes the motive of the formation of the dream", and this is the desire of the unconscious, an indispensable element; the transformation of the content of the dream It is for the satisfaction of this desire.Therefore, if you only discuss that dreams express thoughts, then dreams can be anything: a warning, a resolution, or a preparation, etc.However, in addition to this, dreams themselves are often the fulfillment of a subconscious desire; if you think that dreams are only the products of dream-work, apart from the fulfillment of desires, they have no other meaning.Therefore, the dream must not only be the expression of a resolution, a warning; but also a resolution or something else, dreams often use the unconscious desire to degenerate into its most primitive form, and the result of translation is the fulfillment of this desire.In general, the main quality of dreams is the quality of wish-fulfilment, and the others are optional.

All of this is clear to me, but I don't know if you understand it too.It is not easy to prove this point; on the one hand, evidence is needed, and the evidence can only be obtained after careful analysis of many dreams; on the other hand, the most important point for the concept of dreams can only be discussed in conjunction with other phenomena. convincing, but these discussions are left for the future.If you understand how closely these phenomena are related, you will know what the nature of one phenomenon is, and you cannot know the nature of this other phenomenon without research.Since we do not yet understand the symptoms of neuroses which are analogous to the phenomena of dreams, we have to take what we understand as contentment for the time being, and we will now give another example to draw a new inference.

Again we cite as an example the dream "one and a half florins buy three theater tickets" which has already been discussed several times, and frankly there is no particular reason for choosing this example.We have already learned that the hidden meaning of this dream is: the dreamer hears that her friend has just got engaged, that is, she deeply regrets that she married too early, and thinks that if she can wait patiently, she may marry a better husband.Therefore, she looked down on her current husband a little bit.We also know that the latent content of these dreams contributes to a dream-desire, a "voyeuristic impulse" to be free to go to the theatre, the product of an original impulse to wonder what will happen after marriage.We know that this curiosity of the child often takes as its object the sexual life of the parents; that is, it is an infantile impulse which, if present in adults, must have its origin in infancy.However, the news heard the day before the dream did not arouse the "peeping impulse", but aroused remorse and resentment.This voyeuristic desire is not directly related to the latent content of the dream at first, so even if the voyeuristic desire is excluded in the analysis, the interpretation of the dream can still be obtained.However, remorse cannot form a dream by itself: regret for a premature mistake in marriage is not enough to make a dream, but because this thought arouses the previous desire to see what will happen after marriage.This desire then becomes the content of the dream, and marriage is replaced by going to the theater; its form is the fulfillment of an earlier desire: "It is now possible to go to the theater to see plays which were forbidden before, but you cannot, Because I'm married, you still have to wait." In this way, the actual situation becomes its opposite, and the previous victory replaces the recent regret;The fulfillment of the latter determines the manifest content of the dream; that is, the manifest dream: the dreamer is seated in the theatre, but her friend cannot see it.The other parts of the dream are actually the fulfillment of this desire and are omitted here.Behind the dream still hides the hidden meaning of the dream.The task of dream analysis is to find the hidden meaning of pain hidden behind, and omit the part which represents the fulfillment of desire.

The purpose of this long passage above is only to draw your attention to these hidden meanings of dreams.First, you must remember that the dreamer is ignorant of the latent contents of the dream; secondly, these latent contents are all quite plausible and interrelated, and can therefore be regarded as a proper response to whatever stimulus provoked the dream.Thirdly, the latent content of a dream is as valuable as any psychic impulse or intellectual activity.We would like to give the latent image a more restrictive name than before, and call it "remembrance" of the previous day, to which the dreamer can either admit or deny.I can therefore draw a distinction between "remnants" and latent thoughts, but whatever is discovered by the analysis of dreams is called latent dream-content.It is also what we have used before; "the remnants of the day before" is only part of the hidden meaning.Therefore, we can describe the events of the dream as follows: In addition to the "remembrance of the previous day", there is still a powerful but repressed unconscious impulse of desire, which makes it possible for the dream to form.This impulse of desire thus affects the so-called "remnant mind," and other parts of the latent mind, that is, parts comprehensible to the non-waking mind, follow.

I once used a metaphor to explain the relationship between remnants and subconscious desires, and I repeat it here again.In every kind of enterprise there is a capitalist who pays for it, and a planner who designs it and knows how to carry it out.For the structure of dreams, capitalists are often subconscious desires, which provide the necessary resources of spiritual energy for the formation of dreams; while planners only determine the way of energy consumption for the "remnants of the previous day".The capitalist himself could have both the plan and the required knowledge, and the planner himself can be said to be well-capitalized.This can simplify the situation, but increase its difficulty in theory; for economics, the same person often distinguishes between the function of a capitalist or the ability of a planner. After identifying the difference, our Metaphors are justified.A similar change occurs in the formation of dreams: leave it to your imagination.

This issue can no longer be continued at this point. I think you may have doubts in your mind for a long time, and now it seems that the time is right to raise it immediately.Asked: "The so-called 'remnant' is subconscious, is it really the same as the desire to form a dream?" This question is certainly good: this is the most important point in the whole incident.Both are subconscious, but their meanings are not the same.Dream desires are another form of the unconscious, and it is of course very convenient to distinguish them by names.But we prefer to do research after we have grasped the phenomenon of neurosis.If the concept of the subconscious has made some people fanciful, now we have to conclude that there are two subconscious minds, and people will be even more fussed.

So, let's end with that for now.Once again you have heard unfinished words; yet we may just hope that our knowledge in this field will be improved by our own efforts or by the studies of others, and what we have acquired is amazing enough to make people Surprised.

(End of this chapter)