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Dreams, Jung, and Memory Reconsolidation
In June 2026, Dreams, Jung, and Memory Reconsolidation will be published by Routledge.
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In this book, five archetypal dream experiences lead to the discovery that Jungian dreamwork may replicate the process of memory reconsolidation. Dream series concerning the anima, father, shadow, orphan, and self, revisited through episodic memories, strengthen somatic and salient pathways, leading to the conclusion that dreams are created through the interpersonal mind. The dreamwork and analyses bring Jungian psychology into consilience with interpersonal neurobiology.
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Jungian Dreamwork
One of these series depicting a pregnant black widow spider reveals a distinct aspect of the self archetype. The spider’s characteristic red-and-black hourglass, the black womb, and the uncontrollable infestation reference symbolic and archetypal material. However, five years after cancer treatment, while reflecting on the dual toxic and healing properties of medicine and venom, the experience of the self archetype surfaced. Looking back, this became the first example of memory reconsolidation through dreamwork. Additionally, the dreamwork demonstrates how both bottom-up processing via the body and emotional memory and top-down symbolic amplification enhance integration across multiple interpersonal neurobiological domains.
Neuroscience
Brief explanations of three modern neuroscientific theories update Jung’s metapsychological theory and conclusion that complexes are the gateway to the collective unconscious. Porges’ polyvagal theory demonstrates how somatic and relational connections enhance the prediction of others’ mental maps. McGilchrist’s hemispheric dominance theory suggests that ego consciousness can be divided between the two hemispheres, thereby improving subjective awareness of one’s dreams and waking life. Additionally, the processes outlined by Ecker, Ticic, and Hulley, collectively known as memory reconsolidation, strengthen the theoretical explanation that the dream brings new consciousness to implicit mental models, thereby resolving symptomatic blockages caused by old emotional episodic memories.
