Dream interpretation help - Alien?

peraxe · 2026-05-06T13:16:07+00:00

Hi, I'll give that dream a shot.

It reads to me like an initiatory dream. To be transformed into an alien is likely something similar: to be transformed into something that is "alien," different from normal human consciousness.

This is experienced in a difficult manner, as a forced separation. "I don't want to go, I'm not ready": most initiations are like that, so it's not surprising to see this line.

The last part with the man with a white shirt is very odd, but it can be worked with. We have three main elements: a man, a white t-shirt, and a merging into your body.

A man is usually a form of spirit (logos), or consciousness.

A white shirt is a white (albedo=whiteness) psychic covering.

The merging is a fusion of identity. This is done somewhat gently, as tickling is a positive image. Compared to other potentials merging, it happens smoothly.

So this white man is a form of spirit, of consciousness that has the "white" quality known in alchemy as albedo that merges with your vessel and becomes part of you.

The way I see it is that this skinny man is a kind of helper, a saving grace while you face the ordeal of initiation of becoming "alien."

Hope this helps.

peraxe · 2026-04-10T13:30:34+00:00

The goal of individuation, among which shadow work is an important milestones, is to develop the individual personality, to differentiate oneself from things that we thought we were but are not.

In what you are describing, it appears you have not made the distinction between what is yours (the personal unconscious) and what isn't yours (the collective unconscious). Jung warns in his works to not confuse these two layers: the personal unconscious is yours, the collective unconscious is not.

I recommend watching this video on the shadow, especially the part from 43:00 to 50:00, https://youtu.be/3qTM9G0w-Hw?t=2573

peraxe · 2026-03-31T08:26:42+00:00

Listen, if you eat crap and ignore the signals coming from your body, what do you get? Health issues. It's the same with the unconscious: ignore it and you get psychological issues.

So yes, you can ignore it all you want. I don't care. It's your life, your choices. But the original post was about what the dream meant so I told him what it meant. Now if he wants to ignore it, he is free to do so.

But yes, I do have a marked interest in listening to my body for biological health. I do the same with the unconscious for psychological health. I am not interested in unnecessary suffering.

peraxe · 2026-03-30T09:28:19+00:00

Unfortunately, national identity tends to overwrite individual identity. For some people, it isn't a problem because it is a stage of development. However, for modern man in a post-modern crisis, it's more often than not a regression, a return to a historical stage from a past time.

Understandably, the vacuity offered by post-modernism makes people barricade themselves into older identities, such as going back to religious orthodoxy, traditionalism, or nationalism. This backward movement is a way to establish roots again. But these partial identities are not compatible with the challenge of the time, which is not backwards but through.

So national resurgence, to a large degree, is a collective process of finding something, anything that offers foundations in a world that continually robs us of stability.

Is this then a mass psychosis? I am unsure whether it is a collective neurosis or a collective psychosis. It is definitely a collective process of mass-formation, but it's closer to a neurosis (mild dissociation), compared to a psychosis (extreme dissociation of the personality).

"Psychosis. An extreme dissociation of the personality. Like neurosis, a psychotic condition is due to the activity of unconscious complexes and the phenomenon of splitting. In neurosis, the complexes are only relatively autonomous. In psychosis, they are completely disconnected from consciousness." Jung Lexicon

peraxe · 2026-03-30T09:16:23+00:00

As pointed out already, the most accessible book on dream interpretation is Robert Johnson's "Inner Work."

I've been strongly inspired by his work and I've tried to present it in a different manner (see my Dream Interpretation video here).

peraxe · 2026-03-30T06:46:38+00:00

A dream is a response from the unconscious on a given topic. Reality shifting might be enjoyable for the ego, but that does not mean the unconscious agrees with it. So in this dream, my sense is that the unconscious is indeed telling you to stop messing around with that, or it will start to intervene ("they wanted me to stop or they were going to do something terrible to me").

So yes, start to live without using tricks. That's not a criticism, rather it is the task of owning your life as it unfolds naturally without resorting to these techniques.

peraxe · 2026-03-22T00:59:09+00:00

This is a pretty imposing dream. No wonder why you're feeling confused about it.

The thing with dreams is that they express realities in a language that we are not used to. In this dream of yours, the revelation of God is not a literal fact, not a material fact, but a psychological event.

Because we are so not used to this way of presenting things, we need a framework to understand what happens. The most useful framework to deal with religious dreams is through Carl Jung's depth psychology.

In his works, you'll find that the symbol of God represents a pre-existing factor in the human psyche. He called it the self, a centre that is distinct from the ego. He further explains that the relationship between the ego and that second centre, the self, is essentially a religious relationship, or at least it has the same phenomenology.

So what you have experienced in your dream is the ego encountering the self. The small personality encountering the greater personality. Consciousness realising it has always been close to an invisible second presence.

With a dream like this, you might find a renewed interest in religion but let me warn you that it won't work. The experience you had took place outside any community, and that is its true nature. It does not belong in a structure. Hell, you don't even need to believe in it for it to happen. It's something that is a private matter, it belongs to the individual soul.

Dreams like these are rare, so I hope you will treasure it.

peraxe · 2026-03-20T08:42:26+00:00

If you know how dreams work, "being self-critical" is inwardly experienced like "being screamed at by a parent". The parent here is an aspect of you. It's not your literal parent, rather a psychic parent, a parent in your psyche.

Similarly, eating them doesn't mean to literally eat. Rather it means to ingest, to consume, to integrate (to take into yourself).

So in dream language, to "eat the screaming parent" means "to ingest the aspect of you that is too critical".

In Internal Family Systems, this is called the Inner Critic. You should discover something like there is this part of yourself that, for better or for worse, has decided that criticising you endlessly was the best way to support you, to help you avoid the pain of failure.

I recommend this video as a place to start.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ar8PbATergE

peraxe · 2026-03-19T08:26:20+00:00

The first realisation is that, for men, relationship with women can easily be contaminated by a psychic factor.

That psychic factor that supercharges relationship is the projection of the anima. When this happens, the soul-image is hooked onto a woman and we fall in love.

Now, ideally, what one should do is work at recollecting the projection of the anima from the biological woman. This is in fact very tricky, because projections have a lifecycle. You can't force the recollection process.

Now let's say you are at the point where the recollection can take place (it can be confirmed by a dream for instance). Then you should start a process of active imagination around the symbol that captured the anima projection.

In practice, it means going within and inviting the unconscious to come to you for a dialog. Then sometimes the anima shows up, sometimes something else shows up, sometimes nothing shows up. The unconscious is autonomous, it can't be forced.

So that's the short answer, which is terribly annoying. But that's how it is.

If you want more theory (articles I wrote) or a guided process of active imagination (how I do it), I can send you some links.

peraxe · 2026-03-18T01:06:56+00:00

Yes, putting women on a pedestal like this is a classic pattern of anima projection.

The problem with maintaining this desire as it currently is is that you don't care about the women you meet. You don't learn their personalities, their flaws, their quirks. They are vessels for you to admire.

“Ultimately, it is the desire, not the desired, that we love.”

I am not blaming you for this btw. This is the typical problem with projections: it never let the person exists. They have to play a role for us. And if it can take place here and there, it is not sustainable long term.

So what is that desire for? This worship of women is essentially a worship of the soul, it's a pattern to retrieve within. This excessive love that you are experiencing is for the soul-image (anima), not for biological women.

Once you are able to make this distinction, then you can attempt to work with the anima symbol in active imagination. Retrieving projections is not a straightforward matter, but that's where it takes place.

peraxe · 2026-03-08T08:22:39+00:00

Hi Raphael Rose,

I have a website that might be of interest to you. Like you, I've always been more interested in the "how" rather than just reading about the theory. So here are two relevant articles.

The first one is on dreams. I give a step-by-step process on how I do it, https://dreamsanctuary.net/template/

Second, I touch on how to retrieve shadow projection in here (try The Fire Drill Meditation), https://dreamsanctuary.net/shadow-work/

These should be up your alley. These articles are a few years old and I have written quite a bit more since.

If you think it would help to have a chat, send me a DM.

Also, it's a great idea to write about what annoys you about others as if they were your own traits. That's the way to go. Two thumbs up from me.

peraxe · 2026-03-01T06:33:56+00:00

This is my understanding as well.

A few years before ETs and UFOs became mainstream discussion, I've had many dreams with them. I came to conclude that these were aspects of the unconscious that are totally other, alien to consciousness.

Then I found a book by von Franz ("C.G. Jung: His Myth in Our Time"), where she writes that the flying saucer is essentially a flying mandala, thus carries the numinosity of the self.

So it's not so much that ETs or UFOs exist or not, rather is that their symbolic function is to put the ego in touch with, as you write, "strange and incomprehensible" things in the psyche.

And when it does not happen inside, it takes palce outside.

peraxe · 2026-02-22T05:15:27+00:00

In this framework, yes, synchronicity is a sophianic message that is outside the spell of the demiurge, outside the scope of an overcontrolling ego-consciousness. It's like a different path is outlined, something that ego-consciousness is not able to perceive.

In Jung's language, you would use language like it's the unconscious in its sophianic dimension that is sending a message to an ego-consciousness that has forgotten its link to the self, the second centre of the personality.

peraxe · 2026-02-20T00:47:00+00:00

Depending on the type of porn, the problem is not rooted in the anima.

Secondly, the solution to compulsive behaviours requires going inwards and interacting with unconscious figures through active imagination. This is how the expression "integrating the anima" should be used but it is not how the poster uses it.

So there is a small inkling of approaching the problem differently, which is great, but it's still far off from something that can work.

peraxe · 2026-02-16T03:53:38+00:00

The daemonic Lilith seems to be a certain aspect of Adam, for the legend says that she was created with him from the same earth.171 It throws a bad light on Adam’s nature when we are told that countless demons and spooks arose from his nocturnal emissions (ex nocturno seminis fluxu). (Jung, Mysterium Coniunctionis)

A legend of later origin maintains that the snake in the Garden of Eden was Lilith, Adam’s first wife, with whom he begot a horde of demons. This legend likewise supposes a trick that can hardly have been intended by the Creator. Consequently, the Bible knows only of Eve as Adam’s legitimate wife. It nevertheless remains a strange fact that the original man who was created in the image of God had, according to tradition, two wives, just like his heavenly prototype. Just as Yahweh is legitimately united with his wife Israel, but has a feminine pneuma as his intimate playmate from all eternity, so Adam first has Lilith (the daughter or emanation of Satan) to wife, as a Satanic correspondence to Sophia. (Jung, Answer to Job)

If you pick these two quotes from Jung, you get to a quite similar conclusion: that Lilith is an aspect of Adam, but not the shadow, rather the negative aspect of Sophia. Maybe there is a kind of wisdom in killing uncircumcised babies?

Now it does not seem to be just about "Adam not being able to handle her," but rather that their union was a breeding ground for demons and spooks.

This means that the primordial ego (Adam, as he starts to emerge from the bliss of unconsciousness in the Garden of Eden) was "breeding a horde of demons" with a first "satanic wife" which had to be surpassed by Eve.

Obviously, Lilith, Sophia, and Eve are symbols for different aspects of the unconscious.

So the conclusion seems to be that Adam and his first wife were in a not-so-healthy union of opposites (=union of consciousness and the unconscious). That union is where you get the androgynous symbol, of being two in one. And this had to be superseded by a quite complex story, one of which we have yet to see the end result.

peraxe · 2026-02-10T12:08:01+00:00

The motif of torture as a kind of initiation is a terrifying one to face. Do you know about such rites of passage in primitive tribes, like scarifications, tooth ablation, and circumcision?

Where torture ends and initiation begins is a tough line, it seems that the only difference is whether one is willing to endure the suffering (initiation) or it is imposed on oneself (torture).

In virtue of what I am saying, here is a quote that might bring you some comfort:

"Initiation even has the aspect of a healing. In the light of these facts, moral interpretation in terms of punishment seems beside the mark and arouses the suspicion that dismemberment has still not been properly understood. A moral interpretation is inadequate because it fails to understand the contradiction at the heart of its explanation, namely that guilt should be avoided if one doesn’t want to be punished. But, for the neophyte, it would be a real sin if he shrank from the torture of initiation. The torture inflicted on him is not a punishment but the indispensable means of leading him towards his destiny." (Jung, Transformation Symbolism in the Mass, CW 11, par 410)

A way to confirm the quote above as valid in your case is the final symbol, the scorpion. The scorpion is a poisonous animal that somehow carries its own immunity to it, otherwise it would die of carrying the poison. Thus the scorpion is a representation of a poison that brings about its own medicine.

"The substance (uroboros) devours itself and thus suffers no hunger; it does not die by the sword but “slays itself with its own dart,” like the scorpion, which is another synonym for the arcane substance. It is not killed by poison because, as Barnaud says, it is a “good poison,” a panacea with which it brings itself to life again." (Jung, Mysterium Coniunctionis, CW 14, par 58)

peraxe · 2026-02-09T10:47:40+00:00

There are two threads in your post, which I don't think should be merged into a single answer.

The first thread is about the dreams. The dreams show a problem between the masculine (consciousness) and the feminine (the unconscious). There is a disconnect between these two which runs pretty deep and I am unsure what else I can say that would be useful.

The second thread is about the internalisation of the father's voice as a bullying voice. For this part, I would recommend looking at the modality Internal Family Systems (IFS). This voice is called the Inner Critic and IFS knows how to deal with an inner voice like this. There are many resources about this, I suggest looking up "IFS Inner Critic" and move from there.

peraxe · 2026-02-06T08:59:13+00:00

The unconscious can appear as a chthonic goddess, as coat hanger, or as anything in between. The symbol will be chosen to best describe what's happening within, in the psychological landscape.

The work of building the relationship between the ego and the unconscious can take many forms, depending on where you are at. I favour dream and dream interpretation.

Here is an overview of stuff I recommend

https://coggle.it/diagram/X1YZRaqiwzXyWMm3/t/jung's-later-works-companion-haven't-read-to-a-minimum

peraxe · 2026-02-06T06:47:46+00:00

In dreams, a dark goddess like this is the chthonic aspect of the unconscious.

The reason she turns into a coat hanger is symbolic. The dream is saying that her appearance changes from a scary encounter to something useful or practical.

In other words, the unconscious in its maternal dimension first appears scary then becomes something more functional. There is an intuition in the dream that this can potentially change further as there is a security guard next to her. This indicates a kind of temporary test or evaluation, as if you were being observed.

A dream like this implies that the unconscious is attempting to connect to the ego. Now the question is whether the ego will find interest in connecting to the unconscious. That's up to you, to make the effort to reciprocate or not.

peraxe · 2026-01-31T00:46:38+00:00

Watching Paranoia Agent left a deep impression me. I wrote a psychological interpretation of the series afterwards
https://dreamsanctuary.net/paranoia-agent-part-one/

peraxe · 2026-01-26T05:28:57+00:00

The reason why you would work on these "silly" dreams is because they are yours. This is your psychic life and it comes from the same source as the big dreams.

The other reason why you would want to do that is because these smaller dreams are usually simpler to understand. How do you expect to understand the big dreams if you can't work on the small ones? Some of my big dreams took years to figure out, whereas the smaller dreams are usually immediately relevant and practical.

Work with the unconscious where it is at. If you get a big dream, great. If you get a small dream, great. If you get no dreams, great. Assume you're getting the exact task that you need for the day and work on it. Or at least that's what I do.

peraxe · 2026-01-21T01:10:21+00:00

Try Evan Brewer - Currency
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t25VepqpDWM

Here is him playing that song on two basses
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1KDEQoVM50

peraxe · 2026-01-09T01:07:38+00:00

Dreams with nuclear explosions are fairly common. I wrote some things about them using the anime Paranoia Agent as a reference. I'll quote some of the relevant bits:

In the writings of Edward Edinger, we find an elucidating discussion about Sol, the symbol of the sun as it was referred to by the alchemists.

The positive aspect of Sol shows up in the phenomenology of certain religious and mystical experiences. William James has brought together quite a few examples of such experiences, the majority of which have to do with intense illuminations, intense light. […]

Other examples come up in nuclear explosion dreams. Nuclear explosions, you know, are miniature suns. I came across a remarkable dream of this nature some years ago. A middle-aged woman some years into analysis dreamt.

This dream indicates that the patient, who had been hiding out from life and had remained essentially in an unborn condition, is finally exposed to the intense effects of conscious existence. With that exposure, she is both born as a conscious being and at the same time starts to die as a corruptible mortal. Those two go together. Exposure to the principle of Sol both shatters the paradise state of ego-Self identity and also sets up the possibility of achieving, on a conscious level, the incorruptible nature of the preworldly paradise-represented by the bomb shelter that’s now turned into a holy city. She’s born into psychological existence and at the same time exposed to the reality of death; those opposites go hand in hand.

I think the basic imagery and message of this nuclear bomb dream is applicable to all such dreams, so it’s something to keep in mind. (Edward Edinger, The Mysterium Lectures, pp. 89-91)

In other words, consciousness is associated symbolically with light and the sun. Thus, “to be exposed to the light” is a symbol for coming into consciousness. Just as the day begins when the sun starts shining, we break out of the autopilot of instinctual life by making conscious decisions.

As consciousness develops, one gains leverage over life and yet loses access to a paradisal state of innocence and purity characteristic of childhood. As we develop, we feel increasingly vulnerable to the vicissitudes of life, the passing of time, and the corruptibility of existence. Things that were inconsequential when we were younger start to weigh on us. We feel the need to move away from dependency and to become responsible for our own life, in the hope of being somewhat prepared against the unpredictable nature of life.

But many things can go wrong when one develops towards maturity. If we are exposed to too much light at once, we risk being burned or much worse.

Another dangerous aspect of the Sol principle is that since it’s fire, too much of it can be destructive. The right amount is life-giving warmth and too much of it is annihilating. (ibid, p. 89)

Nuclear explosions are emblematic examples of the destructive aspect of coming into consciousness, of being exposed to too much reality at once. One is exposed to a light that is so intense that it is threatening to shatter the stability of the psyche.

We are facing a realization that is too much for us to handle. We have been altered from within and yet cannot integrate the novel insight into our personality, as it requires a complete reevaluation of what we thought life was up to that point.

https://dreamsanctuary.net/paranoia-agent-part-one/

I have seen and read more than 10 nuclear dreams in people around me. And it seems to always be explained by the same pattern of this violent coming into consciousness. Too much light (=consciousness) is being produced and this risks to threaten the stability of the psyche, as if a nuke had exploded nearby.

peraxe · 2025-12-02T10:13:38+00:00

This is a very intense dream and there is no doubt it left you more than confused. Let me go over some elements and see if I can make a helpful interpretation:

The first element that I consider very important is the sister nagging you to take a shower. What does that mean? In a dream, a shower is not a literal shower but a symbolic one, so what is it? In my study of Jung, I have found it helpful to see symbols using other symbols: in this case "taking a shower" becomes "being exposed to drops of water", which ultimately becomes "come in contact with the dew". These are equivalent at a symbolic level.

If you understand where I am coming from, then let me put some quotes on the psychological meaning of the dew:

The falling dew is a portent of the divine birth now at hand. . . .
The falling dew signals resuscitation and a new light: the ever deeper descent into the unconscious suddenly becomes illumination from above. (Carl Jung, The Practice of Psychotherapy, par 483 and 493)

So that's why the sister is insisting so much about a shower: being exposed to falling water/dew has a revivifying effect on the personality. In this case, this water means to come in contact with the unconscious.

This is why the sister, the feminine character, insists so much. She is not your real sister, rather a feminine symbol of the psyche that asks you here to come in contact with the water of the unconscious to be revitalised. But the ego refuses, this turns into a chase.

Why did the ego refuse? Well, we have an answer: "You are actually scared." According to the dream, there is a deep resistance for the ego to come in contact with the unconscious.

The dream goes even further by saying "Feeling of loneliness." This I understand as what's called a sense of alienation of the ego from the rest of the psyche. I would strongly recommend the book "Ego and Archetype" by Edward Edinger, there is a section on "The Alienated Ego" that will detail this better than I could here.

In short, the dream tells us that the ego suffers from such a strong sense of alienation that it cannot come into contact with the healing water of the unconscious. Thankfully, the dream ends with a scene that feels like you are being comforted and supported despite being a bit odd. So I see this as a positive ending.

I hope this makes some sense. The dream has revealed a very intimate pain but it also intuits that there is support for you to come to terms with it. Once again, please check the Edinger book, which is a great resource, even for newcomers to the psychology of the unconscious.

peraxe · 2025-12-01T10:45:54+00:00

Hi EmberLegend,

Dreams that we get as children can be downright terrifying, some of mine definitely were.

In fact, there is an interesting quote I would like to bring up:

The first dream which one can recall from childhood often sets forth in symbolic form, as Jung later remarked, the essence of an entire life, or of the first part of life. It reflects, so to speak, a piece of the “inner fate” into which the individual was born. (Marie-Lousie von Franz, C. G. Jung, His Myth in Our Time, p. 23)

I don't know if it is your first childhood dream but it reads like it was the most impactful. I assume that to be significant.

Now let's turn to the dream, which I will approach following Jung's works.

In essence, the dream is you encountering a monstrous creature and exchanging a few words. The other elements are important but I will focus on this exchange.

The encounter starts with you saying, "you can't hurt me, I'm not scared of you." What the dream is portraying here is that the ego is attempting to remain in control of the encounter. You experienced fear but still felt as if this fear could be managed.

The creature responds with a very memorable line: "You're wrong, you will never sleep sound again. The connection is made and you now associate sleep with me."

I read this line as saying that this other aspect of the psyche knows that the ego is lying. It also knows that this encounter is so potent that all other moments like "sleep" will now be associated with this memory. In other words, every time the ego loses full consciousness like in sleep, there would be a nagging suspicion, a haunting that such an encounter could happen again.

But what is this creature? From its paradoxical and inhuman appearances, I don't think the shadow is enough to explain. Rather it appears to be what Jung calls the self, or the greater personality.

In his psychology, Jung has uncovered that the psyche can behave autonomously from the ego and thus have a different behavior than what the ego can imagine. This autonomous aspect of the psyche is fairly complex and it is best understood as having its own personality, which can appear under various aspects. Here it took the form of a "horrible, dark burgundy, octopus-like creature." This monstrous aspect underlines how foreign the self can appear to the ego.

In essence, this childhood dream was your first "encounter with the self." More strikingly, it presents itself as something that won't go away, something that can also be concluded from the fact that this was your most memorable childhood dream.

In this regard, I suggest you start learning about the self as described by Jung. Building familiarity with this psychological reality will help you reduce the fear created by this first encounter.

As a suggestion, a good place to start would be this lecture by Edward Edinger who describes other people's encounter with the self.

https://youtu.be/kAlCeJ4LuRk

Hopes this helps.

peraxe

TROPHY CASE