Abstract

Whether it is in traditional or modern context, dreams have a special place in both psychology and psychotherapy studies. 'The Traditional Interpretive Dream Approach' model which we had come across its first remains in Mesopotamia and also is the inspiration for psychoanalysis, is based on the interpretation of the symbols in the dream and the principle of reaching the hidden meaning. However, what is done with this interpretation is to move away from the phenomenal subjective reality of the client. Our psychotherapy practice has forced us to see this fact in time: Dreams are also experiences just like the waking experiences and a phenomenal self has its place in the center of these experiences as they are in the waking ones. We modeled the dream studies in which we take dream self in the center and we called this model as 'Phenomenological Dream Self Model '(PDSM). The PDSM proposes an self-centered view, takes its theoretical background from its deepened practice, and brings this practical PDSM closer to the phenomenological view, but in principle it is not based on the unconscious but on the consciousness of the dream self. There are four stages of PDSM. While the dream self experience is examined in the first stage, the waking self experience is examined in the second stage. These two are compared in the third stage and in the fourth stage, the associations related to dream are examined on the basis of the phenomenology of the dream self.

Key words: phenomenological dream self model, dream works, psychotherapy, self