Every month, Jungian analyst Stanislav Raevsky deciphers the pictures you saw in your dreams.
Son Lada, 42 years old
“I have two higher educations and a good job. At the same time, I dream three times a year, or even more often, that I am taking exams. I learned everything, but the ticket contains questions on another subject, but you can’t refuse. Or this plot: I go to the stand with the results of the exam, look for myself on the list for a long time and suddenly I see “2” against my last name. I wake up in despair, with tears.
Interpretation
Answer at the blackboard, exam, retake. Such dreams are dreamed by many and, as a rule, are very hurtful. But why do educated, successful people again dream of an unlearned lesson, a bad ticket, an unfamiliar object? Aren’t we still, at heart, insecure students? Maybe we just pretend that we have grown up and know how to do something? And that’s why it’s so scary that they will bring us to clean water and it will become clear to everyone that we are only pretending to be smart, successful, and our real score is “2”. But this deuce puts us our own inferiority complex. And it is not connected with our real achievements, but is based on childhood traumas. If we find it difficult to rely on an internal sense of self-worth, then it’s time to realize our inferiority complex and start working on it. Otherwise, we will look for ourselves all our lives in the lists of other people’s assessments and see a deuce there.
- Meditate and take exams
Often parents, out of good intentions or because of their own lack of fulfillment, expect only fives from us and even take fours as deuces. We get little support from them and hear a lot of criticism. Then our life turns into an eternal test, into an attempt to earn their approval. Think about who rated you a two. And try to give up trying to pass the exam to this biased examiner. After all, life without assessments is full of joy and freedom, and assessments doom us to anxiety and constant dissatisfaction with ourselves.
In the modern world, the exam has replaced the rite of initiation, which in traditional societies accompanied the transition to a new social and age status: a young man became a man, and a girl became a mistress and mother. In such a ritual, it was not enough to show one’s abilities and skills; the old self-image died and a new one was born. In the middle of life, many of us go through a psychological crisis: our former, childish, naive and heroic «I» dies, and a new, mature and wise one is born. Perhaps your dreams about exams indicate the process of gaining maturity.
Our education often gives us too specific skills or, on the contrary, theoretical knowledge that is not applicable to life. Rarely are we taught the main thing — how to be happy, how to fill life with meaning, how to understand each other. Life tests us, but we continue to prepare for the wrong subjects: “how to build a career,” “how to get married,” or simply “how to be an excellent student in life.” Perhaps you should think about what exam you are preparing for and what life offers you. And live it so as not to put yourself «2».