‘Keep on dreaming!’: theoretical and methodological considerations on Gestalt therapeutic dream work

Abstract Dreams are understood as creative design processes for the integration of everyday experience and inner psychological processes. Although they take place in sleep, ignoring the external reference to reality, they are comparable and connected to Gestalt processes in waking consciousness, and can be supported in a similar way with Gestalt therapy methods. The reduction to the common thesis that the dream is a projection falls short and is sometimes problematic in therapeutic terms. The metaphorical and symbolic ‘language’ of dreams is due to the special logic of the right hemisphere of the brain, which is predominantly active in REM sleep. Keywords dream, Gestalt process, brain hemispheres