Solving the Task of Finding the Meaning of Dreams as a Method of Exploring Comprehension of Meanings of Life

Abstract

The paper presents outcomes of a quantitative psychotechnological research on the process of one's comprehension of his/her own life. It focuses on the reflective mechanisms of realizing meanings of life, thus further developing research on meaning formations of personality within the culturalactivity approach. For these purposes a method of solving the task of finding the meaning of a dream was used in the study, which is in fact an operationalization of the method of productive amplification of consciousness. Rather than examining the already formed contents of meanings of life available for introspective descriptions, this method allows the exploration of the constructive activity of consciousness through which these meanings of life are formed. The main outcome is the reconstruction and empirical model of reflective activity carried out by the individual in the process of comprehending meanings of life and his/her life situation

Keywords

• unconscious
• comprehension
• reflective activity
• meanings of life
• dreams
• primary symbols