Psychology suggests that every dream fulfills a wish. Yet, dreaming feels like so much more. Dreams have enabled people to fly without wings and to vividly as in life imagine the impossible. Those who dream not only escape reality —they enrich and transform it. Without dreams that contradict life, life would scarcely be thinkable.
(Chapter 1 of this serialized novella can be found in the previous issue of SEXPOL RELOADED. We earnestly advise the reader to have a look at it. Also, we would like to underscore the fact that this story constitutes a work of fiction and, as such, any resemblances of fictional people portrayed herein to humans existing in reality, whether past, present or future, must be regarded as sheer coincidence.)
My father was an educated man. He had traveled to many countries, experienced a great deal and his way of thinking was characterized by a sense of consideration and understanding.
When you begin to reflect on the nature of dreams, you feel like you’ve been placed into another world. You feel like you’re in the midst of an ocean full of so many mysterious phenomena because everything is extremely encrypted.
Dreams are cultural artifacts: they are the royal road to the unconscious of a culture and of an individual. They stir us up, they can be funny, they can frighten us, and they show us—symbolically—the themes and inner conflicts our self is currently negotiating.
In a previous issue of this magazine, we explored the relationship between shopping addiction and narcissism. In a culture defined by “higher, faster, further, stronger, bigger and better,” going on a buying frenzy fits in just perfectly fine: distinguishing oneself, elevating oneself, wanting to be better than others. In other words, consumer frenzy aligns well with a narcissistic subject that wants—or sometimes feels compelled—to compete in order to survive in the world.