The Blob's Psyche:

Of course, we are not completely open-minded, and (fearful to admit!) we have our own conceptions of how dreams work. One cannot interpret without an interpretive framework. Allow us to introduce you to the Blob. Right now, it's configured as a diagrammed spatial metaphor of how we see the psyche. Run your mouse over the words and brief descriptions will pop-up. Then, you can either click on the words or scroll down for more detailed concepts.

The Bowl: Consciousness, Experiencing, Thinking, Feeling

Here we have the Green Blob, and here we have the Bowl. The Bowl is your consciousness-the part of you that thinks and feels. When you say, "I want," or "I think," or "I feel," that "I" refers to your conscious mind. We're showing the conscious mind as a bowl because it is filled with different thoughts and emotions every day. When you're preoccupied with something, or when you're dominated by a certain mood, or when you're adopting a certain way of relating to people (say, the way you relate to a friend versus the way you relate to an employer), your bowl is filled with different elements of you. It's very useful to remember that your bowl can be filled with different things, because when you're in a certain mood, especially the really bad moods where everything seems yucky and you feel as though life will be horrible forever, you can understand (intellectually, anyway) that this might not be the case, and if you confront your mood the way you might confront a problem in the outside world, you'll be on the road towards making yourself feel better (or at least feel as though you're working out your problems).

So what's inside the bowl is everything that is temporarily apprehensible to your thinking process. If you're thinking about a problem, it's inside the bowl. If you're feeling a certain emotion, it's inside the bowl. Things inside you that you cannot effectively grasp consciously are outside of the bowl. If something is forgotten, it is outside of the bowl. If something is remembered but isn't really connected to what you're currently thinking, it's outside the bowl. Of course the thing about The Bowl Analogy is that we made it up. Of course there are complexities that don't fit into cute little drawings. Like when you're feeling a certain emotion, and you're thinking about it, and you're sure it's inside the bowl in the same way that your soup hopefully is, but eventually you realize that there's an important part of the issue that you've forgotten, and you need to dig deep and try to put it together. If you bite into a hunk of indescribably good chocolate ice cream, and suddenly you feel an overwhelming sense of danger, it might be because you've forgotten that you're lactose intolerant (or something like that). Your memory of lactose intolerance is certainly in your head somewhere, and it certainly was previously in the bowl, but somehow it has disappeared! Where is it? In the lingo of the above diagram, what mechanism puts things in the bowl, and what mechanism takes them out? After the fashion of all who ask rhetorical questions, we have answers for you. To answer the first question, check out the Sludge and for the second, check out the Gear System! (back to top)

The Gear System-Repression/Remembrance/Forgetting/Dreaming

The Gear System encompasses the parts of you that remember and forget. The Gear System is run by the Rat, and its two most important functions are Repression and Remembering. The Gear System is in Repression mode when you are awake and your mind is actively in the process of putting memories and impressions into categories and/or forgetting them (by putting them in the I Don't Want to Remember Category). In Repression mode, the Gear System runs opposite to the image you are viewing, and the Sludge is taken from the Bowl and deposited into the ocean of Sludge on the bottom. In Remembering mode (which can also be Dreaming mode), the Gear System is running as represented in the image, and the Sludge is being taken from the bottom and is being desposited into the Bowl, where it is experienced by the conscious (or Dreaming) mind. (back to top)

The Sludge-Repressed/Forgotten/Misplaced/Hated

If you actively don't want to think about something, or if you simply don't care about something, chances are that something is still somewhere in your head. For our purposes, that someplace where all of your memories are stored is the Sludge. We call it the Sludge because it's a rather scary entity, and when it's extremely active, which is when you're reliving your past failures, or heartbreaks, or embarrassments, you're likely to perceive it as a burdensome goop which seeps into your mind and negatively affects your disposition. If you're extremely focused on the Here and Now, and if your attitude towards life is that the past is something to be forgotten, or gotten over, then you are especially susceptible to the Sludge when you are sleeping, for when you are in the process of dreaming your barriers against remembering past events are far weaker. (back to top)

The Rat-Chewing away at everything you can imagine, and more.

There are different scientific, spiritual, and psychological concepts for entities in your mind that strongly affect you but are not necessarily controlled by the conscious mind. These concepts range from the concept of chemically controlled mood (such as Prozac might be prescribed to balance), and demonic possession (such as monastic life might be prescribed to exorcise), to the Jungian shadow, wherein the cast-off halves of universal dualities congregate into a hidden consciousness that directly opposes the personality that presents itself to the world. For our purposes, such an entity is the Rat. The Rat is a ravenous creature which finds its sustenance in the voracious consumption of thoughts. The Rat does not discern between outward and inward thoughts. If you are engaged in a spirited discussion on politics, the Rat will be busy tearing away at whatever political party you are particularly angered by. If you are working on a project that taps your creative and critical faculties, the Rat will be chewing away on that project, and the results of its digestion will manifest itself in better output on your part. When you don't have that external source of interest, that engaging quest, that compelling job, that complex relationship, the Rat begins chewing on the very stuff of your mind. Your critical thoughts, unable to work beneficially in the world, turn inward and you begin critiquing your own self, mulling over your childhood, your young adulthood, your mistakes, your failures, your current social status, your current relationship status, your abilities or inabilities, all of these things are morsels for the Rat's insatiable appetite. You can see that the Rat simultaneously motivates the activity of your mind and causes you to become depressed or self-destructive when you aren't engaged in compelling work. (back to top)

The Baskets-Bits, bytes, nibbles, or chunks of brain data.

The Baskets contain thoughts and memories. Importantly, they are not composed of a certain set of dimensions-a single Basket can contain an infinite array of events, so long as they are obliquely connected. You might say that the Basket contains one Thematic Unit, which means that the contents of a Basket are associated with one another based on a certain (oftentimes invisible) theme which is the motivating force behind the reason the thoughts entered the Basket in the first place. The existence of the Basket answers the question, "Why do I remember, and why do I forget?" (back to top)

Dreaming-Things that go Bump in the Night

Dreaming occurs when you are sleeping and your internal conscious barriers break down. Suddenly, the mists of forgetfulness disperse and the entirety of the Sludge (all which is forgotten while awake) is available to you, and the Rat (which feeds off thought and memory), bereft of an external stimulus to chew on, becomes extremely voracious, thus motivating the Gear System to bring Baskets of Sludge to the Bowl, which then experiences a Dream. Each Basket could be said to contain one Dream, and each Dream is brought into being by a motivating force (referred to as a Thematic Unit), which could be anywhere from frustration you aren't able to express during the day to a childhood trauma you haven't yet worked through. (back to top)

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