Threatened by a Man with a Knitting Needle

This dream, experienced by a 22-year-old man, provides an opportunity to describe how dreams generally function and how dream interpretation can be conducted in practice.

The dreamer is sitting on a sofa in his brother's apartment. The brother is passively present in the background. "M," an old acquaintance of the dreamer, rises from an armchair holding a knitting needle and approaches the dreamer threateningly. The dreamer does not know how to react; he cannot understand what M intends by this. The situation feels very threatening, yet at the same time, it should be a joke. The dreamer does not want to run away or start a fight—both reactions would seem ridiculous. So, he just laughs nervously. M comes closer, and it becomes clear that he is serious. The dreamer lightly strikes M on the arm to show that he does not appreciate the joke. But M persists, so the dreamer hits him quite hard. M responds with only a sarcastic expression or remark. The dreamer runs into the kitchen. M follows him. The dreamer grabs a pair of scissors lying by the stove and shows them: If you continue, I’ll use these. M comes closer, so the dreamer stabs him in the hand holding the needle. It starts bleeding but doesn’t seem to make much of a difference otherwise.

The dream follows a typical dream structure, with an introduction, a development, a climax, and a (potential) solution (often called lysis in Jungian literature). This structure can be used to break the dream into more manageable parts.

Structure

The introduction of a dream describes the psychological situation the dream addresses—where in the inner landscape the dream ego finds itself. Here, the dreamer is sitting on a sofa in his brother's apartment, where he had also lived during a rather difficult period. The dynamic is connected to the dreamer's background and wounded self-esteem.

The development, or the problem the dream depicts, is symbolized by M—an older, somewhat aggressive man with whom the dreamer had associated during a questionable phase. In brief, the dream represents an activated, threatening complex tied to the situation described in the introduction. The development consists of this threat and the dreamer’s inability to handle it effectively.

The climax takes place in the kitchen, where the dreamer flees while M follows, intending to stab him with the needle. The situation feels almost desperate, as the dreamer cannot escape—M blocks his way. The fact that the dreamer runs specifically to the kitchen is significant, as we shall see.

The resolution to the problem described in the dream appears to be the scissors, which could save him. However, the dreamer does not know how to use this tool; he just stabs the threatening man with it, mirroring M’s intent to stab the dreamer. The dream ends without a satisfactory solution.

Associations

This dream emerges from the personal unconscious. That is, the dream images pertain to the dreamer’s personal psychology and are, so to speak, drawn from his life. Everything in the dream is familiar: the apartment, the brother, the threatening man. To understand what these elements signify, one needs to work with associations. Questions like: “What comes to mind when you think of this apartment?” “What feelings arise when you mentally revisit this place?” “Who is M as a person? Are there any specific memories about him that stand out?” And so on. It’s important not to veer off into associative chains or “free associations,” as Freud advocated, but rather to remain focused on the specific image in question. These associations should ideally be written down alongside the dream itself.

The dreamer associated the apartment and his brother with a time when he felt unsuccessful and incapable. He often fantasized about escaping, just leaving and abandoning the situation altogether. However, one of his problems was a lack of money and other resources, so he felt trapped in this place. These feelings describe a complex quite well: one is stuck in it (as long as it remains unconscious) and wishes to be free from the symptoms it generates. Apartments in dreams often signify a certain complex.

When the dreamer reflected on M, he recalled various scenes and described him with different adjectives, but nothing “clicked.” He couldn’t understand why M, of all people, would be threatening him in his brother’s apartment. (They hadn’t seen each other in years, and M had never visited either the brother’s or the dreamer’s home.) As the dreamer contemplated his memories, an image he had forgotten suddenly surfaced with force. It hit him like a blow, accompanied by a emotional surge. In brief, M had rejected the dreamer in a humiliating way. The strong emotional reaction the dreamer experienced suggests that this event is connected to a complex, and it is this very complex that M represents in the dream.

While there is a tendency to associate dreams with escapism, vagueness, or wishful thinking, dreamwork tends to be the exact opposite. Dreams reflect reality, possess their own internal logic that can be understood, and are often painful to engage with. Dreams of this typical kind almost always concern our complexes, which are usually negative and unconscious because we do not want to confront them. In this way, they attack us from behind, so to speak, with irrational, emotional reactions during the day and unpleasant stories at night. However, these symptoms also provide us with the opportunity to become conscious of them, to expand and enrich our consciousness. One could say that the unconscious strives to become conscious, to be integrated into our lives, and that this is why we have these dreams.

As the dreamer worked through associations and other techniques, the dream began to unfold for him. But the process remained unsatisfying because he could not fully grasp what the knitting needle represented, and above all, he drew a blank when it came to the "scissors." It is not uncommon for the ending of a dream to remain a question mark, as the beginning often deals with a situation the dreamer is relatively aware of, while the dream ends in a more unconscious domain. In a sense, we follow the dream down into the unconscious, and as Jung liked to point out: the unconscious is really unconscious.

Amplification  

The term "amplification" is usually applied when discussing archetypal images for which one lacks useful associations. It could involve an animal, a natural phenomenon, or a small human figure. To amplify means to "enhance" the symbol by studying general conceptions of it. For instance, how have humans viewed lions, thunder, or dwarfs throughout history? While exploring the symbol, it might suddenly "click," providing insight into what the particular image represents in one’s dream.  

In this more everyday dream, which belongs to the personal unconscious, we encounter more commonplace symbols, so this is not amplification in the strict sense. However, to understand what the instruments in this dream mean, we need to move beyond the strictly personal, as the dreamer lacks associations, and consider them more generally. Jung explains that when working with an analysand who has no associations to an ordinary object, such as a table, he says, "Suppose I have no idea what the word 'table' means. Describe this object and its history in such a way that I cannot fail to understand what it is." (“The Practical Use of Dream-Analysis,” par. 320.)  

So, let's explore: What is a knitting needle? The first thought might be "the act of knitting," but that is likely irrelevant here, as you cannot knit with only one needle. M held it moreover like a stabbing instrument. What could you do with a knitting needle held like a knife? To me, the first thought is: "You could prick something." What might one want to prick with a needle? Personally, I think of a balloon.  

So, in the dream, an aggressive man, whom the dreamer associates with wounding his self-esteem, threatens him with a needle, as if the dreamer were a balloon he intends to puncture—essentially, to annihilate. Here, a new element enters the dream: this suggests that the dreamer is inflated. We are dealing with a typical psychological dynamic involving wounded self-esteem compensated by inflation, followed by a fear of being deflated, and so on—a cycle of shrinking and expanding. At the time of the dream, the dreamer is entirely unaware of this inner dynamic.

The solution in the dream is a pair of scissors. So what is a pair of scissors? It is a tool that allows us to cut, whether it’s fabric or a piece of paper. To cut means to divide, to distinguish. Symbolically, it is a tool for differentiation, which is a fundamental prerequisite for consciousness. The dreamer finds the scissors in the kitchen, which is, in short, a room for transformation – to cook is to heat, transform and bring into consciousness. In other words, the dreamer potentially has the ability to bring the complex that haunts him into awareness, to differentiate the complex from the ego so that he is not repeatedly at its mercy. But at the time of the dream, he cannot apply this ability in his conscious life. Instead of using the scissors for differentiation, he uses them as a thrusting weapon, just as the complex wants to thrust him with his "weapon." Edward Edinger says in The Eternal Drama (p. 73):

“[Theseus] overcame Cercyon not by brute force but by the application of conscious skill and inventiveness, suggesting that consciousness must use its own principles in dealing with the unconscious forces and not try to meet the unconscious on its own ground.”

One might add: “…as the dreamer does in our dream.” Dreams often reveal what we have within us, as potentials. This can refer to unrealized abilities, but it can also be psychological development or even the future. It is up to us to grasp this potential, bring it into consciousness, and manifest it in our lives. The unconscious cannot do this for us; it needs the conscious ego to be realized.

The Day Before the Dream

"Where does the dream come from, why do I have it now?" This is a question people often ask themselves. When writing down a dream, it is a good habit to also note what is going on in one’s life, particularly if anything noteworthy happened the day or days leading up to the dream. Dreams are often reactions to the experiences of our ego.

The day before our dreamer had this dream, he experienced a conflict with his boss at work. The question was important for the dreamer, and he was convinced that he was right, but his boss showed him that he was wrong, in a, let's say, demeaning way. The dreamer was very disappointed, felt defenceless and humiliated and went home with strong feelings of discomfort, still convinced that he had been right and unfairly treated.

Obejctively, the conflict wasn’t particularly dramatic, but it had triggered the dreamer’s inferiority complex quite significantly. This complex is linked to his upbringing (represented by his brother in the dream), troubled him as a young adult (the apartment), was activated by M, and followed by the exaggerated feeling of being “punctured” (the knitting needle). The dream not untypically allows the dreamer to trace where these reactions come from (a kind of anamnesis) and how he can overcome this problematic state (the scissors, the solution). In fact, the dream is typical in this way: It starts by describing the problem and its background, and ends by showing the way forward—where the unconscious "wants" to go.

Finally, a suggestion: Now that you have read this text, go back to the dream and read it again, when you have the context of the dream—both the external and internal. You may find that the dream, which was likely difficult to understand at first, now appears surprisingly clear. Dreams do not distort or censor; they simply describe the state of affairs with symbols.