Social dreaming matrix

Domain I · Psychodynamic & depth psychology · W. Gordon Lawrence, Patricia Daniel · 1982 · Tavistock Institute

What it is

Read this first: social dreaming is not a psychotherapy. It is a method of collective inquiry and action research. Its authors present it as non-therapeutic and non-interpretive, and it has no treatment manual, diagnosis, or phases of change. Below are the procedures its authors and the…

Format

• Session count. A single matrix (for example one conference morning) is common. Conferences often run a matrix on each of 3 mornings. Lawrence's programmes ran matrices daily over several days, followed by Dialogues and Consultation Sets, and some were repeated yearly. Ongoing monthly matrices also…
• What it is: a number of people (any size, face to face or online) sit in a "matrix" rather than a group. They offer the dreams they remember, and the free associations those dreams set off, to the matrix as a whole. The focus is on "the dream, not the dreamer". A reflection session follows, in…

Who practises it, and how they are trained or regulated

• Read this first: social dreaming is not a psychotherapy. It is a method of collective inquiry and action research. Its authors present it as non-therapeutic and non-interpretive, and it has no treatment manual, diagnosis, or phases of change. Below are the procedures its authors and the institutions that carry it on describe. Clinical uses (for example in a clinic team, a training group, or a conference) are marked.

Questions to explore with your client

• What drew you to it, and what are you hoping it will change?
• Is it a group, retreat or community? How do they respond if someone wants to leave or raises a concern?
• Does it use a device, heat, cold, water or a physical procedure? Has a medical professional checked that it is safe for you?
• Who runs it, and what training or registration do they hold?
• What actually happens in a session or meeting, and how often?
• What does it cost, and is there pressure to commit to more?
• How do you feel afterwards, in the hours and days that follow?
• Does it fit with, or clash with, the work we do here?

What practitioners of it watch for

• extensions turning into consultancy advice-giving detached from the dream material.
• pressure to perform. It is working if fragments and "I'd forgotten this until now" dreams appear.
• your own anxiety driving interventions. It is working if silence gives way to new material rather than to group chat.
• linking too early, which turns hosts into interpreters. It is working if participants begin to offer links themselves.
• a long or theoretical opening, which casts the host as an expert. It is working if the first dream comes within a few minutes.

When to involve someone else

• New or worsening physical symptoms, or advice to stop or change prescribed medication: involve the client's doctor or prescriber.
• Signs of coercion, isolation from family and friends, escalating costs or secrecy: discuss openly and consider safeguarding.
• A crisis or thoughts of suicide: follow your crisis protocol. In the US, call or text 988; in the UK and Ireland, Samaritans on 116 123.

Drawn automatically from the guide's own sections. Stay curious: neither endorse nor dismiss what the client values, and check anything that matters against the full guide and its sources. Not medical advice.