Penis

For a man the penis represents more than simply his sexual appetite. It depicts the whole drive of life through his glandular system that develops the body type he has. It is therefore often depicting a sense of his own power of self expression, his potency in expressing himself and capability in the world.

The healthy function of the sexual organs predispose a mans body toward male sexual characteristics such as square hips, muscular frame, facial hair and deeper voice. This brings a certain creative explosiveness to his personality, creates urges toward fatherhood and loving his woman, with connected desires to supply the needs of family if he is emotionally healthy. The positive aspect of the penis/masculinity is for him to want his woman to meet his maleness, his caring aggression, his sexual desire, with her own fiery female energy, needs and strength.

So the penis in the male dream can link with any of these characteristics, or in some way indicate difficulties, trauma or fears about them.

Example: The prick stands up for love. Maybe in youth it stands up for performance, or because you are expected to have sex, or because you believe you have no value if you cannot perform. But when you are 60, 70, or 80, the truth comes out. Can you love? The prick stands up when you feel that glow of life that we call love. This sort of love isn’t just there because you said you were going to do it at 12 o’clock that day. This love is an expression of life. Like life it has its seasons. It ebbs and flows. To press it to perform day after day is not to respect those seasons. With such little respect the flow diminishes. The prick no longer stands up except perhaps through artificial stimulation. You do not command life, it commands you. If it does not, you or dead. This sort of love responds to the human need. Perhaps it should be called compassion.

Example: Emily takes my penis and loses it? For a time Emily really did control my penis. I was completely at her mercy. P

This is one of the themes in male dreams, showing how the man is at the mercy of his sexual desires for a woman. In this sense he feels she controls him. It might even be that she is shown cutting off his penis, suggesting relationship with her kills his sexual drive.

Example: I broke it. I broke my dickey. It was dead. I was dead. I was dead and wanted to kill others too. I couldn’t ask for love because my dickey was broken. My prick. I didn’t have a prick. I didn’t want people to look at my prick because it was dead, broken. I couldn’t ask people to love me because they would know my prick was dead. I couldn’t love people because they would know. I wanted love but I couldn’t ask. My pride was gone. I lost my pride because I lost my prick I didn’t want to go on living without it and wanted to die.

“That’s why I killed my daddy. I killed him. I killed him because I wanted his prick. Mine was broken and wanted a good one. So I killed him to get his. 

Example: Dreamt I cut off my penis and used it to masturbate myself. This I did by pushing the penis inside me, where presumably I had a vagina.

Example: ‘My lover Terry, myself and another woman were all on our bed. The other woman seemed very sure of herself and kissed Terry in a very intimate way, he doing the same to her as I lay very near to both of them. Then Terry stuck his bottom in the air and started to lick my chest and breast. I found myself licking around his penis, felt I was under some kind of pressure from both the other two to do so but didn’t feel too shattered as I did it with love for Terry, but I had a bitter taste in my mouth.’ Sally P.

In talking about this dream Sally said she often struggled with what she wanted, and what her partner wanted in sex. She might go along with his needs, but not find it palatable. Even if she did do it with some love, it might leave a ‘bad taste in her mouth’.

Example: ‘I felt as if I were as one with Terry and I realised he was trying to make a journey, as his penis, into his mother’s vagina. Her vagina looked like a long dark tunnel and was threatening to him. I said, ‘You haven’t given your mother satisfaction and you say you will not. Then he was really smashed up in body. Withdrawing into a garden with a high green hedge. I took a leaf from the hedge and began to pull it apart with my hands. Terry said, ‘Look what you are doing, teasing me.’ I felt withdrawal wasn’t the way and started to follow him, walking alongside the hedge. I said, ‘It feels like you are strangling me, so why don’t you do it and kill me?’ We have been going through a lot of sexual withdrawal, Terry saying his sexuality was his to do with as he wanted.’ Sally P.

This second dream of Sally’s is a shrewd summing up of Terry’s sexual fears. In fact Terry suffered a great deal of anxiety about sex, and later uncovered the sort of fear and desire to avoid giving his mother satisfaction in becoming a full blooded man shown in the dream. Our unconscious is a very capable psychologist, and while Terry in Sally’s dream represents her insights regarding him – and must not be seen as a statement of fact about Terry. Nevertheless, such insight are often enormously useful in dealing with relationship difficulties.

Just as women may experience penis envy, men may experience vagina envy. This because there is nothing that a man can do that is quite as miraculous as having a baby. In some men this involves a huge struggle regarding their sexual orientation or easy expression of heterosexual sex.

Example: Was in an underground train. It came out and floated on a lake or river. Then it drew back into the tunnel. I had a baby that I took into a toilet on the train, and put my penis into its back passage, having sex with it. Afterwards, in wiping my penis, a whole lot of stagnant looking sperm came out. I threw it down the toilet.

Although dreamer had never had any conscious urges to have sex with a baby or children, it is not uncommon to dream such dreams. In fact the dream is about the stagnant sperm. His normal sexual development had been disturbed as a baby, and he was reconnecting with it.

Penis replaced by vagina: Could be feeling inadequate as a man or be developing a contact with the female receptive in oneself. It might also show the loss of male drive in sexuality.

Loss of penis: See: castrate.

Penis turns into a snake: Feeling the intense instinctive drive of sexuality. This is a realisation of the drive as existing beyond one’s personality and is an expression of what the sex drive is doing, depending what is happening to the snake. See:reptiles lizards snakes.

Bleeding from penis: Emotional hurts or fears that are interfering with expression of healthy sexual feeling.

In a woman’s dream: Your relationship with, desire for a mate and therefore your relationship with your own desires and male characteristics, such as ambition, work capability, aggression, intellect.

For a woman, the penis may represent your feelings or fears about meeting a man’s full sexuality, as well as the deep experience of the relationship with your father, and all the issues of dependence, fear, love or anger that still exist in your from your childhood. It connects with your experience of growing from childhood, and how your father met your emerging female sexuality. The penis is also the holy grail of your desire for sexual expression. The reality underlying the symbols of temples and churches, embodying as they do the sacredness of the creative sexual drive and the mystery of life.

The penis might also depict the details of the sexual relationship with your partner. As with the example of Sally’s dream below, the events in the dream define the problem or relationship.

Freud suggested that some women experience penis envy – a sense that their vagina is not as good as a penis. This theme often appears on women’s dreams and may be the nucleus of a powerful conflict if explored.

Example: Dreamt that I have an icicle hanging off my penis

In this dream the man’s sexual drive is show as frozen, probably repressed by anxieties or relationship difficulties.

I was with a very attractive woman and felt to see if my penis was erect. It was, but I seemed to have no power there. When I explored the issue of my sexuality, I realised that when I hold back my sexual feelings toward women, for whatever reason, then I feel slightly depressed, disconnected from the world, and with less personal positiveness in what I do. It is almost like a stream of life flows through me when I am happily sexual, which is diminished by my restraints, whether moral or social. Once the river of life is flowing through me again I feel whole and healed – I feel I can achieve things in the world.

As with the above examples, the penis in a dream is usually a direct reference to sexual feelings, fears, or problems. As these can be quite complex several examples are given below.

Example: ‘So for the third time I held the woman and made love. The woman’s vagina was like a flower. I don’t mean to look at, but in physical sensation. My penis felt like it was penetrating petals of flesh and touching with great pleasure a central receptive area. I was left with the feeling of being able to make love again and again without any negative effects. It was a very positive and healthy feeling.’ John T.

John is feeling confident about his sexual drive. Although a powerful drive, subtle feelings and fears have an intense influence not only on the pleasure of sex, but also the response of the physical organs. The relationship with the penis and sex act in one’s dream shows what fears, hurts or attitudes are influencing the sexual flow. See: castrate.

Example: ‘Was in a house with my wife. Outside the door was Something which wanted to come into her – an invisible being. We were frightened and it said ‘Do not be afraid, I want you to put your penis in your wife and wait for me to activate you. In that way you will form a body for me.’ I woke and realised the dream was moving me to parenthood. Already having three children I realised this would mean another 20 years of responsibility. Nevertheless my wife and I made love. Two weeks later I dreamt my wife was pregnant with a son. In fact nine months later she bore a son.’ Nigel I.

In this interesting dream sequence the penis is Nigel’s drive to be a father. See: bed; knob; pole; reptiles lizards snakes.

Useful Questions and Hints:

In a female dream – what is my dream showing my relationship with male sexuality is?

In a male dream – what is my dream revealing about the way I relate to my sexual drive?

Does this dream reveal anything about the way I am in an intimate relationship – if so what is it?

Are there any signs of me growing beyond old patterns of my sexual/emotional behaviour – if so can I enhance them?

Here some useful links – Easy Dream Interpretation – Sexually Inadequate – Man In Your Dreams – Dream Like a Computer Game –