Singing the Dream That Wakes You Up: CIIS Professor Publishes New Book on the Emotional Truth of Dreaming

What if dreams are not simply images that dissolve upon waking, but living communications from the depths of the soul? This is the invitation at the heart of The Emotional Truth of Dreams: Learning from Dream Dialogues in Psychotherapeutic and Spiritual Practice, a new book by Willow Pearson Trimbach, Psy.D., LMFT, MT-BC, professor and director of clinical training in the Clinical Psychology Department, and her co-author Eva Tuschman Leonard, LMFT. The authors, longstanding friends and colleagues, will be conducting a conversation to welcome their new volume into the world, and inviting the wider CIIS community to take part.

The book challenges a deeply held assumption: that dreams are not real. As Pearson Trimbach and Tuschman Leonard demonstrate, dreams communicate emotional truths, which are incubated and encrypted within both our nighttime and daytime dreaming. Learning to listen for these truths, the authors argue, is a core practice of understanding the life of the soul.

Accepting their invitation to "sing your dreams" might just open your soul to growth, grace, and love you didn’t know were waiting for you.
Robin Bagai, Psy.D., Lecturer and Editor

The Emotional Truth of Dreams is distinctive in its form. Rather than writing about dreams, the authors offer a book of dreams. At its center are collaborative dream dialogues, intimate conversations between two trusted spiritual friends and colleagues, both of whom are also practicing artists. Pearson Trimbach is a singer and songwriter; Tuschman Leonard is a visual artist and ceramicist. Together, they share contemplation of dream life and the insights of mutual seeking.

Through fourteen chapters, the authors trace the themes that emerge from their selected dreams — screams, songs, time, love, death, divinity, illness, animal companions, and creative expression. Each chapter unfolds as an act of deep listening, and they reveal longings, curiosities, and discoveries that readers can connect to their own dreaming practices.

The book draws on a confluence of perspectives. Freudian, Jungian, and Bionian psychoanalytic thought meet Buddhist contemplative traditions, Jewish and Christian mysticism, and Indigenous understandings of spirit. This integrative vision reflects the kind of scholarship that has defined CIIS since 1968 — work that bridges Eastern and Western intellectual and spiritual traditions, honoring multiple paths to knowledge rather than privileging any single framework.

Central to the book is the concept of the "nondual un/conscious," a view that Pearson Trimbach also brings into her teaching at CIIS. The authors describe their approach as one of "awakening together to and through dreams.” Where dream life is often relegated to the margins of serious psychological inquiry, Pearson Trimbach and Tuschman Leonard invite it forward as an honored guest, a companion welcomed into the light of awareness. Their hope is that readers will feel moved to apprentice to their own dream life, opening further to what they call the mysteries and liberations of the soul.

The book has already drawn recognition from leading voices in psychoanalysis and contemplative practice, and now anyone from the community is welcome to experience the conversation.

Hear from the Authors

Pearson Trimbach and Tuschman Leonard will celebrate the release of The Emotional Truth of Dreams at a book launch event hosted by CIIS Public Programs on July 22, 2026.

Reserve your tickets to the event here.

Visit emotionaltruthofdreams.com to learn more about the book.