Employing metaphor analysis, the present study explores the nature of unconscious beliefs of PhD students. This research aims at analyzing the metaphors produced by Iranian PhD students about learning and teaching in both current and ideal situations. Using the Iranian context of education, this study intended to: first, collecting the metaphors the students created by using the prompts "A university student is/should be like a..." and "A university professor is/should be like a... ". Second, identifying and analyzing the metaphors. The results revealed that PhD university students concur with forming the foundation of learning and teaching based on "situative" learning concepts. Finally, the results were discussed in the context of language learning and teaching.