My mother is driving down an 8-lane highway. The sky is bright blue; it’s hot outside. We’re going faster and faster, speeding toward a skyline filled with burning skyscrapers.
Boom. The car next to us explodes. Another one catches fire, burning from the bottom up. Boom. Another explosion.
I start screaming “mama, STOP DRIVING”. She’s not listening, mama’s speeding to the burning skyline. I’m screaming and screaming and I look - she’s on her phone, mama’s not looking where she’s driving.
Cars keep burning from the bottom up and mama keeps driving. No matter what I scream, she rarely looks up. I shout with all my strength “YOU’RE GOING TO KILL US” and she hardly blinks.
I reach for the door handle and try to jump out before we reach the burning skyline. I can’t move. I want to stay with mama, I believe she’ll stop driving.
Silence.
We slowly skid to a halt in the city that was burning down. Everything’s grey, crinkling embers break the sound of a ghost town.
I turn to my mom, I quietly scream “why did we speed here? Everyone’s already dead.”
***********
I had this dream yesterday. As it played out in my sleep, I didn’t stop it. I watched the story evolve until we reached the city that burned. Even as my heart raced and my body turned wet with fear, I stayed in the nightmare - I wanted a conclusion. I wanted to be able to wake up and understand why I dreamt it. Were my subconscious visualizations telling me something I didn’t acknowledge yet?
Recently, I’ve been wrapped up in memories of my past. I’ve been thrown back to feeling the same helplessness I used to feel. It’s temporary - I always get out and heal whatever’s triggered me. Dreams like the burning city one help me recognize the individual pieces I need to work through. In this one, I caught onto the fact I stayed in the car, I believed in someone else making a change. The cars exploded one by one - that’s how to past used to be. Not all the bad happened at once, but metaphorical explosions came one after another. And that horrible feeling at the end - was speeding ahead worth it? What was that trying to tell me?
Nightmares aren’t something new; they’ve followed me since I was a kid. Sometimes, they stack up, interrupting my peace for days at a time. Sometimes, they drop down out of the blue; they’re always telling me something. A couple of dreams have repeated themselves as I grew from child to adult. In a particularly paralyzing one, I'm trying to run away from someone and I can't move. I can't scream. Every part of my body is tense, I try to take a step forward and I can't.
I've consciously kept myself in this nightmare - it's terrifying. When I wake up, I know to ask myself - what am I afraid that I can't control? As a kid, there was so much out of my hands. By talking myself through what's bothering me in the morning, I can remind myself that I have power over my life.
I’m not yet sure what the burning city nightmare was trying to tell me. Maybe it was a reflection of real life. Maybe ashes in a ghost town represent foundational soil for a new home. Flattened cities make excellent space for rebuilding.
Good night my friends, I hope your nightmares heal you.
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"When I wake up, I know to ask myself - what am I afraid that I can't control? As a kid, there was so much out of my hands. By talking myself through what's bothering me in the morning, I can remind myself that I have power over my life." this is such a powerful ritual, thank you for sharing it
Your description of the intuitive dreamwork you are doing is an extremely lucid and courageous dance with the unconscious. Was it always this way for you, or did you develop the capacity to work with your dreams this way over time, out of necessity?