What a Way to Go: Network

In one of my dreams, I was leading a group of around 30 people out of a flooded area. We walked into a large, capital-like building, with wide front doors, huge black and white marble tile floor in a large, open lobby. For part of the dream, you need to know that I have been a Baha'i (a religion) all of my adult life.

Anyway, we walked through the lobby. I had a baby in a gerrypack on my back. I was at the front of the group, so came to the door into a waiting room first. The room was full of Baha'is - some I knew and some I didn't. They were all watching a TV that was reporting on the flood that was happening down lower. They were mezmerized with the TV, seemed to be in an alpha state, watching the screen, people dying, drowning, the horror of it all. The carpet was a thick, thick, plush carpet. The chairs and couches around the walls of the room were plush, comfortable, overstuffed furniture. Every chair was filled. I said to the people in the room, "You aren't high enough. Come with us. You need to get higher." They ignored me. They just continued to stare at the TV. They were complacent in their comfort and certain that they were safe.

Someone behind me said, "They aren't going to listen to you. We have to go." I said it a few more times and then just turned and led the group away from that room. We found a staircase right next to the front doors. It seemed odd to me, because it was like a stairwell that would be in a normal house, not a public building. But we started up, me first. About 2 and a half stories up, the stairs ended in a wall. Not even a closed door, just a wall. I turned around and told those below me we would have to go back down - that this was a dead end. It took awhile for all of us to get sorted out and back down the stairs, since there were 30 or so of us crowded into the stairwell.

When we got to the bottom, I again crossed to the waiting room and tried to tell the people that they had to go higher, but they still ignored me, so we finally left and walked down a long hallway. At the end of the hallway, we found the "right" stairs - they were open, curving, spiral stairs, going up many stories. I realized we had found the stairs meant for people to climb. So we started up. And climbed and climbed and climbed. Finally, after a LONG time climbing, we got to the top.

The stairs just ended into air - about two feet across - with a pathway on the other side that I knew led to safety. In order to get to that path, we had to jump across those two feet of open air - clear down to the lobby. I was petrified of jumping (I'm super nervous of heights anyway) but knew I had to do it if all of these people were going to get to safety. So, I jumped. In the middle of the jump, I looked down and saw a trail of water coming into the lobby all that far distance down.

And, suddenly, as I landed on the other side, it occurred to me that I hadn't happened to mention that that staircase - the one next to the front door - ended in a blank wall. And, all of those people were going to continue sitting there, mezmerized by the TV until their feet got wet (which they wouldn't notice for a long time because the carpet was so thick and plush it would absorb a lot of water before rising enough to soak their feet. Then they would jump to their feet, run out the door, and run for that staircase. But when they got 2 and a half stories up and found a blank wall, the need to get everyone on the stairs to turn around and go back down would be chaotic and would take too long, and by the time they got back down the stairs it would be too late and they would drown.

I was in SO much agony of spirit as I landed on the safe ledge. I knew some of those people. They were friends. They were going to die because I hadn't mentioned the staircase. Only I also knew that they were going to die because of their complacency and their refusal to listen to me - certain in themselves that they were safe and comfortable and didn't need to go higher. And by the time they were knocked out of their complacency, it would be too late to find the right staircase.

Baha'is have been warned, just like those in all other religions, about a time of calamity in the future. For some reason that I have never understood, the general attitude about those warnings are that "oh, that's something we aren't supposed to worry about. All we need to do is teach and 'build the kingdom of God on earth,' and we'll be ok." I have argued until I'm blue in the face about preparations for a storm being the reasonable approach when you know a hurricane is approaching, or going below ground if a tornado is forecast - it's never made a bit of difference. Finally, in the past six years, I've pretty much ignored the Baha'i community and gone my own way. But in truth, it hasn't stopped hurting. In their complacency, they sit mezmerized in comfort and false security, certain that they are "right." But in the end, they will run for the wrong staircase.

Lua in Colorado

I have those dreams... in the war zone... urban, dark, wet... huge warehouses and skyscraper canyons and empty streets... running, fighting, dodging explosions... trying to find my way somewhere... battling zombies and monsters... leading or following a band of loved ones... I'm reminded of something Ran Prieur said about post-apocalyptic movies, about how we have these Mad Max fantasies that look really awful, but which really reflect something we deeply want. Instead of lives locked in a cubicle, we're outside, living lives that really mean something, fighting against the forces that would keep us enslaved.

Glad you're reading Derrick. It occurred to me the other day that one way to summarize Derrick's work is that he is asking, over and over, "why aren't we protecting ourselves?" and making the distinction, over and over, between protection and domination, between self-defense and aggression. Good stuff. He really speaks to me. He is a good person and an amazing analyst and a deeply caring soul.

Paul,
I loved reading your dream and the drawings were amazing. I had over a year of almost nightly apocalyptic dreams as Tim and I were doing research for What A Way To Go. I wrote them off to my "unconscious" just "processing" during the night what was too much to process during the day. Now I have other thoughts about these dreams. I wonder if they are not preparing us for working through both the physical and emotional/spiritual turmoil we are to be facing more and more. In that way perhaps they are training as much or more than any kind of literal prophesy.

When we talked about beginning this forum I hadn't thought of it being a place to share and reflect upon our dreams. It just "happened" that I had two clear and relevant dreams the next night after I wrote An Experiment. I want to begin to trust this avenue of insight, guidance, inspiration. Because perhaps it didn't "just happen" that I had those dreams the next night. Perhaps it was guidance: Write about your dreams. Encourage others to listen to theirs.

This is a whole other way of approaching our situation that may be a hundred times more powerful than a stupid technofix that doesn't work. This may be part of what stepping into a new paradigm is about: tapping into the wisdom of intuition, dreams, collective intelligence.