The end of the world and dreams of love
Yesterday I woke up from a dream about the end of the world. I say dream because although the concept of the world ending is nightmarish, the way everything unfolded was in a dreamlike, almost alternate reality state. And luckily, the world did not in fact end before I woke up.
In this dream, the end of the world was upon us. I was a part of a group of scientists*. We were all well aware that the end was near and we were tasked with finding and executing last ditch efforts to save everyone. There were scientific things we were doing and studying at some point but I couldn’t tell you what they were.
There was no sense of urgency or panic. There was an overwhelming acceptance and sense of peace. What was coming was coming, we were beyond scientific solutions and we knew it. Instead of falling into disarray, everyone was rising up. Time seemed to move more slowly, particles of earth sparkled in the air, we dropped what didn’t matter and reached for those we loved.
Up above in the skies there was a wild convergence of science and spirituality. There were very inevitable scientific reasons that our world should be ending, but there was also a spiritual presence only now revealing itself—blanketed around earth like some sort of shimmering protective layer. This presence—a spirit or multiple spirits—had been holding and watching humanity through good times and bad and through all kinds of phenomena, since the very beginning. Now here at the end of the world, it revealed itself to everyone in one last show of protection, giving everyone strength and peace to face what was coming.
The spiritual presence and scientific happenings commingled in the skies creating an aura of darkness and light, both scary and beautiful. Beneath it all we slowed down and held our loved ones close. We tossed tennis balls to our dogs. We read books to our kids and danced under the mysterious sky. We treasured each passing second knowing that it was one of our last.
Now and then we’d glance at the sky, wondering when it was going to happen. The seconds ticked on, the moments with our loved ones stretched, each more beautiful than the last.
Above I could hear the sky spirit saying with such tenderness, “look. Just look at them. We need to hold on. Look how beautiful they are, look how beautiful they can be.”
“It’s their time,” the looming darkness seemed to be saying.
“It’s not their time, yet. I’ve held onto them for so long. Look at them now. Look what they can do.”
We continued to dance underneath the skies and pour love into one another, our only momentary regret being that we wished we had done this sooner. It was love that was saving us, even if just for a short time.
When I woke up from this dream it took me a full 15 minutes to transition out of it. As always, some fragments of the dream immediately began to fall away especially as I tried to hone in on certain parts of it.
I should note that for my entire life I have had crazy, vivid dreams. Not every single night and not always like this one, but often! I used to keep dream journals with pictures because my dreams were that wild and needed to live somewhere. Writing this dream down today feels like my old dream journaling.
I fell asleep on the night of January 30th and at some point entered this end of world dream, and there are several things happening in my life and the word that I can tie into my dream. Sometimes my dreams are extremely random, and sometimes they just make sense.
I am currently reading “The Secret of Secrets” by Dan Brown, which as those who have read Dan Brown know, he likes to cover the convergence of science and mythology/spirituality. This particular book also covers brain activity & consciousness, so I’m thinking I have also been unconsciously absorbing the plot of my husband’s book…
“Project Hail Mary” by Andy Weir. I have had this one on my reading list for so long and my husband is a new avid reader—he’s been devouring this book at night! Like the title implies, the book is about a “hail mary” attempt to save earth from extinction.
Important note: as a lifelong lover of books, reading at night side by side with my husband who is a new lover of books is the best.
Frozen. Just Frozen. My kids are obsessed and the movie’s lovely messaging about love conquering fear and how fear can’t be trusted, fear is the true enemy but love will heal—that obviously showed up in my dream.
THE WORLD RIGHT NOW. I can’t even begin to describe how this one feels. The world is a very scary place right now, and getting scarier. The things that have happened, are happening, and the way they have been unfolding with ease and no consequences is extremely unsettling. The duality of going through your everyday life, especially raising little kids right now who are so full of pure innocence that you just want to protect and nurture your safe, kind and beautiful bubble—against knowing what is happening in the world can be very hard to hold. I find it so bizarre to have casual conversations with fellow school moms whose names I can’t even remember, where we chat about how scary things are and wonder what the world we are raising our kids into is going to look like—and then end the conversation with something like “well anyways… bye! See you at pickup.” Life goes on.
Our family bubble is the absolute most treasured thing to me. We are learning that it’s okay to feel so unbelievably happy and peaceful in our bubble, but also sometimes feel distraught on the outside about the world around us. Hopeful, too, we do have hope—but it’s also important and okay to say that things that are happening are not normal and not okay. We teach our kids about morals, human decency and kindness, and we as adults need to live these morals and use our voices when we see something that isn’t right.
Lastly and maybe the final thing that pushed me into an end-of-world dream, Catherine O’Hara. News of her passing came on January 30th. What a tremendous loss of an absolute icon. Tommy and I decided to watch episode 1 of Schitt’s Creek that night. It turned out that the last line of episode 1 was Catherine’s character saying “let’s all pray we don’t wake up” after her family said goodnight, so of course we couldn’t end on that and watched episode 2. I also watched a clip of her being asked what the role she’d like to be most remembered for and her answer was something like “the role of mother to my kids.” She gets it. I think the mysterious sky-spirit-protector-of-humanity from my dream would approve. Rest in peace, Catherine.
Speaking of this mysterious sky-spirit-protector-of-humanity, I think I know what it might be now. People talk about Mother Earth, but maybe this was the Mother of Earth. Like we wrap our children in our love and protection, this spirit did the same for humanity. Guiding and loving and nurturing, ever-present even when we can’t see her. The other day I got to rock my 2 year old Gus to sleep. There’s nothing like the feeling of your child in your arms, fully trusting and melting into you, especially when they’re 2 and it doesn’t happen as frequently. While I rocked Gus, I could literally feel my heart surrounding him. It was like my aura as his mother was coming out of me and wrapping itself around him. With my eyes closed I could see this motherly, magical glow closing in around him and in that moment I knew my love and protection would always be with him. I could feel it in my bones.
Maybe, like everyone realized in my dream, and like Elsa realized after Anna’s sacrifice (like I said… the Frozen obsession in this house is very real): in the face of turmoil, we need more love. We need to remember what’s important, who we are, and that love is a true human form of magic that transcends time and space.
That’s a lot for a Sunday morning, welcome to my brain. Sending love your way.
xo,
Shannon
*Sidebar: despite a brief but intense phase of my life during high school where I wanted to be a surgeon, I am not a scientist. I would literally check out videos from the library that had operating room footage of all kinds of surgeries, which I would watch at home taking notes. This dream of being a surgeon pretty much evaporated on day 1 of AP Bio. AP Bio and I did not get along very well.
