The Butterfly

This dream has been reoccurring one for some time now. I've managed to translate its meaning and I know why I get it. Mainly I have this dream after a particularly puzzling dream the night before.

It starts off with me in a black abyss. I'm wandering around trying to find something, anything. Suddenly the ground begins to shake violently. Out from the ground sprout walls, they go up so high I lose sight of them. The walls begin shifting and I have to move fast. I begin running. Its like a maze honestly. I turn a corner and a wall quickly goes up. I run another direction and manage to get a bit farther when I slam into another wall.

Suddenly the ground begins to shake violently again. The walls stop moving but I can see a few yards away the ground is starting to cave in. I begin running full speed the other direction turning corners quickly, trying to find a way out. I'm not that lucky. The ground collapses under me and I fall for what feels like hours.

Then I land in a body of water. I come up for air but only for a brief moment. lack tentacle-like things come out of the water and grab me. They begin to drag me down under the surface. I try to break free but for every one I break free from 2 more take its place. I can feel the water filling my lungs and I know I'm going to die. So I stop struggling.

It seems like hours again, I'm slowly being pulled further and further away from the surface, all hope seems lost. Suddenly I see a butterfly floating up from below. Its a brilliant blue and purple butterfly. I then hear myself think 'Why is there a butterfly underwater?' Its begins floating upwards to the surface and I can see it hovering just above the water now.

My strength and determination become renewed and I completely break free from my captors, I can hear a low scream as I swim upwards. The minute I break the surface I take in a big breath of air. I can feel it. I can actually feel it. Its amazing. Its begins to rain at his point. I see a shoreline and swim for it.

When I get there I see what I thought my salvation turns out to be another obstacle. The ground is angled in such a way it seems almost impossible to climb up, on top of that there are the bodies of all those who came before me and have never made it. I see the butterfly again. Its fluttering gently at the top of the peak where I see a light. I know I have to get there.

I begin to climb. The rain does not make it easy. I slip several times, my nails digging into the mud and rock. I can feel it, under my fingernails, I can feel everything. I almost want to give up again but I remember whats behind me, the lost hope, the acceptance of defeat, I didn't want tot go back to that. I continue my climb.

What again feels like hours I make it to the top. I am bruised, bleeding, in pain, but not broken. I see my butterfly first, my hope. And then I gaze at the source of the light and am filled with horror. What I thought to be my peace is something far worse then I could've thought possible. Yggdrasil, the world tree, the source of life, was burning. Everything around it as a desolate waste land. There was no life here for life itself was being destroyed.

I felt sadness like I never knew and an emptiness that would've consumed me. I thought to myself why did I struggle and suffer so much just o see this? What was the purpose of it? I was better off drowning in my lost hope.

The butterfly flew to me and whispered to me 'Now you know our pain. Now you know what you must sacrifice.'

For a long time I've pondered this dream, I could give several meanings to it, but I have found one that better suits me. I figure it is a representation of myself in many tages. The first being empitness (the abyss), the next being confusion (the maze), then lost hope (the sea and the black tentacle things, followed by a small hope (the butterfly), then renewed strength, followed by struggle and acceptance (the shoreline and the bodies), and finally understanding what I will have to sacrifice to gain the knowledge I seek.

It may not be perfect, but until I can find some other meaning to it, this is the closest thing I have to it. I leave you to interpret it as you will.

Aggie