Burning Man Dreams

topic posted Sun, September 20, 2009 - 12:21 PM by  offlineKurt
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I was wondering how many others have dreams about burning man. I have them frequently. There are a couple of recurring themes in mine:

I arrive forgetting something VERY important, like beer or other "consumables". A variant on this is that I drive to the nearby supermarket to get what I forgot, only to return to BM forgetting it again. Very frustrating.

I'm at BM with my Mom. Enough said.
posted by:
Kurt
Phoenix
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  • Re: Burning Man Dreams

    Sun, September 20, 2009 - 2:29 PM
    The first thing I tell people that havent been is "it warps your dreams forever"

    The only time I DONT dream about BMan is likea few days before the event > post decompression, when Im actually really living it.

    The rest of the year, its BMan city, Bizarro Gerlach, strange views of the playa, day glo armageddon mixed with festival and strange san franciosco with aiien cat eyes and large pieces of art, and hippys from Phish tour trying to figure it out while a bomb goes off, not to mention all the sexy stuff.
    • Re: Burning Man Dreams

      Sun, September 20, 2009 - 4:51 PM
      For me it's not just the way it changes my sleeping dreams, it's the way I have waking dreams about the playa. I frequently think "wow, that would be cool to bring to the playa" thoughts, and then space out on utterly impractical schemes to mount something like an airliner on the playa in a vertical dive and the first 20 feet of the nose already buried in the dust, huge flames coming out of the engines and swings dangling from the wings.
      • Re: Burning Man Dreams

        Sun, September 20, 2009 - 11:01 PM
        I dream about Burningman almost every night,althought it is often happening at a different place,such as a school ,a snow cap,a forest,or a beach.Very often,some sort of alien activity is involved.Usually,Im missing either my tent,my cloths,or all of my stuff.Sometimes,I go to my dream Burn after or before some other dream trip,like a cruise,or a trip out of the country.
        Lately,Ive been wondering if these dreams really have anything to do with Burningman.I think maybe my mind attributes these dreams to Burningman just because there kinda "burny".I definatly have many dreams that actually take place on the playa though.
        • Re: Burning Man Dreams

          Sun, September 20, 2009 - 11:10 PM
          Me too. A lot of my dreams are at BM yet the location is different. Sometimes there are trees or water. I just seem to know it's BM.
        • Re: Burning Man Dreams

          Sun, September 20, 2009 - 11:13 PM
          ok we are living the dream then l wake up wondering who put skylights in the tent??
          • Re: Burning Man Dreams

            Wed, September 23, 2009 - 7:36 PM
            Haha, that reminds me of a dream I had shortly after last year's burn. I woke up, still believing I was on the playa, and thought it was very strange indeed that my tent had furniture and glass windows. "How did I bring all this shit out here?" Oh, wait...back to reality, doh!
  • Re: Burning Man Dreams

    Sun, September 20, 2009 - 11:24 PM
    I've been having Burning Man related frustration dreams pretty much every night -- trying to pack for BM but something keeps preventing me and the target departure date comes and goes and I can't get the truck packed so I can leave; or being at the Burn and trying to get ready to go out on the art cars but I can't seem to finish getting dressed and ready to go, and the cars are leaving and I'm not ready to go yet. Sometimes I'm on the Playa, but more often I'm someplace else, although I'm still certain that it's a Burn.

    My most vivid dream so far has been about being at a Burn and having the end of the event come and go, watching everyone packing up and leaving all around me and not being able to get packed, and finally awakening in the morning to emerge from my tent and then realizing that I'm stark naked and alone on the side of the highway, with truckers honking at me as they go barrelling past. So this dream was a double whammy of frustration dream and a performance anxiety (naked) dream.

    I've decided to start drinking more in the hope of making them stop.

    (jk)
    • Re: Burning Man Dreams

      Mon, September 21, 2009 - 3:28 AM
      BTW,I LOVE this topic!
      • Re: Burning Man Dreams

        Mon, September 21, 2009 - 9:11 AM
        Yeah, these are some like totally epicly stellar posts, enjoying them all!

        And speaking of the daydreams and inspriation and stuff like that not having to do with sleeping dreams, is crazy motivation changing stuff and we see its outcome every year in BRC. Its wonderful, can be a bit consuming unless you make it in your daily life as well. I have really enjoyed going from not really into fashion, to making my own clothes and loving it as an art and not just a vanitly.

        I get that Im Alone in the Desert dream too, its creepy. Somtimes I flash back to those quick moments driving on the 447 when its really vast and trippy. Or the turn off/exit and how twilight zone it is. Things we dont think about much when were there doing it, but it creeps back into your subconsious so I dream a lot about those things, too.
        • Re: Burning Man Dreams

          Mon, September 21, 2009 - 10:24 AM
          There are times for all of us, I'm sure, when we have difficulty 'getting our mind to open to a topic', or do not realize the import of the topic until years later. When you talk of Burningman dreams, I immediately reached back in my mind to a song that I enjoyed thoroughly years ago and probably didn't even grasp until my time last year on playa. The song was all-instrumental, Latino and blues-influenced by the band ZZ Top, called "Asleep in the Desert", off their 'Tejas' album (pre-Texas punk era for the band, largely blues-influenced and down-home Southern rock, nothing like 'Recycler' or any of those albums).

          I hummed that song as I went to sleep amid the cacophonous all-night vibe of BRC. And felt strangely, and wonderfully at peace. Welcome home after so many years..........
          • Re: Burning Man Dreams

            Mon, September 21, 2009 - 4:42 PM
            I do that too, every year! Every year I pick an album to go full on pre event and post event. AT the event, it just humms in my mind.
            This year, I picked the New Pornographers: Challengers and Twin Cinema, both were new to my ears pre burn, and now every song sends me somewhere on the playa in a dreamlike state audio style. Im HUGELY sensitive to music so this works well with me. I always pick up a few key tunes AT the event as well, but I do like my own personal music journey. In 06 it was Zero 7: The Garden, and in 07 it was The Levellers: Hello Pig, last year it was Levellers: Burn America Burn. Sometimes it happens naturally, but this year I forced New Pornographers and it worked just as well. Forever etched......

            New Pornographers These are the Fables
            In coral and gray
            In submarine chambers
            One day
            It swam for the light
            The jewels that lit
            The cities that float there
            Cities in circles drawn perfect, complete
            Holding the secrets on my street
            My street, my street

            So come in and play
            The song of the siren
            It's commonplace
            You hear the voice rise
            In one wave
            And crash on your doorstep
            Making the circle here perfect, complete
            These are the fables on my street

            Ten thousand dancing girls
            Kicking cans 'cross the sky
            No reason why
            Why ask to pay yourself
            For the call of the wild
            You found this child
            So raise him

            And wind your back
            Come back to the river
            The currents speed by
            And hope the men fear
            The hammer comes down
            So hard on the evening
            Cracking the dawn of your
            Days are repeat
            These are fables on my street
            My street, my street

            Heaven shook Hell
            And down from its pockets
            The ring in your bell
            It fell through your hands
            Hang at your feet
            The doors that won't open
            Marking the journey of our friends complete
            These are the fables of my street
            My street

            My street, my street
            Lay down in glory, you're not alone
            ================

            Most of the songs on these albums are totally burny becase the lyrics are left to the listeners interpretations, LIKE DREAMS :)
  • Re: Burning Man Dreams

    Tue, September 22, 2009 - 7:00 PM
    The nights immediately following Bman my dreams are not so much dreams as states of confusion... waking up, not knowing where I am. Sometimes having to get out of bed and touch things to sort it out. That passes after a week or so.

    Dreams, however, persist throughout the year. Mostly they are me arriving at BMan and looking for my friends, camp, belongings... usually a little displaced and searching. Never on the playa... always in some strange locale, like a forest, or a rolling hill countryside. Usually someplace green and meandering and lush. But always Burningman.

    Hmmm... I just re-read that. Very telling that my BMan dreams find me displaced and searching.
    • Re: Burning Man Dreams

      Tue, September 22, 2009 - 7:10 PM
      I dreamed that Huelll came back from the dead
      • Re: Burning Man Dreams

        Wed, September 23, 2009 - 4:08 PM
        I too am on the skirts of the playa like you Dusty, in most my Bman dreams. Theres a forest attached somewhere, and sometimes I even can look down onto some kind of playa portal and get an aerial view all black holey
        • Re: Burning Man Dreams

          Wed, September 23, 2009 - 5:45 PM
          Next year will be my first, but I've been having on average 1-2 BMan dreams a week. The other night I dreamed I got to Burning Man and opened my big pack and all that was inside was my tent and a bottle of water. In my dream I started to freak out, then not so much after realizing that what you need at Burning Man has a way of coming to you. Keep in mind I am one who is always over prepared for everything and am already collecting must need items and sewing costume stuff for next year.
  • Re: Burning Man Dreams

    Wed, September 23, 2009 - 11:18 PM
    I was out on the playa with my fiance except there was buildings all around with tents placed between them, suddenly there was a earthquake, and the playa cracked and everything except right in front of me fell in and after that I went to a party.
    • Re: Burning Man Dreams

      Thu, September 24, 2009 - 9:04 PM
      They seem to be happening more frequently since the burn, last night I had 3 diff. ones. The last one, as I awoke for work :( I was dancing at Nexus.