This dream was the first that I am aware of where a Toltec teacher was helping and guiding me in a lucid dream. 

As the dream started, I was walking though the countryside toward a large city.  The road went through agricultural fields, over gently rolling hills.  It was a clear day, with blue skies and a slight chill to the air.  I could see the city off in the distance, but had a long walk ahead of me.  A car pulled up next to me and the driver, a man in his 40’s, asked if I would like a ride.   I accepted, and we continued on toward the city.  As we drove along he told me that he was going to be my teacher, and that he had something to show me.

We entered a large bustling city, which I assume was New York, or equivalent.  We found a place to park, and he said we had to walk through the city. 

When we got out of the car, I looked around and saw that the city was almost empty.  There were no cars or any other vehicles on the streets.  There were a few people on the sidewalks, but they appeared to be in some sort of suspended animation.  We were walking through a deserted and stilled city.  We walked down empty streets, looking at the skyscrapers and other buildings.  It was an eerie feeling, reading the street signs, looking into empty stores, walking across empty streets.  It was a little like what I imagine it would be to walk through the town of Chernobyl when it was evacuated after the nuclear power plant accident – except that there were motionless people in this city.

I then noticed that the people had started to move, but not with any direction; they were just milling around.  They saw us and were commenting among themselves about us. It was clear that they found us to be out of the norm, and to be frightening.  They pointed to us, and I overheard them telling each other that we were not the same as they were – to be careful of us.

I asked my teacher what this was about, and why was he showing me such an odd place?  He said that he wanted to point out that this is the normal situation; there are a few people who are “awake,” but mostly everyone is asleep and there really isn’t anything going on of importance – most people are just milling around using up their days.  There was really almost nothing in the cities, even though we think of them as being full of things.  He said that he brought me here because he wanted to be sure that I understood that in many ways the path I have chosen to follow is lonely and disassociated from most of the people around me. He said that I would find that most things that I previously thought were important don’t even exist.  Even those few people who do take notice do so from a distance.  They will be fearful because I would be different and unknown to them.  He said it isn’t all like that, but much of what I have come to view as full of important things is actually empty.  He then told me that he would continue to visit me in my dreams to help me along the path to enlightenment.

I don’t know if this dream was some sort of warning or just a statement of fact.  I have thought of it often over the years because it seems so true.  I had just finished a cruise in the Mediterranean that had a lot of the feeling of that dream.  The ship and other passengers were basically not there.  They were busy and seemed to be engaged, but were actually so far into their internal worlds that they missed most of what was happening around them.  Those few that I did talk to were hesitant to get any closer than just passing acquaintances.   When we went ashore to visit old ruins we saw and interacted very little with the peoples or places that we were traveling through.  It felt a lot like that empty city, full of people just whiling away their lives.