Cowboy Clairvoyant is a members-only newsletter and series by Autumn Fourkiller featuring dream interpretation, tarot answers, and more ventures into the Beyond.
Dear Dreamers,
I’ve told you, some, about when I would go walking after midnight, up and outside of my body. But have I told you any of when my dreams take me back to somewhere familiar without my feet guiding me there? When familiar is not exactly it, for I have never been there, at least not when I’m awake. The town that is like my town, but not. The haunted stretch of foothills I climbed while asleep as a child, a recurring, and recurring, and recurring. The way sometimes a house I see on the street while driving reminds me of the house, the corridor, the set of stairs, in that haunted mansion with a blue sky view.
This, these places I go when I’m asleep, in visions and clips, are what you could call my Dreamworld. What you, in your own conception, could call your Dreamworld. One of my gifts, if you could call it that, is to see that world, the other world, your other world, like it is my very own. To dip my hand into the spring of your dead. To see.
A week or so ago, while camping with someone that, for now, I’ll simply call The Lawyer, I closed my eyes and went nowhere at all. When I woke up, the wind singing, the coyotes howling, the water against the rocks, the stags in rut, the eeriest blue in the air, their breathing behind me, their arm warm on top of my body, I realized that I didn’t need to go anywhere. The future hung there, ready for me to divine, in the mist.
This week, I’ll guide Dreamer Eli through their dreamscape city, and we’ll explore a three card reading for the depths of mid-autumn and shadow work focuses. Remember that you don’t need a fully formed query to write in, and take good care.
Sending you your own divinations,
Cowboy
What Does a ‘Dreamscape City’ Mean?
i have a “dreamscape city” i go to when i dream. buildings with different jobs i’ve worked or currently work, filled with people i know or know of. outside is basically blocks of farmers market style community in my old neighborhoods. to the side of the “city” is a lake/ocean/river of sorts that i make trips to with groups of “friends.” it all feels so real and weird and i wake up exhausted. i also have sleep paralysis most nights when these dreams don’t happen.
what does my “dreamscape city city” mean???
– Eli
Dear Eli,
Thank you for the gift of your question. Before we begin in earnest and talk a little bit about the “mechanics” of a dreamscape city (or Dreamworld), I’d like to say that given what you shared with me regarding your experiences in childhood, it makes perfect sense to me that you have such an involved Dreamworld. This place has been rooted to you for some time, and is an evolving organism, folding in your experiences, past and present.
It’s totally normal, and perhaps expected, that these dreams (or visits) to your Dreamworld leave you exhausted. When I visit such places, I, too, often wake up feeling strange and dead tired. There are a few things I can suggest to make these experiences feel less exhausting: meditating before bed, sleeping with black tourmaline under your pillow, and a weekly (if not nightly) cleanse with a white candle and herb of your choice.
Secondly, there is obviously something you need to work through in your Dreamworld, given that you are often drawn to it, and you visit so often. A good somatic exercise to get the lay of the land (so to speak) is to literally map what you are seeing. You can do this in your journal or through meditation, but to really understand where you are going, you need to, in your way, conquer it, make it your own. So, in this way, it is less that your dreamscape city means something, and more that it is something.
So what is your Dreamworld? That is harder to explain. It is that thing that hangs in the ether but also your own mind, projecting out of you, and also inside of you. In general, we all have one, even if it is just nonsense dreams and no paths, a weird collection of things strung together, less a world and more a mishmash, a kitchen junk drawer. Your Dreamworld is that vessel for every dream you’ve ever had, all your psychic experiences, your own little rooting on the other side. Visiting your Dreamworld, your collection, can do many things — including heightening your intuition — but, like all travel, can be a bit exhausting. One doesn’t want to stretch themself too thin, or too far.
My suggestion is always to take it one step at a time. Go down one path, not all of them. Think deeply about one dream, not the whole lot. Listen to the wind, not the birds and the trees. Open yourself up to the knowing, and not knowing, and you will soon learn how best to walk forward, and how best to travel the paths laid before you.
And hey, if you need help, you know I’m just a query away.
See you on the Other Side,
CC
A Three Card Tarot Reading for the Depths of Autumn
The days are getting shorter and the nights are getting longer. The ghosts walk and whisper. I start feeling the need to get my SAD lamp out.
Besides that, this particular spot of fall also reminds me of my shadow, as Jung might have said. Those parts of myself I avoid. My blind spots and pitfalls. The worst of the worst of Autumn. The shadow feels omnipresent these days, which made me think that it might for you, too.
For this reading, I drew three cards for the shadow, pulling forth questions to jumpstart your journaling and reminders to get through the depths of the darkness, or at least have a more functional fall.
FIVE OF CUPS: What still remains to grieve? What do you feel you have abandoned your terror? Who did you love and lose, all of your own volition? Are you letting your anger rule you where it should not?
QUEEN OF SWORDS: Cut the bullshit, no one believes it, least of all yourself. What do you feel is the worst thing about the holidays, and how can you change it? If you let yourself be spoken to like a dog (where you can prevent it), they will begin to treat you like a dog. This is not your fault, but it should not be allowed. Don’t downplay your own intelligence and clarity for the benefit of others. What makes you stand apart from the crowd?
SEVEN OF CUPS: Can you will it to be so, or will you have to put the work in? If a map is spread out before you, and all paths lead to yes, which one are you taking? Explain to yourself why. Think before you speak, but don’t let your inner silence win.
