I didn't have "that dream" last night but something just as terrifying. Or almost as terrifying because this time, something was different.
I was dreaming that I was with someone. She looked like my niece but she wasn't really her, like maybe she was a stranger who reminded me of her. Or maybe she was both? Anyway, I was lying down and she was sitting next to me. Suddenly, she wrapped her hands around my neck and started to viciously choke me. I heard myself choking, and panic rushed through me.
"How does it feel now?" she snarled at me. Her face morphed into a demonic face, and my thoughts split into three: one part was incredibly terrified, one part said I'M GOING TO DIE, and the last part went, Oh HELL NO.
It was the rage that won in the end.
I managed to say something. It was only four words, but the strange part is that when I spoke, my voice was not the only one I heard. There was another voice layered over mine. It was a deep voice, full of power and certainty.
I, along with the voice of power, said, "Stop it right now."
The pressure choking my neck eased off immediately. I felt myself being dragged backwards from the dream, the darkness around me eventually giving way to light as I woke up. When I woke up and knew myself to be me again, I kept my eyes closed. I immediately took stock of my body, as it was tingling with a strange sensation (probably due to waking up so suddenly?). I was lying on my back, and my body was warm beneath the covers. There was a slightly cold chill on my lower right side.
The strange tingling sensation lessened as my mind awokened more clearly. It felt like a kind of unknown power was humming through me, waking up my bones and settling into the corners of my heart. The position on my back suddenly frightened me a little; I turned over to my left side. My eyes were still closed.
My mind was still sleepy but I was awake enough to spread "that feeling" around to see if I was completely alone. I thought I was but I wasn't sure. Maybe the edges of the nightmare were still clutching at me, and maybe that was the dread I felt. So I repeated the Our Father a couple of times, and the Hail Mary once. I signed myself and started another prayer.
It was in the midst of praying that I realized the importance of the dream. Or more rather, the importance of what I had done. I had woken myself up from a scary nightmare, and I had experienced the entire waking up process while still conscious. I had spoken words of power. Even now, I still feel the power of those words inside me, hiding somewhere safe, waiting to be called upon again. I had done what I always wished I could. I saved myself.