My Burning Man Experience from Hell

My first Burning Man was nothing like I'd thought it would be - but everything I needed.

Audio version:

Alright, let’s talk about Burning Man.

This year, I went to my first Burning Man ever. I’ve been wanting to go to Burning Man for many years. I even have a journal entry from 4 years ago where I was manifesting it.

For all of you who don’t know what Burning Man is, you are probably wondering why it’s something I needed to manifest. Isn’t it just a festival? Can’t you just buy a ticket?

Burning Man is not just a festival. It is a city that is built within the time-span of a week. I honestly don’t really know how to describe what Burning Man is to those who have never been or heard of it so lemme see if I can find something online that sums it up better than I can.

Ok never-mind, I don’t really like the descriptions I’m finding. Lemme just try my best. I’m sure for some pro-Burners this description may not be super accurate to describe the true essence of Burning Man, but this was what I gathered from my time there.

80,000 people gather in the Black Rock Desert in Nevada. It is one of the most uninhabitable, inhospitable places I have ever experienced, and I don’t see why anyone would really want to spend a week in a place like this. But for some reason, it was chosen as the location of Burning Man.

Apparently the first Burn was held on a beach in San Francisco in 1986, where a few hippies gathered to burn a structure of a man.

It truly is miraculous what people create and build in the week leading up to Burning Man. To give you a little bit of a better image of the layout of it all, Burning Man consists of “The Playa”; which is a big span of desert where burners flock from all lands and walks of life to create art and play. At the center of the “Playa” is “The Man,” and surrounding the Playa is the “City”; home to 1500+ “camps,” where everyone stays during their time in the desert.

Camps can range from having super minimal amenities, where you basically just pitch a tent, all the way to having bathrooms, showers, and meals. 

I am very lucky to have been able to stay in one of these camps that had bathrooms, showers and meals. Anthea and I gave a donation of $7000 to stay in a “Shift Pod,” which is a hexagon-shaped silver tent.

Everyone who stays in the camp donates in some way; maybe they donate their time to set up and build, maybe they donate equipment or supplies. When we arrived, the tent was already set up for us with cots and rugs and the AC unit all plugged in. This experience would be what burners would call the “Sparkle Pony” experience. I guess the term “Sparkle Ponies” is given to first-time burners who show up unprepared and needy for people to do everything for them. I guess everyone’s gotta be a “Sparkle Pony” at least once.

Our camp donation also included two meals a day (which I have to say were very good and packed with nutrients,) and bathrooms and showers, which is really nice for Burning Man. I wouldn’t really call these showers “nice”, they were a bunch of showers packed together in a trailer-like thing and you basically had to push your back against a button to get a trickle of cold water to come out, but hey, a showers a shower.

I donated a lot of money to have this experience, but if I were to go back, the only way I would go is if I was staying in an RV. If you are considering going to Burning Man, I would highly encourage you stay in an RV (unless you are some superhuman who can sleep with 24/7 house music rattling your bed.) There were some moments where friends were kind enough to let me sleep for a few hours in their RV, and without those moments, I don’t think I would have survived.

Our camp was a special kind of camp called a “Sound Camp.” The fun definition of this is that we had an epic giant stage, cool parties and well-known DJ’s staying at our camp. The shadow side was the fact that this epic giant stage had probably the most powerful speakers at all of Burning Man. These speakers blasted deep house and techno music all night into the early morning. Even when our camp wasn’t having a show, we had two neighboring camps on either side of us blasting even darker, dirtier techno music. I guess we were in the Sound Camp section. Our camp was right at the edge of the Playa, making it a prime location for adventuring out but a very poor location for sleep.

I want to move away from the topic of the camps and tell you a bit more about the Playa. The Playa is the area in the middle of all the camps that has the major sound stages and art installations. People prepare art installations for months or maybe even years that go up in a week and are either taken apart or burned by the end of Burning Man. The miraculous thing about all of this, by the way, is everyone is doing it for free. No one gets paid. The artists creating the installations, the DJs, the performances; everything is for free. It is people coming together to create art simply for enjoyment. It is truly a beautiful and rare thing to witness in this day and age.

I remember one time, as I was biking through Black Rock City, I was shocked at how people were standing outside of their camps screaming “Come get your free margaritas over here!” It was a familiar feeling to being in countries like Indonesia and Vietnam and walking through a market, having vendors trying to get your attention to come buy their product. But in this circumstance they aren’t trying to sell you anything. They just want you to enjoy their offering. It’s honestly insane and so cool.

People create the most insane set-ups in such a short time. I want to just give you an example of some of the installations that I experienced while I was there.

• an epic giant pyramid

• a full trampoline park

• giant towers and structures made to be able to play and climb all over

• I didn’t actually experience this, but I heard that somewhere out in the edges of the Playa there was a full-on movie theater. From the outside, it just looked like a box, but you walk in and it’s a full movie theater; movie-theater seats, popcorn and candy and a giant screen. Wild.

It’s kind of hard to put it all into words, but essentially, Burning Man is like a giant playground for adults.

Now that I’ve given a bit of a description on what Burning Man is for those who had no clue, now I will get into the Story of today.

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My Burning Man Experience from Hell

I am slowly gaining more clarity around Burning Man. The other day, as I was sharing the story of my traumatic Burning Man experience on Instagram, my friend Erin told me about a classic burner quote. “You don’t get the burn you want, you get the burn you need.” 

At first I was slightly annoyed by this quote. I understand it all too well, but when you are in the depths of suffering, the last thing you want to hear is, “You need this. Some part of you manifested this into your reality.” 

I always know that in my soul. I know everything we call into our life is here as medicine. “Everything happens for us, not to us.” So, even in the midst of some of the most intense physical and emotional suffering I’ve ever gone through, I understood that it had to be for good reason. For my highest good. For healing. But it was the last thing I wanted to hear when I was in it.

As I regain my health, strength and energy, I am starting to see the sun rays shining from behind the clouds. I am starting to allow my mind to open to seeing the reasons why I was meant to go to Burning Man. Why it all happened. 

I still don’t have all the answers, and I don’t know if I ever will. But the pieces are connecting. The other day, I read a quote from a Burning Man essay by a friend. The writer was expressing how he wished that this Burning Man would be the best one he’s experienced.

"I hope this one is the best, but I know enough about Burning Man to know that that's not how it works. Burning Man will be whatever it will be. It may be great. It may be terrible. It will be exactly what it needs to be.” Prashant Fonseka, from his Essay “Burning Man 2022” on Medium

This statement brought me solitude; knowing that Burning Man can sometimes be terrible. 

I don’t think that was a reality I had known about going into my Burning Man experience. If I had known this, maybe the reality I experienced wouldn’t have been so harsh. As I’ve been traveling the past two and a half months on what I’ve been calling my “America Adventure,” I have developed and accepted a very important phrase that I will now carry with me for the future.

Expect the best
Prepare for the worst

Now, this doesn’t mean walk though life with fear that the worst will always come to fruition. But it means to be okay with it if it does. To not enter every experience thinking it will be rainbows and sunshine and roses; that it will go exactly to plan. Wish for that, yes, but be okay if that doesn’t happen. Be okay if the worst happens. 

Going into my first Burning Man, many people said to me, “This will probably be one of the most transformative and life-changing experiences of your life.” So, yeah, I had some pretty high expectations. Looking back now, I can definitely say that it was. But not in the way I expected it would be. Transformation isn’t always pretty. It’s not always fun. Sometimes (most of the time); it is grueling, it is painful, it is raw. But you come out of it stronger. You come out of it a beautiful fucking butterfly. 

I was in LA for a few weeks before I went to Burning Man, and being in LA resurfaced a lot of old memories around people from my past. Old loves re-entered my reality. Most specifically, I had a lot come up around my first love. He’s been in my energetic field for a long time now.

I am in a relationship at the moment and I am very much in love, but my heart is still attached to this one ex. It’s been over two years now since we ended and I can’t seem to be able to let him go.

I had been thinking about him a lot, revisiting old memories (and old places where we used to hang out). And then I found out he was going to Burning Man.

There’s something specific about the energy dynamic with him that ignites this intense anxious-attachment within me. This has been a recurring theme for me around him in the past. When he enters my field, I obsess and dream about every possible scenario, all the things I would say to him if I saw him, etc.

So when I found out he was going to Burning Man, I was like, “Fuck.” This is going to absolutely take over my experience.

Because when I think about him, it consumes me. It’s like this virus. It enters my brain and completely takes over. I feel out of control, I feel anxious; I just wish I could turn it off. I lay in bed awake for hours. Even when I was in a relationship with him, it was always like this. It took me hours to fall asleep next to him, laying awake in my mental torment.

The weeks leading up to Burning Man, I was thinking about him a lot. It was like this itch in my brain.

And then I started to feel physically itchy.

I was in the RV on the way to Black Rock Desert when I noticed some hives start to form around my lower belly area. I didn’t think much of it, hives are not super uncommon for me. I thought they might have been bug bites as well. Either way, I just have super sensitive skin, so I didn’t pay too much attention to it.

It always shows up quite drastically on my body when there’s something emotional coming up for me that I’m not allowing to be processed in a healthy way. I’m still not quite sure if the skin condition I was facing had anything to do with Max, or if it was just general anxiety about Burning Man itself, but the anxiety about Max definitely worsened the situation.

I arrive at the gates of Burning Man at around 2am and I am summoned into doing the preliminary “Dust Angel,” which is a Burning Man initiation for first time Burners. They make you exit your vehicle, rub yourself on the ground in dust like a snow angel and ring a bell to announce you have arrived to the Playa.

I show up to my camp, 2 large suitcases in either hand, and covered in dust. My friend Anthea, who you will continue to hear about a lot throughout this story, is already asleep in her bed.

I woke her up and we chatted for a bit as I unpacked, and then we went to sleep.

The next morning, we both woke up after only a few hours of sleep. We were definitely low on energy, but the sleep deprivation was counteracted by a bit of nervous excitement of the week to come.

I am a very nervous/excited person. I have a very sensitive nervous system and new experiences and foreign places can be a lot for me. So I set the intention to really ground in on that first day and make myself and my body feel as safe as possible in this new environment.

Anthea guided us through a lovely yoga practice and afterwards we cuddled. I cried a bit to her, as I just needed a general release from all the pent-up emotions I had been feeling.

I went into day 1 feeling grounded, a bit itchy, but nonetheless, excited.

I deck myself out in my one of my best outfits; this sequined and fringed bodysuit, an epic steampunk-inspired hat which is very Burning Man-esque, and my lace up boots. I was ready for the playa.

I start biking out onto the playa and it’s happening already. I knew it would.

Every man I see is my ex, Max.

I’m literally looking for him in every man, scanning for his face, nervous about the possibility of running into him.

Let’s keep in mind the fact that there’s 80,000 people at this event. Yet, I still feel like I will run into him. Burning Man is very synchronistic in that way. You run into who you’re meant to run into.

I was prepared for this; the potential experience of me looking for him everywhere. This is not my first rodeo. Just a few weeks earlier, I was biking down the Venice Beach boardwalk and looking for him in every man I saw (even ones that looked nothing like him). The irony of it all was he wasn’t even in LA. I knew he was in Europe.

So the knowing of him being in the same place as me at the same time heightened it all. But I just accepted it. I already accepted that this may happen while I’m here. So I just brush past it. I even started to laugh at it, and just make light of the whole situation.

But as the week went on, the thoughts started to become less of a small nagging that I could laugh about. They became all-consuming. They grew and grew and grew. And so did the hives.

I started getting so frustrated, I wanted to rip my hair out. I was completely and deliriously exhausted, and still not able to fall asleep because I’d be laying awake in bed for hours dreaming up every possible scenario of my potential run-in with Max.

“What if I see him? When will I see him? Should I just go to his camp and try to see him, or should I just let us run into each other naturally? What will I say to him when I see him? Should I tell him that I’ve been thinking about him? Should I tell him I might still have feelings for him?”

With those thoughts came a slew of other thoughts about my current partner, Devin. Feelings of guilt and shame that I was even having these thoughts while being in love and in a relationship with another man.

“Should I try to find service and call Devin and tell him about this? But what if I don’t even see Max, would it even be worth it to tell Devin? I don’t want to hurt him. But what if I do see Max, and I tell him I still have feelings for him, is that cheating? I should probably tell Devin first, at least that will make it a bit better. I don’t want him to not trust me.”

The thoughts went on and on and on in this constant, incessant, inescapable loop. It was torture.

There was this one day I was completely delirious, heart-racing and on two hours of sleep, and I was about to say “Fuck it,” and bike directly to Max’s camp to try and find him and tell him everything. And then I remembered it was my 10 month anniversary with Devin.

I felt awful. I felt so guilty. I felt like I was a terrible person. “How could I do this to him?” I thought to myself. “This sweet man has trusted me with his heart. Cloe, what are you doing?”

But it felt out of my control. As much as I hated myself for it, it was happening. And there was nothing I could do about it.

I felt stuck, I felt guilty, I felt out of control. Here I was, at Burning Man, a place that I had been dreaming of coming to for so long, and I felt like I wasn’t even here. Somewhere in the midst of all of this mental madness, I forgot why I even came to Burning Man.

Day 3 was when things started to shift.

I had spent the day in my tent, tending to my hives, so I was *literally* itching to get out. I had been waiting for Anthea to come back from some ecstatic dance event she went to but I thought, hey, I can handle the playa on my own.

At this point, I could barely wear any of the perfectly curated outfits I had spent 12 hours crafting together the night before I left for Burning Man. So I threw on a loose poncho-like dress that was lent to me by a friend, and I hopped on my bike for my first solo journey at Burning Man.

Going out and having experiences on my own is super important to my soul. I need them, and often, they are the moments I end up cherishing the most.

I biked out into the desert and let my intuition guide the way.

It led me first to an art piece with hundreds of different mirrors on it. I approached it; slowly, curiously. I get as close as I can to one of the mirrors, placing my hands on either side of it to steady my balance. There I was, looking myself deep into my own eyes. This was one of the first times I had looked in a mirror in the last few days. We had a small handheld mirror in our room we used for doing our makeup, but it was always dark and I had only used it a handful of times. This was my first time really looking into my own eyes, into the depths of my soul.

And I saw myself.

I saw a girl who was scared, lost, worn down, and completely and utterly exhausted. My eyes were droopy and puffy and tinted red from crying all day. My hair was matted, a constant disarray of tangles and dust. I gently pulled up my dress to look at my body, inflamed and starting to swell around the areas that had the hives.

I looked into my eyes and I cried.

I didn’t recognize this girl.

She was really, really broken. She’s really struggling.

My image was being refracted into hundreds of mirrors, and I allowed my gaze to shift to a different mirror. This one was wider, and shaped a bit differently. I saw my whole body in its entirety.

And in this other mirror, I saw a different girl.

I saw a girl who was so, so strong. She is so brave. I saw a girl who constantly pushes the edges of her comfort zone in the search for deeper levels of healing. She is a fucking warrior.

And with that newfound bravery and admiration for myself, I hopped on my bike again and I was off. To the next experience.

I stumbled upon an art car* deep in the playa that was playing… omg… DIFFERENT MUSIC!

*art cars are these giant epic vehicles that burners create to drive around the Playa. Some are big enough to have 30 people dancing on them, and lots are basically traveling stages for DJ’s to play their sets. To give you an idea of what an art car looks like, I saw one that was basically a fuzzy tongue fit for 3 people, and one that was a massive octopus shooting fire out of each of its tentacles. With art cars, your imagination is the limit.

All I had heard for 3 days straight was techno. Up until now, I had barely danced. I just can’t move my body to techno. It doesn't inspire me. It actually brings me anxiety. Dancing for a week straight was one of the things I was looking forward to most about Burning Man. So, this specific art car was a massive pineapple blasting R&B and hip hop music. R&B and hip hop aren’t what I usually listen to, but I was just so blissed out to hear something that wasn’t techno; music I can actually fucking move to! And when “Its getting hot in here, so take off all your clothes” came on, you best believe I listened.

I knew I would get naked at some point at Burning Man, where nudity is very much accepted, but I definitely did not picture my naked body to look like this; swollen and covered in welts and hives. But in that moment, I truly knew that I was getting naked for no one but myself. It wasn’t to look sexy or beautiful, but just to feel so absolutely free. Especially because clothes made my hives feel worse, it felt so damn good to be naked. So I danced my little naked ass off into the sunset, and eventually rode my bike naked all the way home.

I arrived back to my camp feeling so blissed and free.

“Wow, you look absolutely rejuvenated,” my friend Carissa said to me. And she was right. There was a fire in my eyes again. Life was restored to my body.

Later that night, my friends Ruby and Nate were performing at Camp Mystic, just a few camps down from mine. It was white-out Wednesday, so everyone was wearing all white. Anthea and I were wearing matching crystal pasties and little sarongs tied around our waists. I wasn’t even wearing underwear, because underwear was too painful at that point. It felt so good to let my body breathe and feel so free.

The party was epic and magical and one of the best experiences I had at Burning Man. Something about this party felt so safe, maybe because it was filled with people I recognized from Bali. Anthea and I even ran into our friend Ville that we met on a live-aboard free diving trip in Raja Ampat, a collection of islands in Indonesia. “It even smells like Bali in here!” Anthea joked, as parties in Ubud definitely tend to have a very intense smell, as your dancing with a bunch of hippies who wear natural or no deodorant.

This was the first night at Burning Man where I wasn’t “sticking it out” but secretly itching to go home. That night, I actually just lost track of time, moving my body to the rhythm. Towards the end of the night, Anthea and I were dancing one level higher than the main dance floor. We ended up pulling off our sarongs and dancing completely naked (other than the crystal pasties.) I looked at the scene, at the fact that we were dancing on this podium above everyone and I was like, “Anthea. We’re strippers. We’re accidental strippers right now.” And I loved it. It was so freeing. And the beautiful thing about Burning Man is that no one really cared. Yes, we got a few looks, mostly from men who were quite excited about it, but for the most part, nudity is welcome and normal there. You see fully grown men and women riding around on their bikes butt-naked and no one bats an eye. It’s awesome.

I left the party with a pep in my step I hadn’t really had since arriving at Burning Man. Things were looking up.

Anthea and I were gushing to each other about how amazing the night was when she said, “Oh shit, Cloe. I don’t see our bikes.”

So pretty much, every person who’s gone to Burning Man will advise you to lock your bike. You don’t need to lock it to anything, just wrapping a lock around the tire is enough so that if someone tries to take it, it won’t move. You do this, not because people are purposely trying to steal your bike, but because they are too high to not. When you’re high on acid and see a rainbow of lit-up bikes, you might take one that you think is yours. It's a pretty common mistake that happens often at Burning Man.

So after 20 minutes of looking around in the sea of flashing bikes, we are about to give up. Our camp is close by enough that we can walk home, and hopefully, they will appear in the morning. “Let’s just look one more time,” I say to Anthea, even though we’re both about done.

And just as we had admitted defeat, Anthea shouted at me from across the bike sea.

“Cloe! I found them!”

We hugged and jumped up and down and screamed like two little school girls. And there happened to be a man standing close-by that started to cheer us on too.

“I know exactly what you guys are feeling,” he said. “Congratulations. I am so happy that you found your bikes. I've been to 7 burns and I manage to lose my bike every single time. So this year I actually bought an Apple Airtag that I attached to my bike so I can find it if it wanders off.”

We allowed our new friend Malcolm to join our hugging and jumping and celebrating session. And then, just as the joy bubble felt like it couldn’t have gotten any bigger, another man approaches us.

“I’ve been looking for my bike for literally half an hour and I was about to give up.” He said. “But then I heard you guys find your bikes and 15 seconds later I found mine.”

“Eeee!!” We all squealed as we welcomed another successful bike rescue into our circle of joy.

“I have a special gift I would like to offer you guys,” said Malcolm.

Gifting is a really special part of Burning Man. As I said before, everything is free. Camps give out free food or experiences, and almost everyone comes to the Playa with some sort of offering. It doesn’t have to be something tangible, but it is part of the ecosystem to give and receive.

“I have had the opportunity to work on lots of movie sets and this is something I was able to take away from one of the movies I worked on.” He pulls out a small glass pyramid from his pocket. “In this pyramid is actually a piece from the inside of the Pyramid of Giza.” The other guy who had found his bike kinda dips out in this moment. I don’t think he was really down for the intense moment that was about to ensue.

“Anthea, I want you to take this sacred object and hold it to your third eye center.” Malcolm guided. “Cloe, I would like you to put your hand on Anthea’s heart and I will put my hand on her back. Together we will channel love and light into Anthea.”

For those of you who have never done something like this before, you are probably thinking “What in the spiritual woo-woo is this shit?” But I truly believe that in the right setting, we can open ourselves up to be vessels to stream the love and light of God through us. Our hands are these magical healing tools. I have performed Reiki (the art of sending healing energy through our hands) on friends before and have literally felt this pulsing white golden light streaming through my hands into their bodies. I can feel them relax and open up to receive this light and love. I still don’t know (and will probably never know) exactly how it all works, but that’s the magic of it.

So, essentially, I think Malcolm and I are performing Reiki on Anthea as she is also opening herself to receive the codes from this sacred object from the Pyramid of Giza. He is streaming words of wisdom and love into Anthea. I have my eyes closed, but for a moment I open them to take a peak at him and I can see how tapped in he is to divine source. We are both channeling love into Anthea, and it is so beautiful. He tells me to whisper some loving things in her ear, and I do. I remind her how special, sacred and loved she is. And how I’m so infinitely grateful to have her in my life.

Malcolm then guides me to hold the pyramid on my forehead. “We will do the same thing with Cloe now,” he says to Anthea. So as Anthea places her hand on my heart and Malcolm places his on my back, I start to open myself up and allow myself to receive all the magic and healing frequencies that are available for me in this moment. I feel a bit of light pulsing from the pyramid, and I feel love and warmth from the touch of their hands. Malcolm is streaming words of love into me, and I start to get a bit emotional.

“Cloe, remember why you came here. Remember that you have a unique gift to offer this world and that you deserve to be here. That you are supposed to be here. Let go of anything that’s standing in your way of shining your light, Cloe, of being the highest version of you possible. This world needs your gifts. This world needs you.”

Something in his words, or the pyramid or the loving touch or a mix of all of it led to a breakdown, right in the presence of this new friend. I broke down and I sobbed as they both held me. I started to remember.

The weeks leading up to Burning Man, my intention for my burn was to gain clarity with my music; direction on where I was supposed to go with it. Just a month earlier I released my first single “Apollo,” and was feeling a bit lost. I felt like I didn’t really know why I released it and felt a lack of connection to the song. Not even just a lack of connection, but honestly a disassociation. I didn’t want to play it or think about it. I felt confused as to who I was as an artist and what my offering to this world is.

But at some point within the tornado of thoughts about Max, my intention changed to be solely about him. My intention went from being about me and my music to about this man. I wanted clarity around Max; around if I actually still was in love with him or if this was just some sort of attachment, a lingering cord that I still had yet to let go of?

That’s great and all, and I’m so glad I was seeking clarity with that situation because it was very necessary. But somewhere in the midst of it all, I forgot that I also came here for me.

And as Malcolm continued to pour love into my heart through his words, I kept hearing the mantra repeat in my head;

“I came here for me. I came here for me. I CAME HERE FOR ME.”

My whole “America Adventure” up until this point had been a journey of realizing how much of my power I had given away to men. It didn’t matter if it was Max, or my second love, Patrick, or my current boyfriend, Devin. My attachment and neediness of love from these men was a wound stemming from deep inside of me.

When I first started traveling in America, I had been asking for clarity around my current relationship with Devin. We were about to venture into doing almost 3 months of long distance together. The last few months of us being together in Bali were swirled in cycles of pain. I would feel he was being distant and I would get emotional and want him closer, and that neediness for him to be closer would push him even further away. It felt like this never-ending cycle that I didn’t know how to stop.

But while I was traveling, multiple themes arose around my anxious-attachment that made me realize it wasn’t about the men I was dealing with, but about my relationship with self. It didn’t matter which man it was; when I felt rejected in any way, the same feelings of neediness arose. A few events over the course of the 2.5 months in America led me to a crumbling in terms of me giving my power away to men, but this felt like the final breaking point for me.

Here I am, at Burning Man, and all I can do is focus on is some boy who never really wanted me in the way I wanted him.

Max was my first love. And he didn’t fall in love with me back. Or maybe he did, but he was never able to say it. I fell way harder and faster for him than he did for me. And maybe his way is better, to wait and hold back and take your time. But something wasn’t right for me. I wanted more. I wanted to fall in love and I wanted to experience love at the fullest depths possible. I still want this. My soul craves to experience a love deeper and fuller than I can even imagine.

When we ended, we left it open. I told him if he was ever ready to fall in love, I would be there. That maybe it wasn’t over for us.

That night, when I laid my head down to sleep, I allowed myself to picture a future where Max and I don’t exist together. For the first time in the two years since we’d ended, I allowed myself to experience a reality where it was actually over. And I cried. I cried silently and softly so that Anthea couldn’t hear me. Hysterical silent sobs. I wrapped my arms around the emotional support stuffed animal I brought (thank god for him, wouldn’t have made it through without him) and I felt deep into the wounded little girl who so badly just wanted love. That night, I let a big piece of him go. And I finally slept.

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The next day, although still itchy, I felt a little better. I had gotten enough sleep that I wasn’t completely delirious. I had a good night and I had fun and I felt a little bit lighter after my release.

But it was funny, as I would tell people my story, everyone would tell me “I think things are about to shift for you. I think things are about to get better. The worst is behind you.”

But it never was. I’d maybe feel good for a few hours and then hit a low again. Burning Man was a culmination of extremely high highs and extremely low lows. Ironically, the days were usually the darkest for me, and the nights the brightest. Even now, over a month after burning man ended, I am still feeling like my highs and lows have been more extreme than usual. Maybe that’s just life. But Burning Man takes the normal themes of life and multiplies them tenfold. Anything that hasn’t been brought to the surface gets brought up in a very extreme and confronting way.

My rash was the epitome of that. It started as a tiny itch. I had little rashes over the past year that were just tiny itches, but I had ignored them, brushed them aside. But now this tiny itch was a raging fire burning across my entire body that was too loud to ignore. That’s how it works. I’m going to insert an excerpt from a card in one of my favorite oracle decks. The card is called “Trust the Niggle.”

“That niggling feeling. That annoying, niggling feeling. That inconvenient, annoying, niggling feeling. Until you face the niggle, life just throws you more bait to awaken it. The niggle is an arrow pointing to what is standing in your way - the relationship, the conversation, the decision, the shift that needs to be made. If you don’t face it, the Universe will throw something much bigger and more obvious in your path. And then you will likely regret that you didn’t answer the niggle in the first place.” Rebecca Cambell, “Work Your Light” Oracle Cards

Maybe if I had paid more attention to that little itch when it was just bothersome, it wouldn’t have exploded in the way it had. But hey, the body speaks in miraculous ways. And as painful as it was, it was a blessing. Because it made me very clearly see how this situation was wreaking havoc on my mind, body and soul.

Burning Man went on, and so did the highs and lows. By day 6, I was pretty ready to leave. I was delirious, weak, exhausted, and discouraged.

The last few days I had stayed in my tent all day, trying to sleep but failing and feeling miserable. At this point my hives were not only itchy, but sore and inflamed and so tender. The skin around the hives had become puffy that it would create new creases in my skin. I was in a lot of pain. But today was the second to last day of Burning Man and I wanted to try my best to enjoy it. Anthea helped me create an “ice belt,” a sarong filled with ice cubes that I fastened around my lower belly, where my hives were the worst.

We were traveling around with a little troupe from our camp and we all decided to bike out to the Playa.

We biked past naked people dancing and tornados of dust swirling around us, and somehow we ended up at the Man. The Man we must burn.

I hadn’t been on the Man yet, so standing up there was pretty surreal. The Man is situated on a large structure with a staircase leading up to it. I walked up the stairs, taking in the sight of the Playa. And in the very corner, on the edge of this structure, I heard the oh-so-lovely sound of a man’s voice softly singing to an acoustic guitar.

It was exactly what I had been craving. I had been manifesting an acoustic guitar to show up in my reality.

I sat next to him and asked if I could join him in his song. He nodded yes, and I began to echo and harmonize with the words he was singing. His song was something about surrendering to the flow of this magical place.

When he was done, I thanked him for his art. And then I asked him if I could play one of my songs.

He passed me the guitar, and looking out into the Playa, I sang a song I wrote a week earlier that I’d never sang out loud to anyone before.

finding my way back to you
beginnings were endings far too soon
and I’m playing your old guitar
and I’m writing another song
about you

“Thank you for sharing that,” my new friend Sky said. “I can hear a longing in it. It’s beautiful.”

“Thank you,” I said shyly.

It’s always such an interesting experience singing some of the most vulnerable parts of your heart to a complete stranger. I don’t even really realize it or feel it while I’m singing, but I feel it after. I open my eyes and look at them and realize I just told them all of my secrets through a song. But that’s also what makes it so special.

We kept going on like this, passing the guitar back and forth and sharing our music with each other. There was another girl there who was listening to us and had tears in her eyes. The three of us bonded over how much we were craving something acoustic, raw, and soulful.

At one point, I started to sing one of my songs, Merry-Go-Round. This song is about the cycles of falling in and out of love, or even just going through the same cycles of pain and joy with a partner or a loved one. And no matter how painful or difficult it can feel sometimes, we will continue to try our best to love. It’s all we have at the end of the day.

why would you ever wanna run away from love?
you know something, I could never give you up
and I think maybe it’s time that I stop
trying to run away from you
it’s such a pity that my heart is so closed up
ain’t it silly that we run away from love?
I think maybe it’s time that I admit the truth
I’m in love with you
I do
love you
I do
love you

All of a sudden, I started to hear claps. Unbeknownst to me, a small crowd of people were all sitting and listening. I slowly opened my eyes.

There I was, standing up at the edge of the podium singing my heart out, and in some way, I had put on a little show. Performing at Burning Man was a goal of mine that I thought would happen somehow, and I guess it happened in this cute little spontaneous way.

A man with some dusty boots and a cheetah-patterned shawl thrown over his head walked up to me and asked if he could give me a hug. We hugged for a long time and I could just feel how much my song had touched him. “Thank you for that,” He said. “That was so beautiful.”

“What’s your name?” I asked him.

“Simba!” He told me. “Well, that’s my Playa name, at least.”

*Playa Names are typically gifted to you by another burner, and you go by that name during your time at Burning Man. My Playa name happened to be Cloudy. At first, some people from Spain were asking me my name and when I said Cloe, they repeated back to me, '“Nice to meet you, Cloudy.” It was just a mispronunciation that happens often to me living in Asia. For some reason my name is quite difficult to say. So then I told them that and one of them said, “Well, maybe it should be your Playa name!” Boom. That’s the story. So if you ever meet me in person one day and call me Cloudy I’ll know you read my Burning Man story.

“Do you mind if sing something?” Simba asked, gesturing to the guitar. “The more the merrier!” I said, as I passed it to him. I was loving this little jam sesh. This is exactly what I needed.

Simba sat cross-legged on the ground and we all sat down with him in a circle. Something about the song he was singing felt so familiar to me, so safe. I realized he was singing in Hebrew. My body just feels at home listening to Hebrew songs after growing up going to temple and singing prayers in Hebrew my entire life. Simba, Sky and I all happened to be Jewish, and we all started to share stories. I don’t know, something about being around other Jews is just so comforting to me. Maybe it’s because we all carry the same ancestral trauma.

Anyway, given the circumstance, Simba then shares with us that there’s a Shabbat service and dinner happening at sunset at a camp nearby to his. “Oh yes!” I perked up. I remember seeing the Shabbat service in the booklet thinking I should go. By the way, there’s this magical little booklet with all of the events and happenings going on at Burning Man that was, for some reason, never given to Anthea or I. We thought you just kinda had to find out about everything through word of mouth. We had no idea about this booklet until someone let us borrow theirs on Day 5. I really wish we had had that from the beginning. But you know what, I’m not really the type of person who plans and goes by the book anyway. I kinda just like stumbling into the things that are right for me.

“Can I come with you?” I asked Simba. “I would have no idea how to get there on my own. Especially with all of this,” I say as my gaze shifts to the massive dust storm heading our way. I could barely see a few feet in front of me.

“Yes! Yallah.” He says. Yallah means “Let’s go” in Hebrew. I haven’t heard that word since I was 19 and in Israel and the chaperones of my birthright trip were screaming at us to hurry up.

“Yallah!” I shout back at him as we bike off into the dust.

This right here is probably my favorite thing about Burning Man. You make a new friend and then all of a sudden you are buddies adventuring around together. I don’t know, maybe people do that in the real world too, but I don’t. Experiencing this at Burning Man made me realize I want to be more like that in my everyday life. If I’m chatting with someone and vibing, why not invite them to go grab a bite to eat? Or go on a walk? We’ve got some sort of chemistry, why don’t we continue to explore it?

Simba and I in front of his epic dreamcatcher art piece that he made!

So off Simba and I went, two strangers on a little adventure. We didn’t really feel like strangers though. I felt so safe with him. He took me to his camp, where I laid down on a couch and he got me a glass of orange juice with ice. After a day in the desert sun, it was exactly what I needed. I took my boots off to cool down and allowed my eyes to close for a moment.

Before we knew it, I was awoken by Simba and his friend telling me it was time to head to the Shabbat service. We bike up to a scene of about a thousand people all gathered around a little group of people with mics and instruments. The Rabbi started leading the service. I don’t know if he was a real Rabbi or not. I’ve never seen a Rabbi leading a service in his boxers. It was so funny to see all the ways people were dressed while leading a Shabbat service. Honestly, it should always be like that. We should be able to wear whatever makes us feel the best. Fuck fancy dresses and uncomfortable heels. I wanna show up to a service in my poncho.

As I sing along with a thousand other Burners to the same old prayers I have grown up singing to, I feel a sense of comfort that I hadn’t felt at Burning Man yet. I closed my eyes and listened to the sea of voices. The deep and comforting sound of Simba chanting next to me, the higher angelic sounds of the women around me. I felt safe. I felt home. It was everything I needed.

When we all started to sing the Mi Shebeirach, I broke down a bit. This is a very special prayer that we sing for those who are in mourning, or for those who are sick and in need of healing. I remember many times singing this song in temple. They would ask those who are sick to rise up out of their seats and my mom would stand as we sang the prayer to her. And I remember standing, as the congregation sang the Mi Shebeirach to my family and I, when we were in need of healing because she was no longer with us anymore.

Mi shebeirach avoteinu
M'kor hab'racha l'imoteinu
May the source of strength
Who blessed the ones before us
Help us find the courage to make our lives a blessing
And let us say Amen
Mi shebeirach imoteinu
M'kor hab'racha l'avoteinu
Bless those in need of healing
With r’fuah sh’leimah
The renewal of body
The renewal of spirit
And let us say Amen

The Mi Shebeirach just happens to be my favorite prayer that we would sing in services. Maybe it’s because the melody is so beautiful, or maybe it’s because it’s a prayer asking for strength and healing and I find that so special. This prayer obviously has a deep place in my heart. Many people were shedding tears. I started to cry and Simba wrapped his arms around me as I cried into his chest.

He didn’t ask, he just held me.

I haven’t been to a Shabbat service in a long time. Actually, the past few years, I haven’t really known where I stand with Judaism. Being Jewish will always be a part of my identity. I was raised Jewish, I was raised following the traditions and going to services on the High Holy days. It will always be a part of who I am. The last time I went to a service at my temple, it was just after I had my spiritual awakening. I was so excited to go to this service, hoping I would be able to feel a deeper connection to God or the universe. The way they just ran through everything was so rehearsed and felt so lifeless to me. I wanted more. I was craving deeper meaning. I left halfway through the service and sat outside on a bench. I felt way more connected to God while sitting outside on that bench and looking at the trees than I did inside that stuffy room. And since then, I haven’t gone back.

I’ve kinda just been finding my own way in terms of what I believe in. And I think that’s a path every person needs to go on on their spiritual journey. Especially if you were brought up religious. What does that religion mean to you? Does it actually resonate for you, or are you just following it because your parents did, and their parents did, and its what you feel like you should do?

I think Judaism is a really beautiful religion. Of course, there are shadow aspects, as there are in most religions. But if I were to have to pick one, I think I would pick Judaism. And I think most Jewish people would agree that being Jewish is more than just a religion. It’s like an ethnicity. There’s just so much history there in our blood, it’s hard to ignore it.

The service ended and they announced they would be serving Shabbat Dinner for everyone. They had prepared a meal big enough for 800 people in the middle of the desert. I wanted to stay, but I didn’t have any utensils. If you want to receive any food or drinks at Burning Man, you need to come equipped with your own plates, cups and utensils. So I hugged Simba goodbye.

“I want to see you again!” He said.

“I know, I do too.” I told him.

I tried to tell him my foreseeable plan for the night, but was doubtful that we’d find each other again. That’s kinda just how Burning Man works. We exchanged numbers and went our separate ways. That’s the unspoken beauty of it all. Maybe it’s just a moment you share, and that's all it’s meant to be. Maybe we will see each other again. Maybe we won’t. But we shared a magical moment together, and that was enough. And maybe it makes a moment like that just a little bit more precious.

I started to head back to my camp, filled with a joy and love I hadn’t felt since I’d been there. I ate dinner with Anthea, and told her all about my adventures. I love that about my friendship with Anthea. We are both super independent and are so supportive of each other going on our own journeys.

There was a DJ set of a friend of ours supposedly happening at a camp right next door to us at 2am, but it was 10pm and we wanted to pass some time and try not to get too tired. “Hey,” I said. “I met this guy Sky today at the Man and he told me about this beautiful intimate piano performance happening at PlayAlchemist. He told me someone built this glowing piano and people are going to take turns playing it.”

“That sounds really nice,” Anthea said. It did sound nice. Our brains were fried from the heavy deep house that was blasting from our camp and every camp in all directions from ours.

We were both quite depleted, but we dragged our asses out the door. We were slapped in the face by dust and intense winds. We didn’t realize there was a white-out happening, and PlayAlchemist is all the way on the other side of the Playa. But we decided to go for it anyway.

*white-outs are pretty common on the playa. They are massive dust storms that literally cause everything and everyone to be coated in a layer of dust. During a white-out, you can barely see a few feet in front of you. Our first night, we got stuck in a pretty intense white-out and I watched all the lights and art cars just get erased by the dust until I could barely even see Anthea, who was standing right next to me. It was extremely terrifying and exciting. Maybe that’s a good way to describe Burning Man. Terrifying and exciting at the same time.

40 minutes of the most intense and grueling bike ride later, we arrived to PlayAlchemist dusty, battered and exhausted. Anthea somehow miraculously guided us across the entire Playa in the pitch black of night and the white of the dust. This girl is seriously a ninja with her internal compass.

As we are walking towards the massive mirrored pyramid, we hear, “booncha booncha booncha” (that is me trying my best to symphonically explain the sound of techno music.) 

There is no beautiful intimate piano performance with an amazing glowing piano as it was described to me. It was a wild, loud party with the same type of music Anthea and I were trying to find some sweet bliss from. 

“Yeah, no. This is not it.” I said to her. We wander around until we find a cozy tent behind the pyramid where there are multiple beds and rugs laid out. We squeeze into a bed next to some people sleeping, covered in fuzzy blankets. Although there’s a DJ playing loud techno music (ironically right behind the piano), Anthea guides us through a meditation. She guides us to find our safe place.

I go to my safe place. I am laying my head on my mom’s lap and she is stroking my hair and gently tickling my back. There is some chatter in the background of my mom’s friends or our relatives. I have my eyes closed, half present to the sounds around me and half drifting off into a peaceful sleep. This is my safe place. It felt nice to be there, when what was happening externally felt far from it.

I open my eyes out of the meditation and look at Anthea, who looks like she may be drifting off into sleep. “Do you wanna go?” I ask her. “Yes, let’s do it.” She says. And yet again, we head off into the dusty dim night. I am weary and dipping into the little amount of strength I have left.

We waited up a bit longer until 2am for our friend Toltec’s DJ set. I had been eagerly anticipating this set. I was so excited when I found out he was playing at Sound Garden, a stage right next door to my camp. I saw his set at Bali Bloom in May and it was the first DJ set I had felt I could dance to in ages. It wasn’t deep house or techno, it was light and fun and bouncy; there were vocals and throwbacks and I had the most fun I had dancing in a long time. I went up to him afterwards and gave him a long hug, sincerely thanking him for showing me that the dancer is still alive within me.

But as we arrived to Sound Garden, I hear some music that does not sound fun and bouncy and light. It was trance-y and dirty and dark and I hated it. Tonight is just not my night for music.

Anthea decides to stick it out and vibe with it, but I was pretty moody and burnt out. I only last a few minutes before heading back to camp to pass out. I was spent. But I didn’t have much luck. Between my burning body, the bass rattling my bed, and my incessant train of thoughts about Max, I didn’t get much sleep. I didn’t get any sleep, actually.

After 2 hours of laying in this internal and physical hell that I had now grown accustomed to, I decide I’ll bike out to see the sunrise for the first time since I had been at Burning Man. Before I went to Burning Man, I asked my friend Luna for some tips for a first time Burner. “Never miss a sunset or a sunrise,” She said. Every day I had tried to wake up (or stay up) for sunrise, but I ended up passing out too early or sleeping in too late. I was tired, I was delirious, but I’d rather be watching a sunrise than staying stuck in this loop.

I hop on my bike, only to immediately feel an instant pain on my vagina. “Ouch,” I said. It feels sore, almost bruised. I didn’t think much of it. “Maybe my vagina is just sore from all of the bike riding,” I thought to myself. Especially those treacherous rides from last night in the blistering winds and dust. Those did not help. 

I put my AirPods in my ears and press play on some acoustic indie music to cancel out the “booncha booncha booncha” that is still playing even at the ass-crack of dawn, and I ride my bike all the way out to the deep Playa. I find my own little pocket amidst a sea of Burners, most in a blissful yet exhausted daze after a long night of partying and drugs and what I perceived as having the “time of their lives.”

I watch the sun rise over the desert, observing dust storms approaching in the distance. I cry, for what may realistically be my 30th time within this never-ending week. I look around at my joyful fellow burners, wondering what I must be missing. Is it the drugs? Are they hypnotized by the techno?

I yet again prayed to survive this thing that I, for some reason, paid an exorbitant amount of money to attend. 

I pulled out my phone to journal, to try to process and make some sense of it all. I didn’t write much, only the same words that I could gather at that point, accepting and acknowledging the fact that I was suffering and didn’t know why. Accepting that I didn’t know why I was called to be here. 

On my way back to my camp, I pass by an art car with a guy playing his guitar, live-looping and singing original songs. It was a breath of fresh air. And I thought, “If I ever, for some insane reason, decide to come back to this godforsaken place, I wanna do that. I want to bring my art here and give my gift to the Playa. Give my gift to the world and provide a different and raw experience that is quite challenging to find amidst all the noise.”

I biked back home to my camp, tired, but at least in a bit of better spirits. I stumble across Anthea, who stayed up all night, dancing and fluttering her fairy wings across the desert at sunrise. I was happy for her. I was sad for me. But I was happy for her.

She shows me to this bohemian tent that was set up at our camp that we had not known about till now, the last day. It’s covered in furry rugs, pillows, and has an AC unit. Other members of our camp are in there, smoking hookah and just vibing out, letting themselves come down from the wild night and many drugs they’ve all had. 

I lay my head to rest on a pillow - sober, beaten up and bruised. Coming in raw. And by raw, I really mean raw, because at this point my hives have become so bad that they are blistering and oozing and just raw. So here I was, showing up just as I am. 

And somehow I started to sing, for all these people in this tent coming down from their wild, loud night. I started to sing, with my soft, angelic voice and raw, heartfelt songs. I sang and I shared and I brought to them an experience unlike anything they’d had at their Burn yet, or maybe unlike anything they’d ever felt. I told the story of my relationship with Max through song. I remember once, my sister Mia told me that when I sing, it’s like seeing my soul. When I sing, I don’t just sing. I am pouring my entire heart and soul out for you. 

I sang, and afterwards, probably the highest man in the room said to me, “You just made me cry. And I never cry. You’ve got something really rare. That’s a true gift. I want everyone in the world to experience it.” 

So I vowed to continue to share my gift. 

That day, Anthea and I were blessed by a friend who let us sleep in his RV. I almost cried out of gratitude. It was a luxury RV; it was cold and it was quiet. It was heaven.

Dust storms raged across the Playa that day, as they had for many days prior. “‘I’ve been to 12 Burning Man’s and this year has had some of the worst white-outs and weather conditions I’ve ever seen,” my friend shared. “It’s honestly insane.” The people that were lucky enough to have an RV would just camp out in the AC all day, but if you had a shift-pod, it was pretty torturous.

My friend Carissa offered for me to come hang out in her RV multiple times. “You’re welcome to come hang out in here whenever you want,” she told me. But I never wanted to intrude or be a burden. By the last day, I wished I had taken her up on that offer a bit more.

There is this saying that people share frequently on the Playa - “The Playa Provides.” It basically means that whatever you need and whenever you need it, it will be provided for. An example of the truth of this sentiment was shown to me very clearly when I was biking back to my camp and my sarong got stuck in the spokes of my bike. There just happened to be a bike repair man at a booth a few feet away from me. He weaved the sarong out of the spokes and within minutes, I was back on my journey to camp.

People want to help in any way they can. The few times I asked people in my camp if I could sleep in their RV for a few hours, they were more than happy to provide. I just wished I had asked for what I needed a bit sooner.

The last day of Burning Man went by quicker than expected in a haze of dust. The few times I tried to exit my tent, I would run back to the tent hysterically crying from the pain. If I was outside in the 110 degree heat for more than a minute it was so painful, which was quite unfortunate if I needed to leave the tent to go to the bathroom. I would run back to the tent and cry as I stood over the AC unit, desperately trying to cool down my hives. The days were torturous with the heat. At this point, I was just trying to survive it.

We ate dinner as the sun escaped us. The colors of the sky faded into the slightest orange hue and then all of a sudden it was dark. I started to get ready, putting on my periwinkle Royal Codes set that made me feel like an absolute goddess but was simultaneously as comfy as possible. I adorned myself in some Egyptian-inspired jewelry, and I was on my way. I couldn’t bother with any makeup or face gems at this point.

Our camp has a trolley called the “Funhouse” that plays music and drives all around the Playa. We were told the funhouse was leaving at 8pm to go see the Man burn. There had been many times we tried to get on the trolley, but we always somehow missed it. But we had it all timed out perfectly tonight. We were about ready to go and Anthea went out of our tent to use the bathroom. When she came back, she told me the bad news.

“They left without us.” She said.

I almost broke right there. I wasn’t able to bike anymore because whatever was going on with my vagina made it unbearably painful. I didn’t know how we were going to see the Man burn, the most anticipated event at Burning Man.

“Wait,” Anthea says. “I have an idea.”

All of a sudden she swings by with Moho Joe, a guy from our camp who is driving this small 4-wheeler buggy type thing. “Hop on! Let’s go see this man burn!”

We filled the trunk with pillows and laid in the back. It felt awesome to be able to chill and lay while looking out at all of the lights and art cars. The energy of the night felt wild. You could almost taste the excitement in the air.

As I was laying and looking out at this place that I’ve called home for the longest 7 days of my life, I prayed. I prayed that I have a decent night. It doesn’t have to be amazing, or life changing, or the best night of my life, I just prayed that it was decent. Actually, more specifically, that it was not horrible. If it was anything above horrible, I would be grateful.

I was in a pretty intense amount of pain at this point. I couldn’t sit upright because of the hives that were placed at my hip creases. And my vagina was concern-ably swollen. The pus from my wounds was oozing through and making my body stick to my clothes.

“One more night, Cloe. You have one more night of this and then you’re done. Then you can go home. Give it your all.” 

Because this was the last night, and because nothing else felt like it had really worked at this point in terms of turning my Burn around, I decided to take a small dose of Molly (MDMA) with my friend Anthea. I hadn’t taken any plant medicines or drugs the whole week because I wanted to prioritize my nervous system and make sure I felt safe. But the other medicines I had been taking hadn’t worked, so why not try this? At this point, I was desperate. I said a little prayer and called upon my angels to be with me.

“I ask that I am freed from this pain, just for one night. That I am freed from the physical pain, and the emotional and mental prison I have trapped myself in. Let me be free.” And I took the little pill. Here goes nothing.

We joined the crowd of 80,000 people gathered around the structure of the Man. There were security guards and firefighters blocking people from getting too close. There were hundreds of fire dancers, dancing in synch around the Man, spinning and twirling with balls of fire.

It was all a little bit hell-ish, if I’m being honest.

The night before I left for Bali, I stayed at my sister Mia’s place in Marina Del Rey.

“What do you think of the meaning of Burning Man?” She asked me. “Like, burning a man? What do you think that’s supposed to symbolize?”

“Actually, I haven’t thought much about it,” I told her.

“Did anyone talk about it while you were there?” She asked.

“No, not really,” I replied. “I guess we all just kind of accept what is without really questioning it. Or maybe other people questioned it, but I never heard anyone talking about it.”

“Don’t you think it’s a bit satanic?” She pondered. “This whole idea of this man burning?”

I thought back to Burning Man and all the themes of fire. It was a little strange to me, the concept of “burning a man.” Watching the man explode into flames was quite terrifying, actually. It was the biggest and most intense explosion I’d ever seen in real life. The only thing I could compare it to was watching videos of bombs at war or in terrorist attacks in history class. I had never seen an explosion so big.

As the man burned away into the night, tornados of fiery ashes swirled off of him and into the crowd. People screamed and jumped with excitement. It was all so intense and scary and confusing to me. It was like nothing I’d ever experienced before.

Burning Man was like that a lot of the time. Dark music, devilish art cars and art that made you dive into your own shadows. There’s a lot of playful, blissful light energy as well, but there’s a lot of darkness. And maybe that’s the part I wasn’t ready for. I didn’t expect the darkness.

I am never ready for the darkness. It’s been a big issue for me in my life. I remember when I was a young girl, any time I would have a nightmare or even just a scary thought, I would imagine a Webkinz unicorn happily prancing across a rainbow through my mind. And I’d always feel better.

I was working with a coach for a good portion of last year, and she would guide me deep into a trance-like state where we would do somatic healing. Something she intuitively read from my energy was my ability to escape into fantasy worlds. She guessed that maybe it was born out of some emotions that were too heavy for me to deal with as a young child, so as a trauma-response I used escapism.

The light aspect of this is that I have been gifted with a super active and colorful imagination. It’s the reason I was able to create entire fantasy worlds for my YouTube videos that then became a sort of blissful and magical escape for millions of young kids and teenagers around the world. It’s my gift, it’s my magic.

On the shadow side, it is an escape. It’s a way to hide from the darkness; from the heaviness that sadly does exist in this world. Our earth exists in a dimension of duality; light and dark, yin and yang. What goes up must come down. There is always darkness where there is light.

But I cling to the light and I don’t want to experience the darkness. So instead, I escape into my own fantasy world.

Burning Man for me was very much dark and shadowy. There were moments of light, but it felt mostly dark. There was no escape. I couldn’t leave (or at least felt like I couldn’t.) I was forced to face all of my shadows, all of those little itches burning inside me to be seen and felt. I didn’t like it. No one likes it. The dark night of the soul.

Watching that man burn was like watching a piece of myself burn away. A part of me I no longer needed. I had been burning the entire time. I watched this reflection of myself within the Man burn away into ashes into the sky. And it was beautiful, really. The ashes looked like fireflies floating all around us. A beautiful destruction.

“As horrific and terrifying as this week was, I’d probably come back.” I said to Anthea. She agreed. 

---

It had been a few hours since we had taken the Molly and neither of us were feeling anything. “Well, we gave it a shot,” I say to Anthea as I tell her I’m ready to head home. It’s only around 11:30pm at this time, which is quite early to cop out on the last night, but I was in so much pain. Sadly, the art car had left without us, and we had no bikes. We had to make the trek home across the playa on foot, something I prayed would never happen to us. At this point walking was extremely painful for me. But we made it home. 

I start to take my clothes off to change into my pajamas and get ready for bed. As I remove my skirt, Anthea takes one look at my body and says, “Cloe, I think we need to go to the medical tent.” 

My vagina has swelled up to almost three times it’s normal size and my hives are quite scary looking. I am so tired, but I agree. Anthea goes to try to see if she can borrow the buggy to drive us to the Burning Man medical center. The moment she leaves our tent, I fall to my knees crying. I curl in a ball in the fetal position on the floor. I am defeated. I have surrendered as much as I can, but I need help.

Anthea borrowed the keys and like some superhero drove me to the medical tent through all the craziness of the Playa. I laid in the back with a blanket and watched all the bikes and art cars pass me. And for the first time all Burn, I surrendered to the pain I was really feeling. I didn’t put a smile on my face. I didn’t try to pretend I was having the time of my life. I was in the back of a car on my way to the “hospital” and this is my reality. I felt like things were finally being taking seriously. THIS is the reality of the pain I was feeling. THIS is how I needed to be acting. Taking action for my health. Not partying on an art car, pretending everything’s okay.

For the first time, I actually felt safe. Because I knew what was going on with my body was going to be taken care of. It was now bigger than me; it was out of my hands. And I could surrender and rest in that. 

I don’t know what it was, maybe that feeling of “safety,” but it was then when the Molly started to hit. It was then, in the Burning Man hospital, when the nurse was asking me my age and I couldn’t quite figure it out. “Twenty…. five? Twenty five?” I looked at Anthea for reassurance. “I’m twenty five?” 

I didn’t know if there was something possibly more serious going on with my health, but the fact that I couldn’t quite comprehend my age was shocking and a bit scary. 

The nurse takes me back to the viewing room where I see other patients in hospital beds. It’s like a field hospital, basically a makeshift hospital for soldiers at war. One man was fully wrapped in tin-foil from head to toe. I don’t know what was going on there, and I didn’t want to. I wanted to leave. Everything felt extra scary and extra strange, and I very quickly realize I do not want to be here. 

I lay down on the bed and the nurse starts to examine me. I look into Anthea’s very wide pupils and think, “Fuck.”

4 hours later, the Molly hits us both. The nurse walks away and we are dying, laughing at the irony of it all. The nurse, after diagnosing me with what she said could be a potential Candida overgrowth, comes back with some pills for me to take. I shyly ask her, “Is it okay if I take these? I just took some Molly a few hours ago and I don’t know if I can mix these medicines…” She interrupts me to say, “Honey, I know you took Molly. I can tell. Your pupils are huge. Yes it’s fine if you take this.”

Anthea and I erupt in fits of laughter. This is Anthea’s first time doing Molly, or any drug for that matter. As one does on Molly, she’s trying to become best friends with the nurse. “You should come out with us!” She says to the nurse. I am laughing. “Anthea, we gotta go. She can’t come. She has to stay here.” The nurse is encouraging us to leave too. “Go, get outside, see some lights! Go enjoy your last night!” Anthea and I giggle and link arms as we try to find our way out of the hospital.

So we’re on Molly and we run around and explore this crazy foreign planet that is Burning Man. For the first time all week, I didn’t feel pain. I felt out of my body. We find some pretty dangling lights and we twirl through them. Anthea was just telling me earlier that night that if she were to make any sort of art installation at Burning Man, she would make the Tree of Eywa from Avatar, where they could connect the strands of their hair to the tree and communicate with their ancestors. I turn to a random guy who’s also in the dangling tubular lights and exclaim to him, “It’s the Tree of Eywa!” He gives me a funny look and walks away.

We look at all the lights; all the bikes, the wild art cars, the eccentric art installations scattered all around the Playa. Anthea is somehow driving* us in this buggy while our friend Tomcat and I are laying on the pillows in the back, ecstatic about our new “art car.” 

*just a disclaimer, I never would vouch for someone driving on any substance, including Molly. but something about this situation felt safe, maybe because everyone drives under 10mph and we’re in a golf cart. Burning Man doesn’t really feel like the real world and it doesn’t feel like the normal rules of the real world apply. But either way, just wanted to disclaim that driving on Molly is not suggested.

It’s funny, earlier in the night I had been all prepared for my big night on Molly. I had my holographic backpack equipped with my binky (if you know, you know,) my water, my rave gloves; all the things I might need for a wild drug-induced night on the Playa. But when I had left camp later that night, I had been prepared for a night at the hospital. I was wearing a comfy, pajama-like romper that I usually would only wear around the house because it makes my boobs look saggy and doesn’t accentuate my curves very well. My hair was in some messy 2 day-old braids, I was wearing my glasses and no makeup, and my massive vagina was almost hanging out of my romper. This was me. On the last night of my Burn, at this point in my life, this is me. This is how I’m showing up.

We arrive to our next destination, which just happens to be a massive party at the camp of the fore-mentioned ex I had been so concerned about running into. The whole time I had been wondering; which outfit will I be wearing when I run into him? I wanted to be radiant, glowing, and looking my best. But here I was, at his camp, with my skin sticking to the blister stains of my saggy romper. And in that moment, everything started to click.

I came to Burning Man prepared with my trendy, sparkly and form-fitting outfits perfectly organized, accessories and all, in Ziplock bags, and here I was at this party in my saggy romper. I brought all this makeup and various crystals to adorn my face with, and I was wearing my glasses and no makeup. And the fact that on top of it all, this was how I was showing up, and there was a chance Max would see me like this. This man that I have never felt enough for, that I always felt like I needed to be perfect for. What a disaster that would be.

But in that moment, it all made sense. I kept hearing “stripped down, stripped back…” in my head and I realized that Burning Man stripped me of everything I used as a crutch to make me feel like I was enough. All the bells and whistles; the gems and face crystals, the sparkles and sequins. Sure, they’re pretty, but not as pretty as I am when I’m shining with the raw beauty that comes with knowing I am enough. Just as I am. And that night, regardless of my physical state, I felt beautiful. Because I knew just how beautiful my soul is.

I never did see Max that night, or at Burning Man at all, despite the countless nights spent laying awake dreaming of what might happen if I did. But I knew that if I ran into him, in that moment, I would feel grounded in the knowing that I am enough. That I didn’t need him to see me as this shining radiant goddess in this perfect outfit. I am that shining radiant goddess, even looking like this. She’s always there, inside me.

I spent the rest of the night with a new friend I made. Her name was Golden Vision. She entranced me into her energy with her golden headdress and her fairy wings covered in twinkly lights.

“Come, come!” She said to Anthea and I as she guided us under her cloak. We all huddled together in a little circle under the soft glow of the lights and the sheer iridescent fabric that made up the fairy wings. Those wings became our safety blanket, our protective bubble. 

Anthea ended up heading back to our camp, but I stayed with Golden Vision till the sun came up on that last morning in the desert.

Golden Vision and I cried over needing to let go of our exes, of these men that we never felt we were enough for. Of these men that drove us crazy and made us lose ourselves. We let go of the versions of us that were clinging to these men, versions of ourselves that so desperately needed their validation.

I wondered what ways my life over the past few years leading up to this point had been subconsciously directed by a need to be seen or desired by Max. If it was subconsciously directing something as small as which outfits I chose for Burning Man, it could have even been directing my bigger life choices, like the song I chose to come out with first for my album. My first song, “Apollo,” is a song basically praising his dick. The entire song is about his penis, which I had named “Apollo.” And maybe that’s why I felt some sort of disconnection with that song after I put it out. Maybe I wasn’t putting it out for me. Maybe I released it for him.

I don’t want to live my life for him anymore.

“We should go to the temple,” Golden shared, “and you can really let him go.”

The temple is the most sacred and holy place on the entire Playa. It also just happens to be the most quiet. It is a place of mourning, of letting go. People bring memento’s and pictures and anything that may remind them of a loved one who they want to say goodbye to, and they leave them in the temple. I always thought the temple was just for grieving loved ones who have passed on. But it’s for grieving anything; a lover you need to let go of, a friend, or a part of you that is no longer serving you. On the very last day of Burning Man, they burn the temple. And with that, you burn away all that you are wanting to let go of.

Golden Vision and I walked arm in arm across the Playa to the temple. She covered us in her fairy cloak of protection. It felt like a march of pride, two women who had regained their strength. We were doing it. We are brave, we are strong, we are warriors.

I needed Golden Vision’s support in that moment. But once we got to the temple, there was someone else who needed her. There was a girl sobbing on the floor, and Golden felt called to go comfort her. Little did she know, she was actually acting as a “temple angel” in that moment. “Temple Angels” go to the temple to hold space and support others as they are letting go; that is their gift to the Playa.

As Golden started to console the weeping girl, I wandered on my own through the temple. I looked at the photos Burners had pasted all over the structure, photos of people that were no longer here on this earth. I ran my hand against the carvings in the wood and the little letters people wrote. I picked up a sharpie I found along the way and I looked for a clear space on the walls of the temple in between all the letters and photos, a little corner where I could write what I needed to, in solitude.

I found a space that felt private enough and I sat down in the dust and began to write.

Dear Max, 

Thank you for everything. Thank you for giving me the gift of music; for igniting my creative fire for songwriting. Thank you for creating the space that felt safe enough for me to let down my walls; to fall in love for the first time. You will always be my first love, and I will forever cherish what we had. But this relationship is not healthy for me, and might never be. And it’s time to let you go.

I thought I would cry but I didn’t. I just felt extreme exhaustion. I had cried enough tears for him. Maybe there wasn’t any left. I just wanted to rest.

Underneath, I wrote my mom’s name in honor of her memory.

Hilary Claire Feldman

I found Golden Vision and arm in arm, we made our way back to the little tent with beds where we were before.

I don’t remember exactly how or why, it was something that Golden was saying to me that made me feel called to sing her my song, “Beautiful Soul.”

“I want to offer you a song,” I said to her. “This is my gift for you.”

I wrote “Beautiful Soul” a long time ago. I actually wrote this song in dedication to all my subscribers that have shown me so much love over the years. There was a day, sometime in the spring of 2020, around the beginning of the pandemic, where I was watching an old vlog of mine from a meet-up I did in Israel. This was the biggest meet-up I ever did; around 400 people came just to meet me and give me a hug.

At the time that that meet-up happened, I was 19 and a bit numb to it all. Growing up with that kind of fame made it become somewhat normal. I barely thought twice about it.

But when I watched this video back after I had quit YouTube and was a bit outside of it all, I was astounded. My younger sister Saige had gone around with my camera and gone up to all the girls, asking them if they wanted to say something to me. Through the video, I felt myself being completely showered with this unconditional love that all these young girls have for me. It brought me to tears. I felt overwhelmed with love, and allowed myself, for maybe the first time ever, to open my heart to feel the love of all of the millions of people that have followed me for years.

This is my love song to them. But as I continued to sing it and share it over the years, it became my love song to all the people I love. It was for Saige. It was for Mia. It was for my dad. It was for my niece Hazel. It was for my best friend Sunny. It was for whoever I was singing it to who needed to hear it. It’s my way of channeling love. And in this moment, it was for Golden Vision.

Oh your smile
Is like the best thing I could see
Yeah, your laugh
It means everything to me
Yeah, you’re so lovely
In every single way
Even when you let your darkness out
I still won’t go away
I know you may not see it
I know you started to forget
That you’re a beautiful soul
divine product of creation
you’re so wonderful
can you feel what I am saying?
When I tell you how special you are
I’m not lying
You’re a star

I sang to Golden Vision as we walked. Still singing, I guided us to this art installation that was a beautiful orb of light with little geometric cut-outs, allowing the light to stream through. I spun it delicately with my hand as I sang, the light reflecting through the cutouts casting magical patterns and shapes of light across our faces. I looked in her eyes and saw tears streaming down her face. Through my song, I reminded her that she is a beautiful, precious soul, worthy of love. Even if she forgets sometimes, I want her to know she is loved. She is enough. Just the way she is.

I sang it for her, I sang it for me, and I sing it for every person who’s ever forgotten their worth on this earth. Who’s dimmed their light so little to the point where it’s barely flickering. Maybe they got stuck in the shadow of someone else they thought they needed to dim themselves for. This song is for those who forgot just how bright they shine, how worthy they are to be here, just as they are. I sing to remember. I sing to remind others, and I sing to remind myself. 

I wanna hug you
And hold your little face right in my hands
and tell you
If it’s not quite going how you planned
It’s okay
That you’re feeling a little scared
Yeah, I don’t have all the answers
But I’ll show you that I care
About your beautiful soul
divine product of creation
you’re so wonderful
can you hear what I am saying?
When I tell you how special you are
I’m not lying
You’re a star

Burning Man showed me the truly invaluable truth of my perfection and wholeness in one of the most painful ways possible. It was extremely rough, and some of the lowest moments of my life, where I literally was on my knees praying to God or to some higher power to save me from it. I had to surrender, and lay it all out there. Show up to the altar naked. I had to shed my skin and let go of the parts of myself that weren’t worth holding on to anymore.

Now time for the big question. Would I go back to Burning Man?

At this very moment, I cannot answer that. If it would be anything like my first, I don’t think so. I don’t know if I subscribe to the belief that for the deepest healing to take place, intense suffering needs to occur. Yes, I will always find the healing within the suffering, but I would like to choose a path for my life of less suffering.

I don’t regret anything. But I don’t know if I would do it to myself again.

Maybe there’s a reality that exists for me where I can have a more grounded and enjoyable Burning Man experience, where shadows come up, but overall joy and love surrounds me. If it feels right, I will go. If I feel surrounded by the right people, and grounded enough in my body and nervous system, maybe I would go again. And maybe it will be magical and blissful and everything I wanted it to be. But for now, my priority is learning how to exist in this world in a way that feels safe and healthy and loving for my body. And honestly, I just fucking hate techno.

To whoever’s reading this, I love you. I want you to know that you are special, just as you are. You’re a star, and the world needs you to shine your unique light. I want to end with another quote from my “Work your Light” oracle deck.

“Bless the thing that cracked you open, because the world needs you open.”

Stay open, keep shining your light, and I love you.

Signing off, 

Cloe ❤️