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The song "I Am The Highway" by Audioslave is a favorite of mine but I've always wondered about the meaning behind it, especially the chorus.
I am not your rolling wheels
I am the highway
I am not your carpet ride
I am the skyI am not your blowing wind
I am the lightening
I am not your autumn moon
I am the night
It seems to follow a poetic pattern of "I am not your (A), I am (B)" where A is something that might be contained within B.
But what exactly is he trying to say with this?
This is one of my favorite songs, it means so much to me.
The meaning is this: It has to do with being neglected, mistreated, overlooked and taken for granted by people you care about. They might mean much to you but you get the feeling that you don't mean as much to them. So the chorus says that:
''I am not your rolling wheels I am the highway'' I am not just someone to help you get away a little (I'm not just a getaway car, to paraphrase another great Audioslave song) I am much more than that. I am the highway.
''I am not your carpet ride I am the sky'' same meaning.
''I am not your blowing wind I am the lightning'' I am not just the breeze that blows on your face, I am the lightning that lights the night.
''I am not your autumn moon I am the night'' Same here.
He is saying that he is more important than the way he is being treated.
RIP Chris...You were a poet and spoke directly to the soul...
I finally figured out why I like this song so much and why it's on my mind. Beautifully written. "I am the highway" Many people can relate to life experiences in their own story, those are matched energies and we can just agree to let that go because they don't serve who we are. I actually resonated with the sound of the guitar. Kudos to a friend who sings this well. I will pay mind, most who write, just do it and the thought behind it might be channeled. I read through some of the thoughts about the meaning, yes, if you have a relatable experience and tragic loss of love or experience being out of the body on drugs it might represent that to you. That is not my experience. Mine is about the spirituality behind the words, that is where I resonate.
I have published poetry that just came to me as words in the middle of the night, so I wrote the words down and when I read them later, they had a personal meaning that profoundly resonated with my life. I kind of feel my connection with the words here as a bit of synchronicity because I have points in these words that match what my past has been. They meant something to me. they pointed at moments in my lifeline. Many of us don't take the time to jot those thoughts down and they are lost forever but I was gifted with a photographic situational memory and many stuck with me. Lessons about actually walking the soles off shoes to seek employment, things I felt were difficult, yet in the end when I was called to interview I knew the position was mine. That was of personal power, but it came to me seemingly hard. At the time I walked many miles, despite having a car that ran just fine. You see, I made it hard. At least at the expense of my shoes. I feel those associations as a gift to release because they aren't relevant to who I AM now.
First: "Pearls and Swine": Matthew 7:6 in Jesus's Sermon on the Mount: "Do not give what is holy to the dogs; nor cast your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you in pieces." "Bereft of me": It refers to how we define emotions inside our personal space. Bereft is a past principal of bereaving, Loss of love and the grief one feels following such a loss, loss of self-love, deprived of or lacking something, especially a nonmaterial asset. The verse is about not giving away your gifts and treasures to those who would not appreciate them or who would turn on you. Invalidation post failed relationship.
Moving on, "Friends and liars don't wait for me, 'Cause I'll get on all by myself. I put millions of miles under my heels; And still too close to you, I feel, yeah." We mourn the loss of love, to others, it is a topic. It really is meaningless, but when we have loved and lost that person is on our mind until we let go of our cords, contracts, vows, and agreements and retrieve the personal keys we gave them when we chose to allow them inside of our personal space and forgive. We are not actually free from thinking about them until we do this. If they are on our mind, they are in our energy affecting future choices. Loss of love is similar to the process of grief. We do not forget our personal experiences, we can only realize the karma lesson, feel how we felt and let that go. Someone coming to mind is an opportunity to release that energy and upgrade. It is something we should actually be grateful for. "I am not your rolling wheels – I am the highway. I am not your carpet ride – I am the sky." We have all been taken advantage of somehow, maybe we felt like we were tossed under the bus, someone's carpet ride. It isn't true again points to feeling the space of power because if we chose to support someone who did not emotionally support us, it is a choice. Our choice. I am the highway, I am the sky. Free and open space, clear path, Again Eckhardt Tolle. "You are the sky. The clouds are what happens, what comes and goes." I am a spirit, guiding this body in this life. I AM fine despite the miles that might have passed under my heels. This is a lesson about prosperity and abundance and realizing it is ours, alone. We may walk many miles in our lifetime before realizing that we just have to BE who we are and love what we do. Finding that space is our personal journey. "I am not your blowing wind – I am the lightning. I am not your autumn moon – I am the night… the night." This is Power vs Force (Hawkins). Low vibrational energy is the energy of push. Remember the story we heard as children about the sun and the wind trying to remove a man's coat? Wind only caused him to clutch it tightly. Sun's warmth caused him to take it off. Things can be easy, depending on how we perceive and feel the situation. That is a learned experience, our belief. It doesn't have to be hard, but, lessons and learned beliefs can make it seem so. Those are based on personal choices in our own lifetime, not because of others.
When I clear personal energy, I visualize the sky represented as self. A perfect crystalline blue energy. Things that pass and aren't our energy I see as passing cirrus clouds. They will always pass, continuously change and transform, just like the ones in the sky. The clear sky represents our self as "Present, on point, standing in this exact moment in my personal power."
Very important in chorus is that there are two separeted verses. In the first he says that he is doing everything to help someone who's been very important for him (wheels need the highway, carpet ride needs the sky). Second verse is telling us that he became to man who was obstacle for his friend or girlfriend (night is an opponent for moon; blowing wind help to sail, to go ahead but lightning is dangerous and you have to stop and hide somewhere). I think it is a kind of story which we often experience in our life. First we fall in love, we are happy, but sometimes ours relationships don't manage with problems and don't stand the test of time.
The lyrics you ask about cannot be separated from the entire song, including the music. It's prayer, and its answer.
Begin with the opening guitar. What do we hear? Morello playing what sounds like a haunting church organ. The first verse begins with a reference to the Sermon on the Mount. Pearls and swine. Do not throw your pearls to pigs. Pearls = from God. Pigs = from humans. He's bereft of both. He's missing both. He's on his knees praying about his life. It's been tough. Yet, he doesn't pity himself for being been lost and alone. Then the Lord answers.
He's not the rolling wheel, the magic flying carpet, He's much greater. Then back to the singer - he sound desperate. Listen to the sadness in his voice in this verse and the first. he's down, but he doesn't want to be down. The choruses provide the answer.
The choruses are triumphant, they're meant to give the singer hope. Keep going, i'm not just the wind blowing, i'm the fucking lightning. I'm not just the moon, as magnificent as it may be near harvest time, i'm the entirety of the night. I love how Cornell lets go. He doesn't come back after verse two. Morello's gentle guitar from 3:30 thru about 4:10 is a beautiful interlude between the repeated chorus. The Lord then returns even more emphatic.
Incredible song. Too much soul to merely be about a simple man just talking by himself.
I believe this song is a message from someone who's lost everything, or so he feels after losing the love of his life, and thus he left the place he lived in, possibly to forget how much he's been mistreated.
The chorus is kind of explanation of how he feels about the relationship that has just been ended. Nothing new so far from my side as everyone here feels the same about the song. But they seem to miss one subtle detail about the chorus (maybe except for Arek).
So here's how I feel about the chorus. Arek rightly noticed that the chorus consists of two parts.
The first part describes the feelings of a man (or maybe a woman but I tend to believe it's a man) while he stays in a toxic ralationship where he's seriously emotionally involved while his partner is only looking for some fun.
That's why he's telling he's not her rolling wheels (possibly reffering to a car, a fast one, possibly conviertible which is very fun to drive) or her magic flying carpet just to have a fun little ride. He wants to be something much bigger than that, something that's virtually forever compared to human life just like the highway stays long after one car ride and so does the sky after one carpet ride.
And so the first chorus ends. That's not a coincidence.
Then, after the second verse and the repeated first part of the chorus, the second part is introduced, which in my opinion tells he's gone and she'll never hear of him again.
So he's not the wind she can constantly feel or her face. He's the lightening that appeared for a split of a second in her life and now he's gone. And he's not the moon she can see by the autumn night. He's gone and all she can see now is the darkness of the night.
I believe the message is a statement of self worth on the singers part; he has been used for their (friends and the faithless) ends but now knows he is so much more. All the things detailed in the chorus are using something that makes them possible - no rolling wheels without a highway to roll on, no magic carpet ride without the sky to ride it in, no autumn moon without the night to frame it - he is not just the means to an end but an end worthy to seek for its own sake.
Ironically enough, this song helped save me from depression. It helped me realize that I was more than I thought I was. I wsn't battling anyone else but myself. I am not your rolling wheels, I am the highway.
The narrator is sick of being viewed as insignificant and feeling under appreciated by his wife. He is not HER rolling wheels, the thing that powers HER car in HER direction, he is the highway itself, greater than any car, even hers. He belongs to no one. Neither does the sky – no matter how good a magic carpet ride is, the sky is mighty and eternal. Similarly the moon, night, lighting: not only does he not light her way in the nights, he is an untamable force of nature. She couldn’t see it so he’s packing up.
V1 The narrator is tired. lacks fulfillment no matter hard others try. Figuratively alone whether in city or country. But don't feel bad for him/her as he/she won't feel bad for you. Chorus - the narrator is screaming from the mountaintops he is more than just a carpet ride, just a fun trip in a car. he is the HIGHWAY AND SKY V2 whether your friend or fo it's irrelevent to him whether you are here or not.At this moment he is running/flying away but can't get far enough
Increasing size of the chorus is merely a crescendo of I AM THE F****** HIGHWAY!
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