The earthquake is the ground itself withdrawing its guarantee. Surviving one is read as foundations shaken and the self still standing — in the East the order of things rearranged, in the West bedrock assumptions giving way, in Ibn Sirin's tradition a great disturbance in one's land, weathered.
Three readings
In Chinese tradition · 周公解梦
In the Chinese frame the earth is the given order — family, state, the arrangements beneath all arrangements — and its quaking marks that order in rearrangement: upheaval in the household, the workplace, the world one stood on. The classical readings attend to what falls and what stands: to come through with your house intact reads as the disturbance passing without ruin. The tradition asks which of your certainties has recently moved — because the dream says one has.
Psychologically the earthquake is the failure of the assumed: not a threat that approaches but the ground that was never supposed to move — a diagnosis, an infidelity, a faith or institution cracking. Survival dreams stage the after: what of you remains when bedrock certainty is gone. Dreamers in the first seasons after life-quakes get these constantly; the dream is rebuilding's rehearsal, checking which walls still hold.
Ibn Sirin's tradition read the earthquake toward a great disturbance in a land or a life — upheaval, trial, or a ruler's hard decree shaking a people. To survive it, finding oneself standing when the shaking stops, reads toward being spared through the trial. As meaning: something foundational has moved or will — the dream's mercy is its ending: the shaking stops, and you are still there. Build accordingly.
Why do I dream of earthquakes after big life changes?
Because the metaphor is exact: what moved was not a thing in your world but the ground of it — marriage, health, faith, work. The dream processes the discovery that bedrock can move, and practices standing anyway.
What do the cracks in the ground mean?
Cracks read as the fault lines made visible: the specific certainties that failed — where the break runs through your life. Dreamers usually recognize the crack's path immediately on waking.
What does rebuilding after the quake mean?
The rebuilding dream is the sequel and the good sign: foundations being relaid by choice, on ground now honestly known. It tends to arrive when the shock has passed into work.
This is the general reading. Your dream is specific.