A goal is not always something to be reached; it often serves as something you are meant to aim at. --Bruce Lee

I love the artist Tara Mchperson!  I own some of her handsigned Rock and Roll posters from back in the day when she really needed the money.  What I love most about them is that she always addresses the VOID.  You can find that sad, or beautiful, or tragic, but I see it as REAL.

There are periods in your life when you feel as if you are just walking about like a zombie in a void.  You get up take a shower, brush your teeth, get dressed, drink coffee, go to work, get home, eat, watch TV, go to bed, REPEAT.  You do this routine every day until the weekend comes then you get up, do chores, run errands, watch a little TV or play on the computer, go out with friends, REPEAT.  This is one way this cycle manifests and I am not criticizing this cycle. Some people find bliss in this cycle or repeat rotation but not me.

Another option:  You go to school every day striving for a goal, and working a little part time job or NOT working a job and having your partner do all the work so you can just concentrate on school. You come home and do homework every night then go to bed and get up the next day to do the same thing REPEAT.  The weekends are spent doing homework, hanging out only to start the same routine again on Monday REPEAT.  This routine is slow, steady and lasts as long as it takes until you either give up or finish school to get your goal/degree. Once again, this is not a BAD routine I am just showing you how it is common in our lives.

Other scenarios:  You get married, have kids, do laundry, do dishes, go grocery shopping,  cook meals, take care of your children (wash them, teach them, discipline them, play with them), take care of your pets and plants (the same as children), only to finally after they are all asleep and tucked away YOU go to bed, get up the next day and start the same. REPEAT, WASH<RINSE> REPEAT.

ROTATION:  I feel that life works not only in cycles but in patterns of rotation.  Yes, like a wheel or gears, or part of machine…however you want to state it.  It is what you do when in the rotation; or how you perceive the rotation that is integral to how you “escape” or “supersede” it.  Some people say they take comfort in patterns and routines this in itself is a way of overcoming a rotation so you do not get bored.  Myself, I am easily bored.  I discovered this about myself at an early age.  So I would read voraciously, be involved in way too many activities, and run around the block with excess energy pretending I was a horse or a marathon runner whichever one came to mind first when galloping.

I got bored in my spiritual life magically speaking (apparently I am a social witch), then I founded a coven and that kept me busy.  I got bored in my spiritual life again (I had done the covens, groves and circles) then the opportunity arose to help co-found a Wiccan church and that has really kept me busy.  Just when it was getting launched and flying like a rocket I came to the discovery that in some areas I was still bored.  I needed and wanted more not out of others but for myself.  The other clergy started running more circles so I could participate and learn; I teach students so that kept me busy learning also; I was not learning what I needed to learn in my heart. To find out what that was I had to step back, stop being “so busy” and listen; really listen to my higher self and to my Gods. “What was I doing wrong” I asked? What I did not ask was, “What was I doing right?”

 I went outside to our circle and starting approaching things differently, I know my elements, I know my Gods, I know how to raise and manipulate energy, I understand intensity and vibrations.  I made myself start “reflecting” on other options; I shook up my comfort zones and questioned them.  I spoke to my deities and told them that while I would always love them that I needed a bit more and I did not understand what was missing I did not understand my void.  I explained that I loved the Temple, I loved teaching classes, I loved my husband and children and all the things they had given me but I was at a pivotal point in my own personal life and that I needed something specific.  I was scared to say it out loud, it seemed wrong somehow to ask for a deeper personal spiritual life for myself but once it was said I felt pressure easing off me like a ton of bricks and I realized that was what I needed. I needed to be honest, I had a life too, I did not exist just to serve other humans and the Gods I also existed to serve myself and my heart else how could I serve others?  My void was stated, my needs were clear, my Gods came through.

A teacher landed in my lap.  The first thing he asked me was…”How was my circle balanced?”  I could answer that, but it made me stop.  I thought and thought, and came back to let him know that I did not like the concept of balance in a “traditional wiccan circle” for myself and this made me feel guilty.  I wanted one type of circle for me, and another for the Temple but I knew he would not have been prompted to ask me if there was not a reason for it.  I sat down and drew for him all the circles I knew and I have to brag here I was amazed at the wealth of maps of circles I knew and the amount of circle styles I knew and this explained my void.  I told him how just recently I had an “epiphany” about how to divide the circle in different quadrants eight to be exact, and how it corresponded to my deities, and how historical this number came up and up again.  I showed him all the old maps from John Dee, Aleister Crowley, Plutonius, mystics in Egypt, and they all had divisions and symbols and balance but were not what I was looking for even though I had tried them and understood them. That was my void.

He nodded left, came back a few days later and had a puzzle.  He took all eight pieces showed me different ways of laying them out and then explained to me where my issues were arising and I realized I was not bored, just resigned and blocked.  I needed another fresh perspective to push me, to cheer me on, to tell me it was okay for me to want to “make my own alchemical circles” and yes I could “combine Egyptian deities” and Yes I had “to release pre-conceived notions” and that it was Okay.  He also had eight quadrants, and he approached everything differently than me but that could me my “launching point” not the end of my destination.  I felt peace and pieces fall together I had to voice my feelings and confront my void to get to my destination.

I have worked with him now for about a month; he patiently listens to me and prods me, questions me, then pushes me.  I needed a teacher, I needed a guide, I needed someone to step in and push me when I had already passed the “degree system” that is earned and taught in Wiccan traditions.  I needed someone to help me after I had ran covens, and helped co-found a church.  I wanted to be good just to be good.  I wanted to “supersede myself” have my “own style” and leave behind my own “circle maps”.  The Gods are okay with that. What I find myself asking is “why was I so silly as to not realize that they would be?’ Why did I assume that it was not okay for me to push boundaries just to push boundaries? Have you too gotten so caught up in life, that you have forgotten this truth? 

I told you I hated routines and boredom, some people hate it so bad they fill those voids with drugs and alcohol; or with drama from people or groups (they are the instigators of it yet they will blame it on others), some people fill this with love or passion or sex, some people with creations and art, some people fill it with pain and suffering and are always hurting and crying, some people fill it with a new project and a new job, some people fill it with exercise, some people project it onto others therefore they are perpetually angry and mad, there are millions of ways to fill your voids some unhealthy for you and some very good for you.  But, you cannot ever see it if you do not stop and listen to yourself and look at yourself objectively and question the void, your role in it, and its role in you.

I was taken to the Void on a journey this week.  It was not empty, it was not scary, and I understand the void better now.  I looked at it and saw vast possibilities, I understood the voids role in my life and in the universe and I felt happy in my heart.  The void is not your or my enemy it exists for many reasons but the one we have trouble comprehending is this; there is a VOID only if you let it exist.  You need the void.  You need it to create, and to fail, and to soar, and to fall.  You need it to see that you are dissatisfied, and that you need to learn and grow.  You need the void to rest because you are tired and you are pushing yourself too hard.  You need the void to understand that you have to think, you have to plan, you have to be active, and you cannot just “exist” as a big void you have to create.  Lastly, you have to understand that the “void” is unique to you…it’s there to push you on, to help you discover your “mission” and your “gift”.

This week, look for your VOID.  This week, realize that if you think you do not have one you do.  Find that void, empty it out of all your pre-conceived notions and “ways of being and doing”.  Make friends with your void, but do not become too comfortable with it else you do nothing at all.  Life is full of creation and void.  Life is full of construction and destruction.  Life is full of rotations and learning.  Somewhere within yourself and outside of yourself is a balance.  Where is your circle balanced?  Mine is balanced within me.

Thank you for the gift of your time, and for listening.  I pray you find the balance you seek and that you make friends or at least peace with the VOID.