Caught in the Void

That surging of energy within my entire body prevented me from drifting into a peaceful sleep. Wide awake, I was familiar with this routine. I walked barefoot out onto the street under a moon- and star-lit sky, and climbed up the nearby boulder pile awhile until I chose a flat-topped granite slab to call my meditation cushion. I surrendered to the energy, allowing it to direct my consciousness into a relaxed, altered state. One of my guides wanted to chat, so I looked around to make sure no one was watching. I opened my mouth to channel her words more clearly. “Why am I feeling this?” I asked her. I had been feeling empty, simply empty, like I had a huge hole in my heart. This feeling of emptiness had persisted for a few weeks, coming and going. “Sometimes we need to spend time in the Void,” she replied. The Void is where nothingness lies, where new births begin. It is a darkness that we fear because it is nothing. What do I do in nothing? Where do I go? Who do I turn to? There is nothing. It is terrifying if one gets caught up in thinking about it. It is the Black Hole at the center of our Universe, the empty space between atoms and between stars. It makes up something like 99.9% of the universe. All the stuff we know as our bodies, the earth, every Thing, only makes up at most one-tenth of one percent of the universe. But it is also the Divine Matrix that holds Matter. It is the womb that acts as a container for life. It may be seen as the feminine principle of creation.

My guide asked me to relax and be in the Void, to have faith that new beginnings needed a gestation period in the darkness. If we do not know the darkness, the empty nothingness, we cannot know the light, the beauty we grow into, the earth and the stars. And if we do not know the Void, we will fear it as we fear Death and cling to Life. If we cling to life, we never let our browning leaves fall to make room for new growth.

Soon after I surrendered to that feeling of emptiness inside of me, something new took root. This little seedling is searching upwards for the light. Who knows what this new life will bring, but I will try to nourish it as best I can, as I would for all little fragile things taking their first shaky steps in the world.