This is my small story of the apocalypse and I am calling it

“The Unknown”

Uncertainty courses through my veins. I am most certainly not myself anymore, but some strange and unfamiliar survivalist version of me. I am moments of calm in the eye of the storm. I am moments of deep grief for the stories of struggle, strife and death. I am moments of strength as I caretake and cook for my younglings. I am moments of weakness as I feel helpless to help others. I am moments of terror for myself with every unacknowledged deep ache of my still asthmatic lungs. I am moments of anger as I listen to stories of companies keeping N-95 masks for non-essential procedures while simultaneously witnessing stories of lack in needed areas. I am moments of hypocrisy as I teach yoga online but can’t seem to escape my own root chakra for days on end. I am moments of love every time I glance my babies’ way and see that they are ok.

The unknown can both be exhilarating and terrifying at the same time. I teeter on the edge of the here and now and what the future may be? I keep having flashes of a dream that I had when Donald Trump was sworn into office. It was a dream of panic and chaos, of borders closing, of hostile government take-over, of dictatorship and persecution. My kids and husband had international passports and were able to leave and I left them, ripped them from my arms at the airport and said “go.” I was left here with a certainty that I would die, not from illness but because I would not settle. I can not settle again for anything less than a divinely inspired life. I can’t cease in my quest to speak my truth through my craft and my teachings of SHE for they are my soul’s purpose. Teaching the mysteries of the feminine divine, healing and magic. This dream was before Trump decided he liked the word “witch hunt,” which is ironically exactly what I knew would happen to me in this strange nightmarish-scape. I did not know the hows or whys but I knew I had a target on my back for living vocally as a feminist and as a witch, and I had just knowingly sent my rock, my partner and my whole heart away to safety and would face what was coming unprotected and alone.

If this is indeed my story then I get to change the narrative of that which could be. I will not be left alone. It cannot be more of the same. More patriarchal control or a simple regime change from one evil to the next. A hostile take-over by the putrid orange face of the anti-Christ won’t be allowed. There is something here though, in this unknown whispering “change is coming.” Mirror magic abounds. What do I mean by that you ask? The world, our government, our systems have become reflecting pools. They are mirroring to us the things that need to get torn down. Systems have failed us. It will not be wrong to be angry about it, but please let that anger lead us through the lens of love. What is anger if not just a deep hurt that something we love was damaged or wounded? Like our blind faith in our systems, and when they fail us it hurts. Anger is a natural step, a valid feeling in the path of grief and healing. Let that anger affect change in ways that make the world a better place to live in.

I will not let go of the vision of a better future. Today we sit on the turning point. We are no longer disillusioned and veiled in maya (illusion). Today we are seeing the systems for what they are. Greed. Money making capitalist systems. Our healthcare system, the thing that is our life line between death and a future has failed us as a society and it has failed our healthcare providers too. It has placed our healers in harms-way telling them that they took an oath to save lives and asking that they potentially give theirs in exchange. That’s huge. That’s big. Americans as a whole are terrified of death. We fear the unknown, because we have lost our connection to the divine mysteries. This could finally be the catalyst for the change that we need. To push us back into consciousness. To open us back up to conversations about community, society, wealth distribution and the sustainability of the earth. To realize that the earth is ever abundant if only we treat her right and there is plenty for all. If we all lived in love there would be no need to hoard and compete. It’s our moment to switch back into Goddess consciousness, to live a life of soul healing and purpose rather than soul deterioration and militant marching to work and home again. It’s our moment to say that we will not expend our wise elders in the name of money for they are our wisdom keepers and our most valuable members of society. It’s our moment to be collectivists for the greater good. Perhaps we even realize that borders are only in our minds and are invisible lines that we have drawn in the sand. Imagine if we all believed we are one race, one people.

I am so disappointed in my Governor. I remember the day that I voted for her. I said that I was voting for a straight “V-ticket,” voting only for women because I held the personal belief that if something like this came to be that I could trust in a woman to take action. I wanted her to rise like a fierce warrior goddess to protect her state, to be a manifestor of magical equipment to help her people live, to call to action the doers and the helpers, but instead she has played politics. She has really made me question whether or not being a left-wing or a right-wing politician means anything anymore? I wanted to see her with a liberal bleeding heart, weeping for her people, and crying with bare breasts for her state to organize and take action. I realize that image might have been unrealistic but I wanted it none the less. I will trust in those that have ethics and values like Bauer, who have switched from making hockey face masks to making health care face shields at zero profit. Stories like that are what are going to be migrating through our psychic fields for years to come as the tales of heroism and the trauma of this global apocalypse tears through us. My version of the story would have been that we banned together, we became rooted in sustainability, that we took care of our elders, our young, and our adolescents in ways that no one human is left with a feeling of lack or hunger or that they were left to die because the richest country in the world could not provide basic life sustaining support for them. This story however is The Unknown, and there is no way to predict how the story will really go but I will not let go of my idyllic machinations.

I will pray that my nightmarish dream doesn’t become reality. That we do not get worse before we get better, but something inside of me tells me that isn’t true. I hope that the polarization of political parties doesn’t drift even further apart. That the patriarchal capitalists don’t seize hold of the energy of panic and fear and take the reigns and lead us down a dark hole of even more control. Instead, I will hold fast to the image of a better world taking shape from this apocalypse. I will pray that what is occurring now is at the hands of the dark goddess. That while maya that word I’ve mentioned before, a yogic term for illusion is currently cloaking us in the unknown, that it is in fact a feminine energy that is intended to veil that which is not yet ready to be revealed. I can feel safe in the dark space of the goddess, knowing that she will be no less terrifying in her energies of deconstruction, but I trust in what’s to come from it. I will trust in the necessary destruction of systems that need to go, of landscapes that need to be restructured. Sitting in the space of trust even while in The Unknown, that what is meant to be will be and I will cherish every giggle that I hear from the lips of my babes.

I sit in the space of not knowing. Not knowing does not keep me from daydreaming. Speaking of my babes, if this is my story then I will also write into being that there will be no more WARS. That we will not come out of this on the other end in a global power struggle with a future draft signed in to order. My sons will not be sent off into battle. My gentle sweet-hearted eldest with his soft blue eyes will not be sent to die without me or his loved ones around him in the name of conquer. I will continue to work my ancestral healing of the magic of my own personal DNA helicase mandala to erase the epigenetic damage of past wars and famine. So, if there is one thing that I do know in all of this uncertainty it is that I will love my way through it. I am tired of anger even though I know how powerful it can be. I’ve had enough of it for a lifetime, but I know that I will use it once again to cast my magic if needs be. I know that I can hold space as a divine feminine circle leader to let others speak their angers into circle in safe ways to bring about healing. I will try to establish personal boundaries so that my feisty Germanic-Irish spirit doesn’t get to the point of going beyond and into a rage that won’t be helpful to society. I will fight with an open heart for my sons to be able to become kind and loving adults within a society that we have left better than we found it. I will offer myself to the service of the goddess to be able to help her people grieve those who do not make it through. I will rise from this cocoon of isolation ready to embrace the uncertainty with a leap of faith. I will keep my babies’ long eye lashes in their deep peaceful sleep as my guiding image for the future. A future of love and innocence. I will rise knowing that this is day one of a better future, and an opportunity to save the world for those who are yet to be born. A future where we can meet as witches in our sacred groves once more and pray to the goddess for all that is holy in flesh, blood and bone. To teach all of the mysteries of SHE, for she is the greatest mystery and the greatest UNKNOWN. I will hold fast to my future visions even while I currently sit isolated and alone, in The Unknown.

Dr. Tara Coumoundouros, Pharmakeia, Karuna Reiki Master, ERYT-200/RYT-500