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The Goddess has a plan… or does She?

I’ve come across the phrase “the Goddess has got a plan” or something similar within the Pagan community, especially when people are trying to sort out why good things happen to bad people, and bad things happen to good people. For me personally, there are a few reasons why this just doesn’t sit right in my own Pagan worldview.

To begin with, I simply don’t believe in predestination. Many people have a simplistic view of “fate”, which seems to preclude the concept of free will. Many things are “fated to happen”, or meeting that person was “just fate”. Sometimes the notion of free will is forgotten in these instances, other times willingly overlooked in order to explain or justify the reason something has happened. Many Pagans, and all Wiccans, believe that we have free will, such as in the Wiccan rede (maxim or “counsel”) “an it harm none, do as ye will” which translates to “do not harm others while you live up to your full potential”. You will is your potential, your spiritual goal, your highest self.

But everyone is on this same ride. We are all going through life together, and someone else’s will may come into your life to challenge, support, annoy, or validate your own experience and your own will. Some would argue that a higher power has a plan for everyone, and that they are in some sort of control over the final destination, which means that there is some sort of control over the everyday experiences that lead to this final destination. This precludes free will, in my opinion.

Some have turned away from deity because of what has happened to them in their lives. They can’t believe that a deity would allow such things to happen to them and/or to the world in general. This is still a belief in pre-destination, and a deity that controls everything like some master puppeteer.

For me, deity is most certainly not this in any shape or form. Deity is the energy of life, of death and of renewal. That is its agenda. This energy may be seen in many different ways, relative to culture, to personal preference, to environment and so on. Different people attribute more associations to this basic agenda, myself included, into a more specified spiritual practice. But overall, the plan is life, death and renewal (or regeneration).

Our relationship with deity is very personal, and can be very specific. But does my Goddess have a plan for entire world? I know that she most certainly has a wish for the world, but it’s not up to her. It’s up to us.

Our free will, our own capability of taking full responsibility for our lives and the lives of others is part of that overall plan of life, death and renewal. It’s the growing up of the human race, the evolution that hopefully will take place sooner rather than later. In a Druidic sense, it is coming to realise that we are part of an environment, and that we need to be a contributing and beneficial part of that ecosystem in order for the whole to thrive (us included). In a Wiccan sense, it would be to do the least amount of harm and to become the best person that you can be in a similar context. In Hedgewitchcraft, it would be to understand and work deeply with the cycles of nature in your own home environment, crafting your life in complete attunement to the world around you, both the seen and the unseen. In all of the above, we are opening ourselves to deity in order to better understand ourselves, and how to live well on this planet.

That, in my opinion, could be the only plan the deities could have for us. Bad things will happen to good people, not because it’s part of deity’s plan, but because there are bad people out there who harm others knowingly or unknowingly. Human ego, greed and fear get in the way of so much that could be accomplished.

Sometimes it’s really hard not to despair when the world seems like such a mess. But we have to put faith in ourselves, in our own actions and be the example we want to see reflected back to us in the world. Working with the wonderful energy of the gods is one way, though not all Pagans are religious. Working with the energy of the land where you live is at the core of all practice, to better understand our place and how we can make it better not just for ourselves, but for all in order to have a sustainable future that follows life, death and renewal, even when not viewed from a religious standpoint.

Your own Will is that which will see you through the most difficult of times. If you align your will to the flow of nature, you will come to understand the true inter-connectedness of all things. And these all have free will, just as you do. It’s learning to meet each other, soul to soul, and work with that energy which in Druidry is often called “awen”. In our relationships with the world we come to better understand the world and really participate in this great, vast cycle within cycles. We will see the good, the bad and the ugly on the way, but we have to realise that not all of that is part of any deity’s plan. It just is, and we can learn to work with it, to condemn when we need to, to be the light we want to see in the world, and to really think long and hard about our own ethics and morality.

That’s my plan, anyway.

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The Myth of the Moral Highground

Is there such a thing as a moral highground?  I have heard people say that they can accept certain people’s behaviour, on the basis that they “are a better person”.  They have chosen their beliefs in themselves, their faith, whatever, and made a judgement call as to who is a better person.  But then, who is a better person above them? And above them? Isn’t it all about perspective anyway?

Believing that we are better than someone else is a falsity and a tragedy, in my opinion.  It can lead to all sorts of destructive behaviour, from bullying to arrogance to war.  Passing a homeless drug addict in the street – do you believe that you are better than that person? Finding out about someone’s infidelity – does that make you a better person? Working for charities, donating time and money – does that make you a better person?

Do you think Mother Theresa thought she was better than the rest of us by doing what she did? I hardly think so.

We all make mistakes. We all have moments of enlightenment, and moments of dark despair. Our lives have happiness and tragedy in them.  Yet claiming that we are better than someone else is simply to say that our circumstances are better than theirs – and circumstances can change on a dime.  As a noun, the dictionary defines circumstance as “a condition, detail, part, or attribute, with respect to time, place, manner, agent, etc., that accompanies, determines, or modifies a fact or event; a modifying or influencing factor: Do not judge his behaviour without considering every circumstance”.  We cannot even consider every circumstance, for we are in no way omniscient. We could become the homeless drug addict, and then where has the better person gone?

We are all on a level playing field.  The search for a moral highground is like looking for the Holy Grail.  All that each person can do is simply to do the best that they can at any given point in time. Sometimes their best may not be all that “good”, whether the person has had moments of enlightenment or not.  Yet to judge ourselves against others only separates us further from others, which leads to an Us and Them mentality, in which horrendous things can occur such as war.

Surely we need morals to follow, else anarchy would reign?  For the most part, most people naturally want to do “good”.  Morals are constantly changing as well, as are opinions – else women would still be the property of their husbands, African Americans would still be relegated to the back of the bus and Britain would be ruled by the Christian Church. Trying to gain the moral highground on a level playing field just doesn’t work – you’d simply be jumping up and down trying to get above everyone else, and yet gravity would bring you back down each time.

Realising that no one is better than anyone else is the key to living a happier life, for you and everyone around you.  People who think that they are better may fall into destructive patterns.  They may not realise that by blowing out someone else’s candle, it doesn’t make theirs burn all the brighter.

Yet there is nothing wrong with living a life of discipline, and of trying to better oneself – to be more aware of one’s own patterns of behaviour.  If we accept that we are only doing the best we can at this point in time, there’s nothing to say that we can’t do better in the future. But we shouldn’t strive to do or be better than other people.  The work should be done on ourselves, with the realisation that the thinking behind “I am better than her” does not make you better, and can, indeed, make you worse.  It is simply putting one’s self onto a pedestal to gain the moral highground, and anyone can fall off the pedestal easily.  I know that the next time I find myself thinking that, I am going to step off my pedestal and get back to the level playing field, where I can look everyone in the eye and see that we are only doing as we can, and just to do the best that I personally can, which is no better than anyone around me.