Remember when you were small, and the adults around you all know Every Single Thing? Remember when they knew the answers to your questions, your "why?" in a way that seemed omniscient? I also remember when one of these All-Knowing Adults said, "I don't know. But I know how we can find out!" Then they introduced me to encyclopaedias, and later, the library. To my very small mind, this was Amazing! To my grown-up mind, it's still amazing! To know that there are repositories for knowledge-- so we can all Know The Things! That fact is so awe-inspiring and heart-stoppingly great, that I'm still thrilled by it.

Now, do you remember when you suddenly knew all things at that magical moment of Becoming An Adult?

I'll wait while you think on it. For me, the answer is Never. I never got that magical moment of knowing all things. I barely got a moment of knowing Some Things. I've spent my 20+ years of "Adulthood" feeling like I was completely faking it and hoping no one noticed. I've hoped I could fake it well enough, and that I didn't get caught being stupid when someone needed something important from me.

In other words, I'm a typical, normal, average, adult-ish person.

In my infinite wisdom, I have no idea what I'm doing!*

Many religions claim to have all the answers, to know all the important questions, and to be the end of all questions. I mean, how can you ask questions if you have The Answer and The Truth? That's just silly! Whether telling you that "believe this way" or "don't eat this" or "wear that" or "don't wear this", religions are more often lists of Do's and Don't's, but they pretend very hard to be answers to everything on top of it.

I learned as a Christian kid that the world would end in fire. That Jesus would take all of the Christians who were alive into heaven (bodily, called The Rapture). That a horrible 7-year period of Tribulation would occur where the Anti-Christ, demons, and Satan himself, would harm and torment people on the earth. Then the Last Battle (Or Battle of Armageddon), then literally burning everything down, and remaking it all new.

I was terrified of fire for a very long time. I was terrified that the Rapture was going to happen, and I would miss it, that somehow, I had become "un-saved", that God would burn me along with the demons. I had regular nightmares about hell until I was about 40, even though I left the church at 16.

And I had been taught that the Bible had all the Truth and therefore I knew the answers to all the hard questions (which were, "God Did It", and "God Knows" and "God's Ways Are Higher Than Our Ways/unfathomable" and my favourites, "Don't Question God")

I got into a lot of trouble asking questions.

But those questions led me out of Christianity and the misogyny and hate, and eventually away from gods altogether. Without questions I wouldn't have become an atheist, and without questions, I wouldn't have been brave enough to say, "Would a loving-god really allow war/children to die/famine/etc?"

But, leaving religion, and admitting that I don't actually believe in a god, or any higher power, means that I have to admit there are So Many Questions I'll never get an answer to. Maybe, eventually, someday, science will figure it out, but there isn't an afterlife, no magical spiritual library where I can ask the Cosmic Librarian where to find the answers to the Big Questions! Hell, I can't even ask this hypothetical librarian the Little Questions.

Although this started when I became a Pagan, this ambiguity continued, and so I had to make peace with it.

I had to find ways to accept that I won't live long enough to learn the answers to all the things I want to know-- because we humans just haven't figured it out yet. I had to learn to find comfort in that state of Not Knowing. And being that I am a curious person who is a little bit obsessed with learning All The Things, that was a hard thing to get my head around.

The first thing I did, and you're going to be so tired of seeing these words, was start Therapy! I knew that I had learned some terribly damaging things, that I had been taught them from a very young age, and that I needed help to unlearn them. Therapy helped me get through the terror of hell, and down into the sadness that was underneath it. The concept of Hell, and how it's taught to kids is abusive, and I'll talk about it more someday. But when you understand that the adults who are scaring the literal hell out of kids are doing it because they are also afraid, and that they truly are trying to do the right thing for the people they love, you can sort of get why they do it. Doesn't make it easy, and it doesn't make it right. But therapy helped me learn to grapple with that hard fact, and to get through it. Notice I didn't say "passed" it, I got through it, I didn't sweep it under the rug and get passed it.

The next thing, and something I still do: Find out what things I'm fine being ignorant of. I have tried and tried to like the band Tool, and the Zelda video games; I've tried to get into the Kingdom Hearts games (there's like 97 of them now), and Economics and Money-Stuff**. There are other things that I just can't be arsed with. And it's not that I don't understand the concepts of these things. It's that I just Do NOT like them. I loathe them. I despise them. They are just so far outside of my idea of "great stuff" that I'd rather read my high school poetry aloud during an open mic night, than try to get conversant in these things.

So, I didn't. I know enough to get through a social conversation, but anything deeper and I just gracefully change the subject or depart while the others keep talking. I'm ok with Not Knowing about monetary policy. I know enough to Google when it's time to vote, and when it's time to contact my elected officials. That's good enough.

Figure out where you're comfortable, what goes in your "Eh, fuck it" column, versus your "I MUST Know!" column. If it helps, you can actually jot things down. My "Eh, Fuck it" column really does include the band, Tool. I'm the only person I know who loves metal who hates Tool. I just can't with them. But, I tried, and even if I don't understand why in the world people like them, well, I feel that way about country music, boy bands, and red wine, so each to their own.

In your "Must Know" column, be careful not to write down "the answer to everything" (it's 42), or "Why Am I here?" (your parents fucked, and your mother carried the pregnancy to term), because the real reason is so simple that you're going to overthink it and go straight to The Philosophical Reason for Stuff. Don't do that. Philosophy goes into the third column. This one is for you to figure out what your interests are, whether you really want to decide on your life's purpose, and what you think about things you can quantify with science. I hope it also includes knowing how to be a good person, what charities and causes are meaningful to you and of course a favourite ice scream (salted caramel) and dinosaur (stegosaurus). This is where you decide what you want to learn, the things you need to know in order to better live your life (also, budgeting, how to wash blood out of clothing, getting stains out of carpet, stuff like that). You know, your "Good Adulting" column.

YouTube can teach you a lot about how to fix stuff around your house, how to cook, and even how to cut veggies and fruits. You can reach out on Meetup and join groups dedicated to mushroom hunting, painting, antiquing and more! Keep learning and you will continue to grow as a person. It is important that a Witch is willing to do the work to keep growing. If you can't learn enough to be satisfied with the answer, hold those thoughts, those questions. You can move them to the third column.

The third column you need to create is more of a "I Don't Know, but I have an Idea" includes "weird experiences", "possible ghosts", and "what is up with that 'ghost cat' at work". These are things that I have some idea, some hypothesis about-- and they're all deliciously half-baked, and strange, but I'm no quantum physicist or astronomer, or anything cool like that, really. But I have some ideas, with the undergrad level of physics that I took, and the various journals I've read since then. And those ideas aren't important to anyone, but me! They are part of how I explain the unexplainable, and they leave room for science to colour in, paint over, correct, and inform.

For example: why do people share dreams? If you've never experienced it, it's very disconcerting. You'll be dreaming, doing your dreaming thing, and someone stumbles into your dream like they're lost. Or you fall into a totally different scene like you're lost. You mention it to the person later, "I had the funniest dream, we were sitting on a picnic table and a faerie flew up and bonked you on the nose!" You laugh about how funny it was, when they come back with, "Right, and then I turned into a flower in a pot, and you had to drive home." Never mind you hadn't told them the part that had you laughing until you cried-- they just told you! That's when you realize you dreamed the same dream. How fucking weird, right?

So, why does it happen? I dunno. I'm sure there's a reason that has a lot of higher mathematics, only some of which I'm able to compute. But I theorize that humans have this Dreamscape that we might share. We tend to have the same kinds of dreams, often across cultures. Maybe mythologies and sacred stories talk about a Dreaming World, some place we can visit while we sleep. So, my hypothesis is that we occasionally fall over each other in this place and have dreams about flowers that are supposed to be our friends.

Is it true? I don't know. I'm ok not knowing. I accept that I'll never quite figure out a lot of things, because science hasn't gotten there yet. I'll never fully understand what happens to my body's electricity when my body dies? I know that my atoms will disburse, but where will my electricity go? I don't know. We can't put a tracker on one person's atoms to follow it through time. So, I imagine where mine might have been before (I hope, a stegosaurus eating salted caramel ice cream, really) and where they might go.

Are there white holes that spit out matter the way black holes suck it in? I dunno. What's on the other side/inside of a black hole? I dunno! These are the questions that I put in this third column. This column is where my questions, serious and silly, Big and small, Philosophy and thought experiment can go. I can practice saying, "I don't know, and I haven't figured it out yet" in this way, and even add the thoughts I have about what/why/when/etc. It's a powerful thing to say, "I don't know" and not feel bad or shamed. So, practice it well!

As I learn to be more and more comfortable with ambiguity, with taking stuff from the Must Know column and letting them drop off because there isn't an answer, or at least not one that really makes sense. Why do people suffer? Because, much as I hate to say it, the universe is cold and unkind, and shit happens. Random shit happens. Why do people get cancer? Well, because evolution is "good enough", but it's random and stupid, and ugh! I have learned to say, "I don't know, and I have chosen to be ok with that." Even when I really wish I did know. I can still choose to accept my own ignorance; I can admit I have thoughts and ideas, but still No Fucking Clue! It's powerful, but it's also freeing! To shed the shame that I must know (or make up) the answer because I am an all-mighty grown up-- talk about coming out of a cocoon! It's great!

The last thing I can tell you about ambiguity is that it is ok if you feel ambivalent about things. It's ok if you don't know how you feel about abortion, climate change, physician assisted suicide (PAS), and quinoa. It's ok to say, "I don't know because it hasn't affected me, but I will defer to those it has affected." If you are cis-man, abortion is not healthcare you will ever need for yourself. But that doesn't mean you should stop supporting the right of women to choose. It might not be your body, but you can be with us in the fight for our own autonomy. You might think PAS, and indeed any suicide is the wrong choice, but you can still be graceful to those who choose that path.

That's the part of accepting ambiguity that is Witchcraft: supporting others in their choices, with grace and kindness even, and especially, when it doesn't apply to you. I will never understand why people eat quinoa; I think it tastes like toasted gravel, but I will make it for you, if you want me to. And I'll hold your hand if you need me there to support you while you end your life. I'll be with you when you give birth or choose not to. I'll support you when you work through all of life's big and little questions-- because it's the right thing to do.

Witchcraft is supporting each other, and that is what we do here at QueerCoven. Choosing to embrace ambiguity doens't mean there's nothing right or wrong, nothing moral or immoral. It means that you understand there will always be so much we don't know, and you embrace that ignorance with joy and seek to learn all that you can learn-- knowing you will learn and grow so much along the way.

*I came up with this years ago laughing with my partner about how we're only pretending to be adults. I can't remember the entire conversation, but I remember it was about kids, and school, and that somehow, I was supposed to be the Arbiter of All Things To Be Decided! I've kept it as an almost-motto, to remind myself, and others, that yeah, I might be 25, or 35, or 45, but I still don't know what I'm doing most of the time. I just try hard, learn from my mistakes, and keep going.

** Money-Stuff is a technical term for everything that falls under the "financial" umbrella, like the Federal Reserve, and Interest Rates, and bonds, and stocks, and Ostrich Markets (or Bears, or Zebras, or whatever they are)