Why talk about this Magic Pool? Well, the first thing is just to try and create language for our experiences. I'm a UU, and I believe that language is humanizing, spiritual, and empowering.
But once we have the language, there are also some important issues we can name and address.
One is that, despite the feeling of ordinariness, the Magic Pool doesn't happen automatically. The professional religious educators who helped design the YRUU conference structures know that; but the youth graduates who go on to try and start young adult groups mostly don't. One of the main reasons why UUYAN (and the dream of a truly intergenerational UUism) has had so much trouble sustaining itself over the years is that the youth program graduates have learned how to swim and sometimes to lifeguard, but not how to build a new pool.
We can coast on our memories of LRY or YRUU for a while, but it's not the same thing as having a pool of our own.
Another thing is that Magic is powerful, and can be dangerous, especially when handled by people without enough training. I'm going to name three "Dangers of the Magic Pool" that I see pretty often when I look around at UU young adult groups: Eddies, Idolatry, and Addiction.
Eddies
Eddies are like little whirlpools at the edge of the Magic Pool. They happen when the boundaries are not carefully constructed, and they can really smash people, make them hurt, or spin people around, make them crazy.
I once attended a local young adult group as a new visitor, and on my way out the door got caught in an Eddy. It started as the meeting drew to a close, so that during check-out I started feeling like a crazy person. By the time I had walked to my car, I was gripped by a strong suicidal impulse. Now, I am not normally a suicidal person. I have never contemplated suicide in my life. But I couldn't start up my car, because I felt I might drive off a bridge or something. I sat there in the dark in my car for about twenty minutes. And then the feeling went away, completely. I was back to my normal self and I drove home just fine.
Later I tried to figure out what had happened. That particular young adult group was one that consisted almost entirely of check-in. Ten or fifteen people came every week, and opening check-in lasted like an hour and a half. I mean, people were sharing every detail of their lives. It was their main ritual. For a new person, it was extremely boring. I didn't know these people, and they didn't know me. I was given a place in the circle, but I couldn't actually participate in the same ritual. I couldn't both be who I was and be in their Pool with them. I was hurled, by the powerful Magic of unconditional love, against the rough wall of exclusiveness and disregard. I got caught on the edge, battered and spun.
What's peculiar about an Eddy is this: it is caused by the Pool itself, in combination with edges that are not carefully tended. I mean, I didn't even know these people. It's not like I had been rejected by my best friend. They weren't even my only access to UUYAN. They were just another group in my district I was visiting out of curiosity.
A feeling of rejection, of being unseen or not belonging, that might otherwise be fairly mild or survivable can become a major trauma if it happens in relation to a Magic Pool. People can get spun and crushed. When we build a Magic Pool, we need to be careful of smoothing our boundaries, of seeing that people can enter and exit in spiritual safety. We need to keep an eye on issues of age, gender, race, class, identity, lifestyle, and newness, to make sure that potential rough spots don't combine with the force of our Magic and cause someone a major trauma.
And for those of us who have had them, we need space to talk about our Eddy experiences. People tend to:
And the Eddies can be dealt with, the boundaries smoothed, sometimes even with just a few words. The Eddies are mostly minor, compared to the Pool itself. But we do need to be aware of them, because people can get really hurt.
Idolatry
Idolatry is the sin of worshipping a false god, or of confusing an image of God, a physical idol, for God itself, of which the image is only an aspect, only a symbol.
If the Magic Pool is where we find divinity itself, then Idolatry is about confusing one particular image or aspect of the Magic Pool experience, for divinity or for the Pool itself.
So, for example, someone might decide that what made YRUU what it was, was how you could just tell people whatever was really on your mind, and then end up creating an UUYAN program that feels like some kind of therapy group. And when they notice that the Magic is not happening, the person would respond by trying to get people to be more and more revealing, as if self-exposure itself could make the Magic happen.
Common UUYAN idolatries:
It's true that these are part of the divine experience; but be careful you're not worshipping the wrong thing, something that is not the experience itself.
Addiction
Addiction is a kind of idolatry of the Magic Pool itself.
There are people who only come alive at conferences. The annual conference might be the only time all year that you feel like a person. The only time you get touched. The only time your soul is really present and you can feel like yourself. The only time you feel free. That is a powerful experience. And it's basically a good one.
But conference-addiction can cause a kind of "jonesing," a desperation, that can distort a person's best judgement. One problem I encounter with this is that UUYAN organizers can tend to confuse conference-addiction with conference leadership potential. They are not the same thing. Leadership is about service, not about hunger. Hunger and desperation can sometimes be channeled into a motivation to volunteer, but a volunteer is different than a responsible leader. Hunger is not a good motivation for leadership. It distorts judgement. We need to make sure our leaders are well fed, and that they are not trying on any level to eat us.
We also need to do what we can to make sure that our Magic is something that makes people's lives better, not just during the conference. We need to think about fostering strength, and not dependency. "Conference-addiction" in a way is just a joke. But I think many of us know at least one life for whom it is really not a joke.
Our Magic is wonderful, and it is powerful. May we do our best to serve it well.