The most memorable aspect of the film, The NeverEnding Story, is The Nothing. The impersonal villain of unbridled chaos, indiscriminately reclaiming matter from pattern, returning all to the infinite void.

The Nothing represents despair, sorrow, confusion, limitation, anger, resentment, hate, doubt, lack, fear. Sound familiar? It’s the all-consuming dark force that tries to influence, program and corrupt us at our very core if we don’t know our true selves. The bully that tells us to take our head out of the clouds and stop dreaming, threatening our creativity, our sovereignty, our ability to feel and love.

As Gmork, emissary of The Nothing plainly stated, “People who have no hope are easy to control. And whoever has control, has the power.”

*Cue lightning strike*

The Nothing triggers our primal fear of death and obliteration. Our absolute loss of control.

Humanity fears death, but humanity doesn’t die. We carry on. Civilizations rise and fall. The precession continues. Life is created as above, so below. Secrets are eventually uncovered. Truths are revealed. Songs are sung. Through it all, humanity is the unfolding creation that is the foil to The Nothing. We are a never ending story.

The Nothing helps us to understand this distilled truth of our own nature, as our co-creator.

In the film, The Nothing created heroes. It brought together an unlikely group that became friends with a common goal. They helped one another succeed because of their shared belief and their unique, individual differences, not despite them.

The Nothing destroyed all but one grain of Fantasia, and from that grain, the whole world was restored, free of the doubt and darkness of The Nothing.

We can understand and accept The Nothing for the alchemical role that it plays as a catalyst in our lives, revealing our strengths and inspiring us to refine our own focused potential as creators.

Order from chaos. Destruction and rebirth. Like the ancient serpentine symbols of Olde, but, that’s another story…