Do We Learn To Filter Out Magic?
Magic has surfaced as a theme for the writers taking my latest Story Circle On-line writing adventure: Grab Life By The Writing Gusto.
I believe Magic exists, we just learn to filter it out on our slog to the “Real World,” which of course is anything but real. Truth continues to be stranger than fiction, so I’m not sure why we continue to train the young for the real world when that’s not in our best self-interest.
Someone said to me that the title for my class wasn’t possible, that you couldn’t grab life by the writing gusto.
Why not? That’s how ingrained folks are to sort everything into real and not real.
I grabbed my own life by the writing gusto, so if it’s impossible then it’s just more evidence that magic exists because I managed to do it.
I’m all for encouraging kids to see magic everywhere they wish to see it!
Whenever the wind blows, I feel magic ripple across my face. In fact, whenever I surround myself with nature, I feel the power of magic surround me.
It saddens me that children spend less and less time engulfed in the world of nature, which is all magic. The more facts and figures that we pump into children’s heads the less room they’ll have for magic and possibility.
And that affects our ability to create a new, healthy economy.
My early childhood brimmed with magic. I sometimes saw things that adults couldn’t see anymore. The summer I dug to China, I put my head down into the hole I’d been digging and saw upside folks wearing straw hats. I know I saw it. Another time, I dug up some jewels. I put the sparkling find in my room in a ceramic pot and someone named the King came and took them. I know he did.
One of my writing participants suggested I read a children’s book called, Tom’s Midnight Garden by English author Philippa Pearce.
I can’t put it down.
Fantastic writing and the story has me hooked. Without giving the plot away, I can tell you that Tom goes to live with his aunt and uncle because his brother has the measles. The aunt and uncle live in an old Victorian that’s been subdivided into flats. Tom’s bored. Nothing to do. No back yard. Overprotective relatives.
Then one night Tom hears the massive grandfather clock in the foyer strikes 13. The author surprises me with what happens after that. Smart, clever, vibrant writing. Here’s my favorite line from the book so far, “There is a time, between night and day when landscapes sleep.”
Philippa weaves a story filled with magic. I got so pumped up from the book, I bought a copy of Summer Magic. a movie starring Haley Mills, my childhood icon who also starred in Pollyanna.Any one who has seen Pollyanna can never forget the lamp with the prisms hanging from it next to her bed. I tried for years as an adult to find the same lamp. Haven’t been successful yet. In Summer Magic she inhabits the character she often plays in her films, a young, exuberant girl who believes in possibilities. The Boston family loses most of their money, but Haley writes a letter to the owner of “the yellow house” in Maine and they end up moving to this small little town surrounded by nature. She continues to believe everything is possible to the point everyone else around her starts to as well. In the end, everyone seems to transform. It reminded me how much I loved the TV shows Bewitched and I Dream of Jeannie.
Here’s my question for you. Do you believe we filter out magic, pushing children toward the real world, a place that may not exist or may not be good for humans? Or am I off the realistic mark?
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jiulietta,
Absolutely most people & organizations filter out magic. Part of the spiritual path for me is learning or relearning to believe in magic, in goodness, in the unseen, in possibility.
Good for you to live, work & write about magic. I might have to borrow this topic for my blog!I’ve already been inspired by your blog & the idea of a muse,so I use that label for myself at times.
Thanks,Brad
Dream on!
Hi Brad,
I’m glad you like the idea of revitalizing magic. Please borrow it for you blog. The more folks that talk about it, the more we can revive it. I’m honored that you’ve been inspired by Take Back Your Life! Enjoy, G.
I missed children’s literature as a kid, a function of my English teacher dad and his desire to have me reading Hemmingway by grade one. In uni I tried to make up for it by taking a Chi Lit class. Tom’s Midnight Garden was on the reading list and was, by a mile, my favorite. So much so that I couldn’t get what the big deal was about A Wrinkle in Time. Tom’s was sooo much better.
I admit that I lost my grasp on practical magic somewhere in the process of trying to act like an adult. It’s coming back now though, with some help from a special friend who managed to never let it go. It’s fun to know that the magic never went anywhere – it was all my intentional obtuseness. Finding it again is almost more fun than holding it in the first place.
Hi Michael,
Fascinating that you were reading the literary greats in elementary school! I now understand where you got your terrific command of the English language.
I’m not surprised you love Tom’s Midnight Garden – I can’t put it down. Like Tom, I don’t want the Midnight Garden to end. I just checked at the BBC did several mini-series versions of it. The 1989 one looks like the one to watch.
Yes, it’s a lot of fun to wake up our inner magician! See you … G.
There are some wonderful magical books written for adults. Sara Addison Allen has written several: The Peach Keeper, Garden Spells, & The Girl Who Chased the Moon. All of Alice Hoffman’s books are magical. Neil Gaiman weaves magical tales both for children and adults.
These are some of my favorite authors. I seek out stories that have an element of magic woven into either the characters, the plot or the setting.
Right now, I’m reading the Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton. This novel has mystery and adventure throughout the intricate plot.
Magic makes reading a remarkable experience. Of course, in addition to enjoying magical novels, I also know that fairies inhabit my garden and angels protect me from harm.
Janet, these books sound great. I will get some of them out of the library. Glad you’ve got fairies and angels protecting you. Maybe, we learn to filter them out as well? thanks, g.
I realized that I never really answered your question. “Do we learn to filter out magic?” Personally, I think the filter comes from the way our brains are structured. In order to survive in business, we have to use the left side of our brains more in order to be analytical. It’s difficult to use both left and right hemispheres equally when challenged to be competitive. Creativity ( and it’s Muses) is not taken seriously by the business domain. It would be fun to watch a garden fairy at work in an investment firm or an accounting office ;-0
It’s so sad that it has to be either/or, because the garden fairy would certainly introduce a new perspective to accounting…hmmm.
Janet, I went to your site and love your doodles. Will leave a comment.
You are so creative with your business ideas – a garden fairy in an investment firm would be so cool. I bet she’d straighten those folks out so they don’t crash the market again.
Have you been to my Fearless Design site? It’s about bringing our true selves to the work place. I’ve done it and it increased my business! Let’s get more fairies into the work place. It will improve things.
thanks for these wonderful comments!
G.
Giuletta,
Thank you for writing this! Magic is a big part of my personal and literary lives, and 2012 will see me bring it into my professional life as well. It is high time that we stop shutting the magic out. Our lives can be so much richer and more balanced if we let it in!
Thank you for this post and for the wonderful book recommendations from you & your readers. I just purchased Tom’s Midnight Garden as an audio book and can’t wait to begin listening.
Recommendations of my own to add to those already listed:
The Orphan’s Tales: In the Night Garden by Cathrynne M. Valente
Anything by Charles DeLint
Thank you!
🙂
Jamie,
I’m happy you found me! Yes, let’s stop shutting magic out. We need more of it!
You’ll love Tom’s Midnight Garden. Lush, lovely, lingering.
The Orphan’s Tales: In The Night Garden sounds so good I will order it.
So many magical stories seem to happen in and around gardens. That’s interesting in and of itself.
Will stop by your site … Thanks, G.
I do not think the real world is good for humans. This I know for sure. So I think you’re right on the mark. Thanks for being a brave promoter of and advocate for magic.
Hi Angie,
Great to see you back here. The magic must have reached you! Humans are magical. To divorce ourselves from that makes us crazy.
Thanks! G.
> Tom’s Midnight Garden
Now you’ve got me intrigued and I’d like to check it out.
J.D., It’s a hard book to put down!
g.
i felt my pulse quicken as i followed your words to a magical space……more please!
i teeter totter between real and magic with the real often winning. why? when i get to set the rules?
thank you for the inspiration. i will make a magic today.
Pia,
Wonderful to see you here! Yes, you set the rules … enjoy your magical day. Thank for stopping in.
G.