The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.
W.B. Yeats
Some time ago, someone told me that magic doesn’t exist. What about sunsets? That feeling in the summer, when it’s hot-hot-hot and then finally it rains? Or love? What about love? I said. And they told me that these things weren’t magic at all. We know how it’s done. Love is just a chemical reaction. Rain is precipitation. Sunsets are reflected light. And you don’t see the magic in that? ‘Of course not. What you’re describing is magical thinking,’ they said.
Most people don’t believe in magic, but they may still wish for a good outcome by knocking on wood. Magical thinking—the need to believe that one’s hopes and desires can have an effect on how the world turns—is everywhere. Spirits, ghosts, patterns, and signs seem to be everywhere, especially if you look for them. People tend to make connections between mystical thinking and real-life events, even when it’s not rational. Of course, some of this is animistic thinking, with the belief that the supernatural is everywhere and has some power over what happens in people’s lives. There is some comfort in thinking that someone or something is pulling all the cosmic strings.
Psychology Today
By this definition, all religion is nothing but “magical thinking”. Faith. Hope. Kismet. Karma. Serendipity. All of it reduced to nothing more than superstitious mumbo jumbo. Unscientific nonsense to comfort us in hard times. Of no real value, let alone validity.
But does nobody else see the flaw in this logic?
I don’t know which system of belief, which religion or spiritual path, is “correct”. In truth, no-one does. Maybe the answer is all and none. I do know that our ancestors had belief before they had words to describe it. I know that science, while wonderful, cannot explain everything – yet. And, most of all, I know that the word “magic” used to mean something quite different.
For we used to exist in an enchanted landscape. A landscape of poetical awe and imagination. Stories. Dreams. Fae Folk and goblins. A shared understanding of our connectedness, our rootedness, which linked us to place. For the place was as alive as we were. As important and valued as our short and fragile human lives. We understood who we were and where we belonged because of magic. It was healing, too. For the antidote to fear is awe. The cure for antipathy is beauty. The cure for loneliness is connection.
And then…
We forgot…
So why does magic matter? It matters because it is in the magic that we find meaning. It matters because our planet sickens beneath the delusions we hold of our own omnipotence and grandeur. We forgot how to belong. It matters because, despite living in the most peaceful and prosperous time in history, we’re miserable. We exist in a constant state of anxiety, oscillating between depression / fear / numbness / anger. Increasingly hopeless. And our mental feeds our physical ailments.
It matters because truth matters. And, just like Yeats, I too know that magic exists.
Once Upon A Dandelion Dream 