‘What is Magik? Magik is the 90% of the brain that we don’t use. Reality is the other 10 percent. Magik is what’s in a child’s eye when he sees snow for the first time. Magik is what’s in an animal’s eye when it first begins to play with its kindred. It’s what’s in the eyes of two lovers when they exchange wedding vows. Magik is what clears all normality away. But just because we know about Magik doesn’t mean we can use it.’
– Heruka Dragonbane.
I was going to speak dryly about what I believe magic to be but I don’t feel so inclined for tonight’s blog. I love the definition that Dragonbane gives for magical thinking. I want to look at the night sky and see it for the first time with the wonder of a child. Without complaining of cold or rain, let me feel the weather on me without expectation. Let me see in each strange the potential friend and find magic and mystery in everything. Let it all be new. Let me feel renewed. Let me laugh and frolick and jump with my dogs and nephews and nieces and see every moment as adventure and see possibilities in every turn. I say all this and the universe replies ‘Go for It’
“The way you live your day is a sentence in the story of your life. Each day you make the choice whether the sentence ends with a period, question mark, or exclamation point.”
― Steve Maraboli
I believe that each minute brings choices, perhaps they are words in our life’s sentence. So many things call for our attention and so many people. We have only so much time and so many things to fill it with. Lately I can totally relate to the line in Peaceful Warrior that “there is never nothing going on”. The question is to what do we give our focus? This week I have been doing the big push to finishing the tarot pictures. As of tonight’s card, I have four left to go and I would really like to get a start on editing them and putting them in some form of book or set. Of course, my son just went back to school and there are a number of things that require attention there as well as house, partner, pets and friends both online and off. I find myself distractible at the best of times and this is incredible but still what sentence do I wish to write and how do I intend it to contribute to the whole story? When it comes down to it, people are more important than things so while I may limit my involvement with the outside world until I’m finished, I will still be there for loved ones. I can’t wait to see what the next paragraph will bring. 🙂
Blessings, G
“Today I am someone different. Today I have finally become who I really am.”
― C. JoyBell C.
I may have found a new daily affirmation. Each day , don’t we become even more who we really are? I mean, it is possible to delude ourselves more and more, build a house of cards made up of delusions but eventually and inevitably the cards collapse under the weight of the delusion until what we are left with is ourselves. How we react to this collapse and how adaptable we are to rebuilding is as good a litmus test of awareness as anything else I can think of. The more aware I become, the more I seek to trigger the collapse of my delusions so that I can shine through that much clearer. I love it when people show me my blind spots. Let me react emotionally and unreasonably so that I can see what triggered it and gain the gift.
Blessings, G
“The warrior who trusts his path doesn’t need to prove the other is wrong”
— Paulo Coelho
I have noticed a disturbing trend lately. People, who’s opinion I value and whom I think of as amazing spiritual beings interested in self-development have problems when they encounter someone who’s on a path that’s way different then the theirs. It’s as if by living my life a certain way I am challenging their sense of themselves. What makes this even more strange is that they see this as being a horrible thing to do and occasionally feel victimized by my stating my truth. I LOVE having my sense of self challenged and tested. Quite often it points out my blind spots and enables me to learn. By integrating someone else’s story with mine I can learn so much and often gain a lesson in compassion. If we fully live in our story and that includes not only the possibility of change but the inevitability of it as well, then we can face another’s story with pleasure even if it is wildly different. Do we only go to movies or read books that only show people similar to ourselves or do we go to for a brief time inhabit another world. Why would we condemn the world that we can enter through another’s eyes? Blessings, G
“Knowing your own darkness is the best method for dealing with the darknesses of other people.”
–Carl Jung
Who do you trust with your dark side? I want people to see me at my best and most positive. There are relatively few people I feel safe enough to show my shadow, my ignorance, my dark and negative side. Why? What am I afraid of ? If Jung is right, doesn’t it work in reverse, by showing other’s my darkness, I allow them to encounter their own shadow? My claim up to now is that I don’t wish to offend but in reality isn’t it that I have not yet found the courage to do so? Do I really have that much fear that mommy will slap me for saying the wrong thing?
It seems of late as if I have been given more and more pieces of myself. Not all of them are pretty
Blessings, G
“Magic lies in between things, between the day and the night, between yellow and blue, between any two things.”
— Charles de Lint
Live in the centre
All extremes lose their meanings
Perspective regained
I love in-between things. Dusk, Dawn, and noon and crossroads all enchant me. In between, life is neither like this or like that but partakes of something new totally its own. If I had my way, I’d stay at the centre always and be able to partake of all things offered rather than choose one to the exclusion of all other. All of the above without being greedy will always be my choice.
I wanted to understand
so I put on your pain shoes
and let you transmit your experience
direct to my being
You used words but I felt meaning
and while i tried to integrate
another’s excruciating existence
you kept on speaking
way beyond need
“I get it, I feel it”
but accustomed to ignorance
you continued…
If you would stop
I could rid us both
of this…
these shoes hurt my feet
and your memories my being
yet knowing this you continue
a litany of woes
the tale of everyone and anything
that you felt had done you wrong
beyond any forgiveness
I finally realized
you don’t want to lose your pain
you don’t wish understanding
and you hate me for presuming to help
How dare I try to take away what makes you real to yourself?
I smile sadly
as the shoes slip off….
Another mile in another’s moccasins…
Another mile in my own….
“A good traveler has no fixed plans and is not intent on arriving.”
– Lao Tzu
On the last leg of a rather nice trip in which I reconnected to family and learned to let go of expectations of arriving anywhere that I expected at the time that I’d expect. Yes, the return trip East to West has been as filled with schedule changes and overnight stops as the eastward journey has been. An interesting symmetry tho this one sustained by a week of memories of babies, dogs and sisters. I also feel in some ways I reconnected with elements of my past that I had let go.
Blessings, G
“White. A blank page of canvas. His favorite. So many possibilities.”
— Stephen Sondheim
The artist in me loves a blank white rectangle and its possibilities. The writer in me dreads it a little. Tho I have to admit that both of them attract me. I love living in the world of potential and possibility manifesting. Not that all possibilities or potentials are pleasant but as we live dynamic existances, change will happen and new potentials will pop up in turn. We can always paint our part of the canvas of our lives and start anew. If we can’t totally excise what was there originally, we can reduce it to a faint shadow, one that adds depth and shading to whatever will come.
Blessings, G
