Magic

I have been reading two books this past week (okay, so I have been reading six books, but who’s counting?)  One is Bright-Sided by Barbara Ehrenreich (Macmillan) which is due out in October and the other is Why People Believe Weird Things by Michael Shermer (MJFBooks.) Both books examine our belief in magic of one kind or another. Ehrenreich looks at “the power of positive thinking.” Leaving aside the philosophical questions, she looks at the latest incarnation as embodied in The Secret by Byrne and the “Law of Attraction.” Both of which come down to getting everything you want by wishing really, really hard and insisting to yourself repeatedly that what you want will come to you. Why People Believe Weird Things goes farther afield, delving into aliens, witchcraft, paranormal experiences and cults. But in a larger sense both books are about magic.

I think most people want to believe in magic. They call it different things: miracles, luck, wizardry, the law of attraction. They (we, I ! ) want to believe that we are not imprisoned in this mundane life governed by logic and science. We want to believe that impossible things are possible if we only say the right words or think the right thoughts.  The world is full of amazing things. How else to explain those things than by magic?

The problems arise when you believe that you control the magic. An even bigger problem arises when other people believe that you control it. When the requested miracle fails to materialize, you are told that you didn’t pray hard enough or you didn’t go through the proper sequence of motions or you didn’t believe enough. And now the lack of a miracle is your own fault. But miracles are, by definition, rare.  If you look beneath the surface you find that the only people getting rich off this stuff are the people writing the books or leading the seminars.

I believe in magic; in the power of positive thinking. I believe in serendipity and luck. I choose to believe in these things, but mostly I believe in kindness. I tend to think that computers and television are magic. I believe that having a positive attitude is more enjoyable for everyone than being a curmudgeon. I believe that wonderful things can happen if you leave yourself open to them. And, clearly, someone wins the lottery. But I don’t believe that wishing will make these things come true. Maybe there are people who can levitate objects with their minds or tell the future (and maybe, someday, scientists will figure out why) but I am not one of them.  Ah, well.

I spend a lot of my time writing stories about magic and I hope that the stories are true on some level. But if you read the stories (not just mine, but all the magical stories) carefully, I think you will find that all of the (good) magic is derived from kindness. That is the kind of magic I believe in.