Finding the Mystical and Magical in Everyday Life
January 15th, 2008 |written by Jeanine Austin, Ph.D.
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I saw a commercial today that made me laugh aloud. A man was beginning his day while a chorus of exuberant, if not completely over-the-top dancers, sang his day’s praises. The man walked outside, admired his beautiful home and smiled happily at his steaming coffee. Suddenly, a giant tree branch fell on his car and completely crushed it.
Many of us have had the feeling of the magical in life and then something happens and we completely lose our mojo. Just like that, the ordinary, mundane and unpleasant has returned to be the focal point of our experience.
On the other hand, most of us can also relate to the feeling of the magical; suddenly our ordinary life takes on extra-ordinary qualities. Unfortunately, these experiences are often fleeting.
Just the other night I was taking out the trash and looked up at the full moon. I had an overwhelming feeling of connection, hope, and appreciation. It seemed as if something so impossibly beautiful was hung there only to communicate those feelings to me.
Not soon after returning inside the house, the feeling of connection to the mystical and magical was gone and forgotten. I was back to clipping children’s toenails, making lunches for the next day, emptying and loading the dishwasher, picking wet towels off the floor and putting Spiderman Band-Aids on boo-boos.
Sometimes these experiences of feeling connected to the mystical last slightly longer. Most of us are familiar with the feeling of falling in love. Our lover’s voice and touch transport us to another world where everything is alive, awakened and magical. The limits we once perceived for our lives seem to wash away and we bask in the appreciation of everything about our beloved. All the synchronicities and the shared experiences seem magical and mystical. While this is amazing time in our life, for whatever reason, it doesn’t seem to last. For most people the goose pimply early stage of coupling is gone by the second year.
Most of us relate certain types of experiences to the mystical and magical while other experiences to the mundane and non-extraordinary. We may feel that a sunny seaside hide-away in Puerta Vallarta, Mexico is magical while a business trip in winter is undesirable. We may think a shopping spree to Dolce and Gabbana is magical while a new outfit purchased from Target is routine. Similarly, basking in a rose filled garden may seem magical but mowing the lawn may seem drudgery. We may think of life without our departing beloved as unbearable. How can we find the mystical and magical when he seems to have taken those possibilities with him?
The adage, “Happiness is not a destination, it is the journey” applies to accessing the mystical and magical as well. Mystical and magical experiences don’t happen to us, we choose them. We don’t have to wait until we go somewhere, fall in love, or appreciate something beautiful. At any given moment, the mystical and magical are there for us to appreciate.
The book A Course in Miracles discuses miracles as being shifts in perceptions. In keeping with this concept, if we open our hearts and minds, we begin to see our ordinary, temporal experiences, from of a perspective of the divine. We can decide that we will perceive our world as much as possible from this vantage point.
People who are enlightened may truly understand what it means to see the entire world as divine. An awakened individual would say that there really is no difference between a trip to Muleshoe and a trip to Tuscany. They describe the magical and mystical as not separate from the ordinary. Some may describe this perspective as a “one taste” experience. In other words, every taste or experience is one with the divine.
In order to experience more mystical and magical elements in life we may choose to see our lives as inherently mystical and magical. Those of us who desire more mystical and magical elements in our lives may deliberately decide that whatever our dharma is, we will commit to seeing all of our life’s elements and nuances as divine, beautiful, mystical and magical; even when a tree branch crushes our car.
©Copyright 2008 Jeanine Austin, Ph.D. All Rights Reserved. Permission to publish granted to GoodTherapy.org. The following article was solely written and edited by the author named above. The views and opinions expressed are not necessarily shared by GoodTherapy.org. Questions or concerns about the following article can be directed to the author or posted as a comment to this blog entry. Click here to contact Jeanine and/or see her GoodTherapy.org Profile
January 16th, 2008 at 7:14 am
It has indeed always seemed to me that these sorts of experiences happen to us. It is marvelous to think that we can create them ourselves. I think it takes a lot of energy, but it must be worth it in the end. What kind of self talk can we use when encountering the ordinary to turn our perception of it into something extraordinary? I like this idea and will be thinking about it more in the days to come.
January 16th, 2008 at 7:16 am
While it is a nice thought, I’m not buying it! I have had what I consider to be mountain top periods in my life. They have usually lasted a year or so. They tend to be linked with an awakening to a way of thinking I hadn’t had before; a new look on the world. But, they never just simply came. They were always followed by a climatic event. One that comes to mind was a horrendous beach trip with family. I saw things in a way I hadn’t seen before. Though some of the times following the event were tough, I had a new sense of my self and my surroundings. If I could recreate that experience just by willing myself to see the ordinary as extraordinary, I’d do it in a heart beat!
January 16th, 2008 at 7:19 am
Gary, I think that is where the enlightenment part comes in. It does seem that you did go through an enlightening time. The key to true enlightenment, though, is being able to maintain this state of awareness. You have to train your senses to always be perceiving something more than they have before. This definitely takes years of work and training. It is, as Johnson stated, a lot of effort. Even getting to enlightenment is a fascinating journey that is well worth all of the time and energy.
January 16th, 2008 at 7:22 am
These threads remind me of something that hit me like a bolt of lightening some years ago. I’ve always struggled with over eating when I’m stressed or bored. Every once in awhile, though, I get it together and am able to lose weight. The thought that hit me was that I thought losing weight was something that happened to me and not something that is even possible to create for myself. It was certainly a lightbulb moment for me. I was able to see something mundane as my view on weight control as something magical and mystical for so long. Once I realized this underlying assumption I had, though, all the magic was gone! So sometimes enlightenment can demystify something rather than make something magical.
January 23rd, 2008 at 2:50 pm
Everyday life can be mystical and magical if we have the right state of mind to embrace it. Life is all perception based. Its like faith, you choose to have it, you choose to see your deity in the little or large things of this world. The choice or the faith is harder for some to come by–others eaiser.
February 20th, 2008 at 7:36 pm
Thanks everybody for taking the time to write your comments. I love the exchange between Gary and Eitel! Wonderful!
Warmly,
Jeanine Austin, Ph.D.