Do You Believe in Magic?

Do you believe in magic?

I do.

A lot of people do, even though they won't admit it. Why?

I have a friend who is not only a professional stage magician but a student of occult and esoteric matters, as am I. Once, over coffee, he told me that many of the stage magic tricks that he performs on stage had their roots in the days when tribal shamans and medicine men and women held sway over their tribes. They would perform their slight of hand tricks in order to persuade their people that the really did have the powers that they claimed to have and that, when necessary, they also had the power to heal them when they were sick or retrieve their souls when they were lost.

We sneer at that today and denigrate the shamans for ‘fooling’ their people into thinking that they had powers that they hadn’t. But the shamans knew something that we have forgotten. They didn’t have magical power. The people did. And it was only when the people believed in the shaman’s power that the shaman was able to help them, so anything that bolstered their belief was considered good and useful.

The tribal shaman knew that it was the patient that held the magic. It was the patient that had to heal himself or herself. It was the patient who needed to do whatever it took to make the magic work. The shaman was only a guide who could do little but bolster the patient’s belief that the healing power existed.

Our reality is determined by what we believe. Because believing in something makes it real. When we expect to experience something, we experience it. If we expect to see spirits, we will see them. So we have to believe in the power of magic – and the power of love – in order to make it work in our lives.

We have a notion in our modern world that if something is ‘real’ that it should ‘work’ even if you don’t believe in it. After all, do you have to believe in calculus in order to get the ‘right’ answer?

I think you do. But belief is only the beginning. You must actually perform the calculations correctly in order to get the right answer. But you have to believe that if you perform the calculations properly – even if you don’t understand where they came from and how they work – that you will get the answer you need.

Magic is like that, and so is love. When we don’t understand how it works, we have to believe that it works. And it is this belief that allows us to do what we have to do in order to get results. Our belief in something, even if it seems irrational to others, allows us to do what we need to do in order to allow that power, whatever it is, to work in our lives. It sustains us when we can’t immediately see the outcome of our efforts.

So, when we are willing to believe, despite our so-called rational consciousness, that love and magic exists, then we are halfway to letting it work in our lives. The other half is doing whatever actions must be taken to attract it. Because when we believe, we will take action. Even with a placebo, the sugar pill must be taken before it will work.

By performing the proper action, taking the pill, lighting the candle, repeating the affirmation, whatever it is, we are declaring that we believe that the magic will come. And it does. As we will it to be, so it is.

However once it does, then we have to figure out what to do with it.

But that’s another story.