Remembering The Magic

Learning to bring the wonder of childhood into adult life

One of the saddest things in life is forgetting the magic. As children, everything is alive. Our curiosity for life knows no bounds, our fascination with the world runs wild.

Like the halls of my elementary school, whose ceilings seemed to stretch to the sky. To this day, I remember being five years old on my first day of school. I entered that little building with a sense of awe for the sights, the sounds, the smells I had never encountered before. It felt like another world. I felt like an explorer in previously undiscovered lands.

Now, at 24, I pass by the school and see how small it actually is. I see those same classrooms, those same hallways that once seemed to stretch on forever, and now they actually seem a bit cramped.

Is it that I got bigger or that my perception of the world got smaller? Probably a bit of both, but I think it’s more the latter.

As kids, the world is absolutely fresh and new to us. That newness allows us to experience the true magnitude of even the smallest things: a blade of grass, an ice cream cone on a hot summer night, or that elementary school classroom.

As adults, responsibility sets in. Bills add up. Life begins demanding more of you. Suddenly, those simple experiences which used to feel profound are now overlaid with anxieties about the future and disturbances from the past. You can’t hear the music with that same depth, you can’t see that blade of grass with that same clarity. Our stressful thoughts drown out the richness of our sensory experiences. Life feels a little more blurry, and a little narrower than it used to.

But it doesn’t have to stay that way. Childhood is a reminder of what is possible, and it’s important that we never forget that we all experienced that magic at one point or another, even if life has been difficult for you. And we all experience that wonder in some form or another now.

Maybe it’s a moment of shared laughter with friends, a harmonious dinner with family, a bonfire on the beach. Maybe it’s only a moment of relief from a stressful day as a bluebird flies across your face on a warm summer evening. The point is, in that moment, you’re there. You’re back in that place that you were when you were a child. It is experiential proof that there is magic in life.

But adult responsibility is not the antithesis of that magic. The aim of adult life is not to abdicate responsibility and seek a life of pleasure. In my experience, that can be fun for a while but ultimately leads to even more dullness.

No, the aim is to integrate that experience of wonder with your real, adult life. Growing up doesn’t mean you have to become stiff and rigid. It provides the opportunity to get better at living life. To get so good at living that you can hold responsibility not as a burden, but as a privilege. To live in such a way that wonder becomes more and more a part of your daily experience.

And how does one do that?

Recognize when you’re there.

When there’s no conflict at the dinner table, notice that. When a moment of unexpected calm arises, notice that. When that bluebird flies across your face, notice that. Maybe it was pure coincidence. But maybe you did something right, which contributed to this sudden re-entry into childhood. And if you could figure out what you did right, maybe you could do that again. How much of your life could you change, just by noticing what’s going right? It’s not a small thing. It happens in small steps, but it’s not a small thing.

It’s easy to get jaded and cynical once the “real world” hits, and some people have good reason to be angry with the world. But staying there forever won’t help you, or anyone around you. Just remember, the wonder you experienced in childhood wasn’t naiveté. Naiveté is believing that the wonder you experienced wasn’t real.

Thanks for reading and have a great day,

Max :)