Most of the time, the phrase is, “it’s time to get back to work.” This means it’s time to stop being creative, stop dancing with possibility, stop acquiring new insights and inspiration – and go back to the measurable grind instead. Maybe we’d be better off saying, “I need to get back to making magic.” Because that’s what we’d actually like to be getting paid to create.**
Seth Godin

As much as we love Harry Potter,
We now this saga’s magic isn’t to be found in the spells and incantations
of witches and wizards,
But in the love of family and friends,
The courage to keep going against overwhelming odds,
In spite of all our limitations,
And, yes,
Facing our own death,
The ultimate limitation.

There’s a kind of alchemy that occurs
when we are prepared to live within our story,
As Donald Miller encourages here:

The heroic transformation begins when the hero takes responsibility for their life and for their story. The hero becomes the hero only when they decide to accept the facts of their life and respond with courage.^

Again, this time from Lewis Hyde,
A suggestion that something magical is possible through our lives:

because world and body are meant to pattern one another, when [the trickster] reimagines his body he imagines the world^^.

Magic is possible where we are when we are
who we are;
Here is Joseph Campbell touching upon this:

To claim the land.  To turn the land where they lived into a place of spiritual relevance. […] One should find the symbol in the landscape itself of the energies of the life there.  The is what all traditions do.  They sanctify their own landscape.⁺ 

We may want someone else’s story,
But really,
The very best place to begin is within our own story;
The facts of life are not how we were made,
But where we are right now,
However difficult a place this might be:

Being able to perform becomes the critical issue: Competence is the best defence against the helplessness of trauma.*^

Magic is moving our lives toward the future,
Transforming our stories.
Yes, there will be a lot of sweat and tears,
Failing and persevering,
But amongst these, there’ll be moments that can only be described as
magical.

For our purposes today,
The opposite of magic is tragic,
Not allowing ourselves and others to believe there will be moments of
wonder and amazement that are the result of their imagination and creativity.

For me to be a saint means to be myself. Therefore the problem of sanctity and salvation is a problem of finding out who I am and of discovering my true self.^*

*Thank you to Queen for the title;
**Seth Godin’s blog: Time to get back to magic;
^Donald Miller’s Hero On a Mission;
^^Lewis Hyde’s Trickster Makes This World;
⁺Joseph Campbell and Bill Moyers’ The Power of Myth;
*^Bessel van der Kolk’s The Body Keeps the Score;
^*Thomas Merton, from Ian Morgan Cron and Suzanne Stabile’s The Road Back to You.