Is it possible, do you think, that if we are opening up to the magic and enchantment around us, our awareness of everything is heightened? Isn’t it possible that once the door is open, it is open to everything?

It is true that once the decision has been made to find enchantment, it is always easily found. But just as we’re looking for a lost set of keys and we come upon that IRS bill we forgot to mail, other things come into view.

So the question then is not necessarily about enchantment versus all that isn’t. It’s about perception.

Can you see it all? Can you experience the tiny butterfly landing lightly on a delicate branch with the same awareness as watching the vulture cleaning up a dead squirrel?

Buddhists believe there must be good and bad. You cannot know good without having first experienced bad. There must be a frame of reference. They are equally part of life and they are relational, which is to say, it depends on the perception of the individual.

It is about taking the good with the bad and being okay with either.

As a young child mud is every bit as magical as a kitten.  Enchantment is about returning to that child-like nature; experiencing everything with curiosity. In the natural world a butterfly is no better than a vulture, the acts they commit are received the same.

As humans we have the ability to discern with emotion, allowing us to ascribe human-like qualities to animals and inanimate objects and assign what is good or bad. This can lead us to perceive situations as good as someone else has the opposite experience.

So if we are opening up to all that is around us through the lens of magic we cannot discard something because it displeases us. We must look further, deeper into the maw of perceived darkness. There is always a light, there is always an upside. Sometimes it’s just being aware that our own awareness is expanding.

It is a process, this awakening to all that is. The rawness of newness. The work is in not abandoning the process. Don’t close your eyes to avoid seeing, simply turn your head and look somewhere else. Eventually you will turn your head all the way around, once more taking in the vulture and the squirrel. It is at that point you can appreciate it all. You can thank the giant majestic bird for doing what we as  civilized humas, disconnected from nature, cannot fathom doing. Accept it all, take your time with it. Wonder about it. It’s all magic.

[Photo: What’s your perception?]