How To Find That Spark of Magic Again in the New Year
Last year you worked hard, turned a year older, but somewhere along the way the excitement of life turned cold.
Christmas morning the house was quiet and the air outside was cold. That festive sleepytime feeling was quickly disrupted when my youngest brother raced into the tree-lit living room like a bat out of hell. Those who were once sleeping were wide awake now as the shriek of Christmas Spirit shattered the silence.
As we got up and moving, mom blared Christmas music to sprinkle extra cheer and our house resembled that of a classic Holiday movie. Gifts were passed, videos taken, and everyone laughed. Everything was perfect…
Except it wasn’t.
I sat quietly on the couch and opened my present. A suitcase. Now I really am an adult. I thanked my mom then sat back to watch everyone else in the family like I was observing them through the window from the front yard. My brother had that glowing youth and fire in his eyes (you know the one, and perhaps it’s the one you and I haven’t seen in ourselves in a long time). He then proceeded to rip open countless amounts of festive wrapping paper and throw it in every direction without a care in the world. Such carelessness.
Like those commercials you see before Christmas, he ripped open boxes that contained all the latest Nerf guns and proceeded to pepper the living room with foam darts. Lamp shades got knocked over and furniture was used as bunkers to hide behind. The living room was a war zone. One that adults begged to escape from with their lives—their precious, boring lives.
It was then, I noticed what was missing. The feeling punched me in the gut as it told me to wake up, take arms, and support my brother as he entered the bloodiest pretend battle of his short life. He was screaming with such fury as he attacked us in every direction and my gut told me he needed reinforcements. I needed to be in on the pretend magic he was weaving throughout the house.
Forgetting the Magic
Growing up, I remember waiting for the holidays to approach with such anticipation that I felt I would implode if I had to wait another minute. To me, the holidays were more than just regular days of the week, but a time when everything slows down and there’s magic in the air. As kids, we imagine the impossible, aspire to be a million things, and look for awesomeness in everything. The holiday season brings it all together in a single marathon of awestruck wonder.
As adults, we all talk about how there’s magic during the season, but for so many of us, the magic isn’t there anymore.
This last Christmas reflected my entire year, and may have been a reflection of your year too. Disappointment. Often we find ourselves trapped in the rush of modern society and the age old adage of “growing up.”
All year, we wake up and look at our clock, waiting/dreading the minute we have to get up out of bed and get ready for a long day at the office/school. We routinely say bye to our loved ones (or pet) and rush off to a day that repeats itself. When there’s a second to spare, we look down at our phone for short term mind numbing and call it a day. We forget to slow down. We forget to play. We forget to wonder.
Our thoughts instead revolve around how we can work harder, study better, or be more prepared for something we seldom enjoy.
In today’s society, independence and workforce success is bred into us at such a young age. It becomes the key driver in a life of “importance” and is forced upon us as we grow. We can end up settling for a school or university to get an education, so we can get a job we don’t necessarily like in order to pay the bills. Like the dream you want to remember upon waking, the sweet new bike we never got, or that song we never write, our goals and dreams disappear into the shadows of what they could have been.
“Don’t lose your Dinosaur.”
That’s the speech Mr. Doback gives his grown up children in the movie Step Brothers. In the film, he explains that his childhood dream was to be a dinosaur, but everyone told him it was impossible. Explaining how he lost his way, it inspires Will Ferrell and John C.Reilly’s characters to put it all on the line with a musical performance, resulting in the epic triumph for the brothers. As wacky as wanting to become a dinosaur is, that speech rang true for many of us who saw the movie. Perhaps there’s more wisdom in that silly comedy than what was intended.
I can remember my “dinosaur” and I bet you can too. Growing up, I wanted to be a rockstar. I wanted to jump around on stage like the musicians I had aspirations of becoming. I wanted to move audiences with something I created. I wanted to do the impossible, and not just admire it from afar. Each day I would play out the concert in my head: “I would say this one line and the crowd would go wild!” There would be applause as I yelled my entire imaginative concert into a microphone over and over. I would hit the road with my best friends and see places I’d never seen.
But somewhere along the way, I lost my dinosaur.
All the magic and wonder wasn’t apart of my life anymore as I focused on “growing up”.
Maybe this year, we all need to find our dinosaur again. Maybe you need to write that song you intended to write, but have let work get in the way. Maybe you need to take some time away from the endless scrolling on Facebook and build that fort for your kid that you always wanted your dad to build. Maybe one day you can hike that trail and be the explorer you always dreamed you would be.
I know we can’t all up and leave our jobs or school to make a dream of becoming a rockstar happen, so perhaps we attempt to shift priorities. My New Year's Resolution isn’t a diet, an exercise plan, chasing after a pay raise, or even becoming a rockstar.
Instead, it will be to prepare.
By next Christmas, I plan to acquire all the Nerf guns and darts my bedroom armory can hold. That way I can be on the front lines with my little brother, leading him into the fiercest imaginary battle either of us have seen.
Maybe then I will recapture the magic, and have found my dinosaur.
Like the writing at HeartSupport? Clap for this piece! Then follow our publication to support free articles and get notified of our latest releases.
