Jill's blog: Disenchantment

Does life get less enchanting as you get older? Or is it just that you forget where to find the magic?

Childhood lends itself quite well to magic. Everything in the world has the potential for excitement and mystery, joy and discovery. Each new experience and activity is to be explored and taken in with wide-eyed wonder. Which leaves me wondering, at what point does that fade?

I suppose it’s different for everyone. Some lose it sooner, some much later in adolescence, some are never fortunate enough to have the security to experience it.

In a previous WorkLife Central webinar, Pinky Jangra shared the message that “Imagination is not just for kids. It is your tool for creation.” Could this be part of the key to keeping life enchanting?

When I was young, my mother would never confirm the existence of Santa Clause. There was never the comment that “Santa is watching” because she didn’t want to lie to us. Didn’t want us to grow up resenting her because she let us believe Santa Clause is real. Needless to say, from a very young age I knew that Christmas was down to Mom and Dad.

When my sons were born, I thought I would want to raise them the same. Neither confirm nor deny the existence of Santa and just let them make up their own mind. Then I started to wonder if I was stripping away some of the magic from childhood. You have such a short window when you naturally suspend disbelief, before the scepticism and rational thinking kicks in. Not only do I want to allow them to be free and safe to believe, I want to foster the process and inspiration of magic and imagination.

The way that I attempt to do this is, when they query how Santa can fit down the chimney, I ask them how they think he does it. How do you think he gets around the entire world in one night? What do you think makes the reindeer fly? The ideas they come up with is better than any answer I could have given them, and it leads to some fun and interesting conversations. This allows them to indulge in the magic and mystery reserved for childhood.

But perhaps this also allows me to relive the magic and enchantment. Perhaps it is through the eyes of children that we remember and reconnect with the excitement, mystery, joy and discovery of life. Since having kids, I have certainly had to learn to remember the love of the simple things. The magic of make-believe. The fun and joy of small moments. That all adventures can be big adventures if you are with the right people and look at it the right way.

Yes, this will change over time. For them and for me. I can already see my 7-year-old grappling with the idea that Santa does not make sense. He will say he does not believe it’s possible, tell his younger brother it’s just Mom and Dad. (Yet I firmly believe that he still wants to hold onto the illusion as he always comes back to the fact that ‘maybe Santa is just magic.’)

Imagination does not have to end because you grow up. Nor should it. Because it is the basis for creativity, and creativity is not just for the creative arts. You use it in everyday life. Problem solving is a creative exercise. Meal planning is a creative exercise. And I’m betting, no matter your job, there will be elements of the creative process within. Rather than take this skill of imagination and creativity away from my children and worrying about them hating me for lying to them about magic, it should be developed. It should be encouraged and built upon so that when they grow up they can still see magic in the world.

We all need to see a bit of magic from time to time. Otherwise, we are left with pure reality and who really wants that?

Jill is an American ex-pat living her best English life on the border of London and Surrey. She spends her days pretending she knows what she’s doing, creating some fun things along the way. With a passion for storytelling and the gumption of a New Yorker, she’s raising two cheeky, clever boys with deep imaginations and an annoyingly cunning use of language. With a husband, cat and hamster along for the ride, life is never boring. Even if sometimes a bit too stressful.