The World is Full of Magic Things

It's wonderful knowing that there is more ahead of us, more to discover and more to enjoy.

Join Emily Brunner as she talks about how we can look forward to all of the wonderful things out there, just waiting for us.

Music: "On Brevity" by Josh Woodward

Transcript

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Hello and welcome to Philly Dances where we talk about ideas, events, and the amazing people that give us all inspiration as a part of Philadelphia's awesome dance community. I'm Emily and today I want to talk to you about magic. I love quotes. I love how an author can take a lifetime of knowledge and wisdom and condense it down into a single sentence. I love reading quotes because they're short. They don't take much time. It's a lot quicker to read a quote and think about the message than to read a whole novel. I came across a quote the other day by William Butler Yeats that really got me thinking and I wanted to share it with you guys here. I think it's really cool. So I hope you take a minute to listen to the quote and think about what it means for your life. Here it is."The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper." In addition to loving quotes. I also love the idea of magic. Now, I don't believe that we can cast spells on one another or you know, move things with our thoughts or turn lead into gold. I don't believe in any of that. I looked up the definition of magic and here's what I found. The definition of magic is the power of apparently influencing the course of events by using mysterious or supernatural forces. I'm going to choose to ignore the words"apparently" and"supernatural" because I only want to consider things that actually exist. I know I'm changing the definition a little bit, but I think that's okay. We're not completing a term paper here or taking the SATs, so for this discussion, that leaves us with a definition of the power of influencing the course of events by using mysterious forces. That's the kind of magic I love. Let's think a little bit about the first part of Yates quote that the world is full of magic things. I think that's wonderfully exciting. There are so many things in our lives that really, truly are mysterious. Think about all the things out there, the things that happen, the things that exist that that we really don't understand that we don't know why it happened. We don't know how it came to be. There's a lot of things like that and they get us curious. Things that are mysterious make us curious. There are so many things in our lives that really, truly are mysterious. The worlds orbiting all the stars in our sky. We can't see those worlds, let alone understand what's happening on them. Think about the way that six individual ingredients can get mixed together and come out with the amazing flavor and texture of fresh baked bread. How does that work? How does that happen? Or think about the moment where we hear something funny and it makes us laugh. What does that, what happens in our bodies that transforms words and thoughts into emotions and laughter? It's really cool to think about these things. They're, they're magic because they are under the influences of forces that are mysterious. Things that we don't quite understand. I love the idea that the world is full of things like this. It gives us a lot to look forward to. Right? The second part of Yates quote though is where the real beauty lies. The magic, the mystery in our world, it's there. It's there for us to experience and discover. It's just waiting. It's out there waiting for us. It's waiting for us to be ready to see it, to be ready to question what's, what is that? What's going on with that and to be ready to figure it out. Our growth through our lives and humanity's growth across generations brings us understanding about all the magic and mystery in our world. It's really a beautiful thing of which we all get to be a part. Isn't it wonderful that we always have magic in our lives, that we have all these discoveries out there just waiting for us to grow to a point where we can actually enjoy them. It shows me that it's never too late, that it's never over, that we always have something to look forward to. No matter how old we are, no matter how much we've learned, no matter how far we've gotten in our goals, there's always more out there. There's always something ahead of us to look forward to. For me, I've always felt that photography is one of the most magical things in my life. With my camera lens, I can change reality by manipulating light with my camera. I can stop time in a single image and being able to share my work with others, it allows me to show what I see with anyone. It's really cool and it absolutely feels like a magic power. You guys, you all have your own magic powers. Now again, it's not the power to turn your enemy into a warty frog, but, but you have magic in you. You have the ability to transform how somebody sees the world. You have the ability to make somebody feel when you're performing on stage, when you're dancing, you are taking that audience member and transporting them to somewhere else. You are making them feel things that they wouldn't have felt if they hadn't come to watch you perform. That's magic. That's powerful and it's important and you should be proud that you get to be a part of it. It's amazing that we all have things in our lives that give us the power to transform what we see, hear, and feel, and things that give us the power to change our world When we have our own magic, life is so beautiful.