Hello you delightful Ray of Sunshine ☀️
If your year has been anything like mine, it’s been a rollercoaster… not the type I want to have another go on.
One of the bugbears that has been twerking continually at me this year has been “lying” - well, not JUST lying (bad enough!) but the kind of lying where a human convinces themself that Their Lie (proven) is The Truth, and then sets their hat to Convincing Everyone Else. My Granny used to say the first person you lie to when you lie, is yourself, and boy was she right.
Someone being convinced of their Rightness, even in the face of evidence to the contrary, took me some time to get my head around - especially as I had a well practiced discipline of assuming my Wrongness for EVERYthing (the weather, things going missing when I’m not there, all the people and all their emotions… ).
Spoiler: if you’re communicating with someone like this and your bespoke flavour of survival strategy includes “fixing everything to manage other peoples emotions so that I feel more safe” you’re likely to do a shed load of overcompensating for imagined deficiencies, and hoovering up responsibilities that are simply not yours.
So I’ve been thinking about the act of lying, and about beliefs, a lot.
A few days ago I was challenged by a dear friend on my “Santa Position”. I never spoke of Santa, I avoided the conversations around Christmas magic, I struggled through familiar singsongs that told Santa stories. I refused to lie to my children. How could they possibly trust me if from Day 1 I lie?
She looked somewhat sadly at me, then at the toddler behind me (not mine), so excitedly glimmering at a Santa helium balloon.
“But what about the joy they get - from the magic?”
Something in her words hit home, but I wasn’t sure what.
This had been my “Santa Position” for some time now. Was I changing my mind? No, I still had the value of truth… was it worth the compromise????
I chewed on it for a while… then had the clanging realisation that the reason I wouldn’t talk to my kids about Santa, was never about the Santa bit.
I never wanted to tell my children that magic “wasn’t real”, and they didn’t have access to it.
So I bypassed the entire thing.
I told myself it was because I didn’t want to lie… but actually it was because I believe in magic.
I believe every act is a magical act, intentional or not, and as each of these acts is motivated by a thought, a belief, then we have a responsibility to believe in better - so “better” can work its magic.
Because those old corny films have something to them.
Things are only possible when people believe they are.
Sounds fluffy, right? That “magic” and “believing in better” can make things better?
It’s not.
It’s the most bona fide obvious thing in the world, when you really see it.
Christmas is a great example: it only happens because enough people believe it should.
Businesses shut (often regardless of whether they are practicing Christian businesses or not).
Shops play Christmas jingles and start marketing their preferred version of tat, months before the agreed date of belief.
Family plan to gather, travel costs go up exponentially to profit from this…
The whole world reflects this belief in Christmas back to us through movies, adverts, Christmas number one’s because… Belief.
Tradition, is accepted belief. The more people believe in something (eg “God”) the more acceptable it is to believe in it.
The less people believe in something (eg “magic”) the more dismissed, marginalised and discredited the people are, who believe in it.
Even when they are describing the same thing.
So broaden this out.
What if no-one believed in… justice, human rights, the possibility of better?
Without that belief there would be no magical acts in the direction of these beliefs becoming reality.
Belief in something drives the behaviour of it becoming reality.
If you are marginalised as “woo”, you may describe the above as manifestation.
If you are venerated as a scientist, you may call this cause and effect.
But it’s the same thing.
Belief creates action (or inaction).
Mass belief also often creates blind acceptance and the delegation of critical thinking.
Why? Not because humans are inherently “bad”, but because the brain likes to be efficient. If someone else has done the thinking for us, and we trust them (or they are in a position of authority) then often we agree for their belief to be implanted as one of our own. No point wasting the brain juice if “they” have already done it - efficient!
(In many cases this is done when we are so young and trusting of those around us -for survival reasons if nothing else - that we have had next to no choice of our belief structures.)
Perhaps we don’t even realise we HAVE certain beliefs, until something happens to unsettle them…
Often that “unsettling thing” is… challenge, or change. Personal change, political or cultural change, environmental change… Suddenly we realise we are trying to navigate an unknown landscape without a map, compass, or direction…
Starting to sound familiar?
What you BELIEVE tethers you to “something”.
If your beliefs tether you to reliance on “same”, change will be monster hard. If a human is tethered to “same”, to a narrow window of traditions and routines, they will be terrified by the unknown of change, and they will act from fear.
If they tether you to YOU, to trust, to belief in better, to the power of your integrity… no matter where you find yourself, you will be tethered to “home”.
Let’s be clear - the world is in flux. It’s in a state of change whether we want it to be, or not and 2025 is setting up to be a momentous ride.
We need humans who soul-deep believe in magic.
Who are firmly, healthily self-tethered, and from there can take steps from SAFETY, to work with the potential of the unknown, to craft a future for all beings that is BETTER.
Being part of a belief system that knows that better is possible, is what we need to move functionally and healthily into the unknown. The more people believe in the magic of possibility, the closer we are to viral mass acceptance.
I happen to believe we aren’t that far away.
You don’t have to know “the how” of better. You don’t have to trust anything outside of you if you choose not to - like believing in the tradition of Christmas, you simply have to know it will happen. Believe in your bones it is possible.
From there, all your acts will carry the magic of this belief.
I’m sending you an abundance of love, magic, and belief in better,
PS If you want a safe space to land as your knowings shift in a world of change, you can instantly access my Sovereign Safety Masterclass here
PPS It’s 21st Dec! Each year on this, the shortest day in the northern hemisphere, I practice my own tradition that I call “light the candle” day to remember that no amount of darkness can erase the light. Read about this practice here: On The Darkest Night
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