Magic never left, we just forgot how to see it

You Forgot Where You Are

"The world is indeed full of peril, and in it there are many dark places; but still there is much that is fair, and though in all lands love is now mingled with grief, it grows perhaps the greater." -Haldir of Lothlorien

You're walking through the world like it's nothing special.

A quick glance at the sky. A dismissive nod at the wind. Another day, another list of problems to solve. You scroll past beauty. You tune out meaning. You drown out the sound of your own heartbeat beneath a playlist of anxiety and unfinished to-dos.

And then—A bird lands near you. A cloud cracks open with golden light. A song hits you—too perfect.

For just a second, the veil lifts—you remember something…

You feel it.

You were never alone. You were never off the path. You just forgot where you were.

Magic never left. You did stopped looking for it.

You started thinking that the world was a system of systems. That every moment had to be optimized, explained, improved.

But there's another way.

You've felt it before—on walks you didn't want to end, in conversations that felt like prophecy, in moments of silence that resonated like a symphony.

It's the same feeling Bilbo described when he said the road "goes ever on and on" — that sense of possibility, excitement even, around every bend.

Serendipity. That sense that something is guiding you. Not planning—but gently, invisibly, arranging what's next—like the subtle hand of Gandalf, working behind the scenes to shape the ebbs and flows of a narrative that will put you exactly where you're meant to be.

And you don't need to chase it. You don't need to perfectly overoptimize your calendar to make time for it. You just need to relax and listen.

Life is magic. (you just forgot how to see it)

To paraphrase Muriel Rukeyser, "We're taught that we're composed of atoms. We're better knowing we're composed of stories."

Somewhere along the way, you started thinking the world was static. Predictable. Logical. Under control. Knowable—if you could cram in enough historical trivia and chemical equations…

You built a self to navigate that world. A name. A job. A set of problems. Like filling out a character sheet.

But here's the truth:

That self is just your traveler's cloak.

Your personality is a persona. Etymologically, from Latin, literally meaning 'a mask, character played by an actor.'

You are not your stress. You are not your pain. You are not even your story.

You are a traveler in a realm that's very much alive. A world that responds when you listen. A place where messages come through overheard conversations, in dreams, in coincidence. You just declared that you're stuck, you can't figure it out, you can't go on—and then boom, your phone rings. It's somebody you hadn't heard from in years…

The world is magical. We just forgot how to see it.

We forgot that every "problem" is just a signpost on the road. Not an obstacle. A direction. Like the trials in "The Hero's Journey"—not punishments, but necessary trials, leading to unknown transformations that will payoff in ways you can't conceive of until the third act.

And if you zoom out a little, you'll see it:

You are not stuck. You're just mistaking a moment, a beat, for the whole story.

The magic is still here. You just have to relax and lean into it.

Serendipity Can't Find You if You're Hiding

"We do not follow maps to buried treasure, and X never, ever marks the spot." — Indiana Jones

You've had those moments.

You think of someone you haven't seen in years—and they call you. You look everywhere for some dumb thing you lost and then when you finally give up, it just appears. You relax for the first time in weeks—and the solution finally clicks into place.

That's not coincidence. That's alignment.

It's the same force that guided Frodo to Rivendell, or brought the Fellowship together. Not destiny exactly, but something more subtle — a current in the river of life that moves you toward where you need to be.

But it only happens when you stop clinging to your problems like they're badges or trophies. When you stop obsessing over who you are, and start paying attention to where you are.

Because where you are is alive. It's listening. It's guiding you.

When your attention is locked on what's broken, what's missing, what's wrong... You're blind to what's unfolding right in front of you. Like a party of adventurers so focused on the map, they missed the CR 10 hidden door in the dungeon wall.

You miss the softness in the wind. You miss the look from a stranger that could've changed your day. You miss the strange synchronicity that only happens when you trust the world a little more than your thoughts about it.

The people who live fully—who create, connect, and change things—they don't just think differently. They see differently. They have what the elves in Tolkien's world possess: the ability to see both the shadow and the light, and to choose the light anyway.

And the second you stop believing your tunnel vision is the full picture? The tunnel opens up.

How To Let the Magic Find You Again

The good news? You don't need to climb to any mountain peaks or drink any unicorn blood.

You're already in the story.

Here's how to see it:

1. Shift from "What's wrong with me?" to "Where am I right now?"

Not metaphorically—literally. Look around. What do you see, hear, smell, feel? The magic of your life doesn't exist in your thoughts. It exists in the room with you.

Try this: For just 30 seconds, do a Perception check on your surroundings. Name the things you can see, touch, hear, smell, and taste. Feel how quickly your nervous system settles.

2. Follow the warmth

What feels light? Easy? Interesting—even if you don't know why? That's the trailhead. That's the breadcrumb. Follow it. You don't need the whole map.

Remember: The next step rarely announces itself with certainty. It whispers with curiosity. That book you can't stop thinking about? That conversation that energized you? That's not random—that's direction.

As Morpheus told Neo, "You know something. What you know, you can't explain. But you feel it. You felt it your entire life: Something's wrong with the world. You don't know what, but it's there. Like a splinter in your mind... ...driving you mad."

3. Loosen your grip on the script

You're not behind. You're not broken. You're not off-track. You're just gripping a version of life that may not fit you anymore. Let go a little. Let life speak.

In comics, the most interesting moments happen when the hero is forced off-script. When the plan fails and improvisation begins. That's not the end of the story—it's usually the part of the story we remember forever.

4. Treat beauty like information

A sunbeam across your desk. A strange birdcall. The way the air smells after rain. That's not background noise. That's the world trying to reach you.

In LotR, the characters who notice the small details—the behavior of birds, the pattern of stars, the feel of the wind—are the ones who survive. Beauty isn't just decoration. It's guidance.

5. Assume alignment

What if everything you need is already unfolding—just not in the way you expected? What if the delay, the detour, the problem... is the path?

The story is already moving. Your job is to play your part with awareness.

The world is always trying to enchant you.

But it speaks in soft voices. In detours. In quiet glances and barely-missed chances. And if you slow down long enough to notice? You won't need to force the path forward. You'll realize it's been unfolding around you the whole time.

Just relax.

Look around.

And when the next shimmer of magic appears—follow it.

-Rex