Sime~Gen Inc. Presents

ReReadable Books

(December 2007)

"The Magical Gift"

By

Jacqueline Lichtenberg

As most of you know, I don’t review books in the December column so as not to commercialize the holidays. But thinking back over this year’s columns may spark an idea for the gift of a lifetime.

In 2006, from January to June we looked at the mystical hypothesis that the Soul enters manifestation through the dimension of Time. From July to November we examined the Soul’s Journey while inside Time.

Science Fiction and Fantasy – even Romance and Mystery – tend to focus on a Hero, a person who has big problems, gets into sticky messes, and blithely jumps from frying pan to fire.

Vicki Nelson of the Lifetime TV series Blood Ties by Tanya Huff and Harry Dresden (of The Dresden Files by Jim Butcher) leap to mind. Both Stargate teams are crewed by heroes. The TV Series Heroes, Smallville, Painkiller Jane, Supernatural, and all the books reviewed in this column are prime examples of how the Hero lives.

Why do we love our heroes so much? Are there any real people like that? The word hero itself is from the Ancient Greeks and denotes the son of a god and a mortal – that is a semi-mortal with divine powers and family "connections" which don’t always make life easier.

Historically, there have been a handful of people whose heroism has engraved the heroic image on the Group Mind of humanity – Moses comes to mind, known as the most humble man, a human God called His faithful servant. Moses always said that anyone else with his advantages could have done a better job.

Thus humility or modesty became part of the formula for The Hero in literature. With David and Goliath, the little guy using cleverness and precision to bring down the big guy became part of The Hero formula. With The Odyssey we see how a Hero has to persist to achieve just the simple goal of getting home. Heroes don’t need grandiose goals, superhuman powers or an ego the size of the Queen Mary. In fact, that’s a good formula for a Villain.

So what is the defining characteristic of the Hero? What makes us admire the Hero and strive to be like him – even if we’re female. In fact, many female heroes have had even greater impact on the world by doing what’s right despite the consequences than their male counterparts. What do such men and women have in common?

Or perhaps more to the point, what do we imagine they have in common – what do we want to emulate?

When we watch TV or read a story, we often think about the particular situation the hero faces, and consider how we might handle it. Often we think we could do better – avoid certain mistakes, choose the right thing more consistently, or be more compassionate to onlookers.

Often we read heroic fiction because we actually see ourselves as heroes, as the person who can lead the way out of the burning building, direct the squadrons in a flanking maneuver, stand in the doorway shielding others from a rain of bullets, judge the timing for Plan B exactly.

In other words, that quality we resonate to in the Heroic Personality is something we see in ourselves, if latent and unrecognized by others.

A good gift for this holiday season would be words and deeds that recognize the heroic within others.

So what is that quality that makes a Hero heroic, that quality we recognize implicitly within ourselves yet yearn incessantly to manifest outside ourselves where it can gain recognition and bring validation of our self-image?

Recognize implicitly; yearn to manifest. Does that ring a bell?

Think back to High School –remember an upper classman doing something really cool. You know you are that cool – but you don’t behave that way.

So you bend your prodigious intellect to the task of defining "cool" – where it comes from, how to achieve it, how to manifest it. And you discover SF and Fantasy novels – yes! That’s cool; that’s me.

And here you are out of college, working for a living, and you’re still not "cool" enough. Why? What is "cool" – where does it come from and how do you acquire it? And what has it to do with the Soul entering manifestation through the dimension of Time then journeying through life?

In physics, "cool" is the absence of heat. Heat is energy stored in "excited" molecules that causes them to move faster (or raise their quantum state). Heat is emotional movement. Cool is emotional stillness.

There are at least two distinct causes of emotional heat and coolness.

Emotional heat caused by making a personal connection or bond with another, is generally good, whether it’s sexual love, parental love, the bond to a teacher, or directly to the divine force running the universe.

Humans need bonds and bonds ignite passion. A person who has no bonds or refuses them is often termed "cold" – taken to extreme that is a dire thing indeed.

Healthy emotional heat comes on slowly, rises to an appropriate level and is sustained for an appropriate interval. Behavior fueled by healthy emotional heat is "cool."

Emotional heat can also be caused by "internal conflict" – a psychological conflict within the person, a neurosis, phobia, or major mismatch between self-image and the actual self. These internal conflicts often manifest as "buttons" – areas of sensitivity that cause exaggerated reactions to minor stimuli. Of course it doesn’t seem minor to the person with the button!

Unhealthy emotional heat erupts suddenly, flashes to an extreme level (often the person will yell, scream and throw things, stomp, hit people, break things, or fire an innocent subordinate) and then subsides so suddenly onlookers are bewildered. Behavior fueled by unhealthy emotional heat is not at all "cool."

Teenagers behave this way and hate themselves for it and don’t know why. Adults, we feel, should outgrow it. But we don’t. There are always some internal conflicts, some areas of life where we’re irrational (e.g.: computer breakdowns within minutes of finishing a three month project you’ve come to hate.)

Heroes don’t "blow their cool" like that even when you hit their buttons. Villains do; heroes don’t. Heroes throw temper tantrums like Moses who killed the Egyptian who was beating a slave, who smashed the first Tablets of the Law when he saw the Golden Calf.

Heroes are more like Harry Dresden. In my interview with Jim Butcher, he explained how Harry sees magical power as morally neutral, impersonal, a part of the universe. Harry is just trying to pay the rent, not become a more spiritual person.

Harry, Butcher explains, sees himself not as a shaman, but a plumber. We see Harry as "cool" because even when he’s being attacked from six directions, he solves one problem at a time like a plumber tackling a geyser and flood. He can be scared spitless, but Harry just confidently does the right thing without sudden, inappropriately intense, non-goal directed energy outbursts.

Why? What is it that a Hero is confident of?

Maybe Time and the magical view of the universe?

In previous years’ reviews, I’ve pointed out how the magical view of the universe and the scientific view of the universe differ. In the scientific view, it’s what you do that determines the result of your action. If two people do the same thing in different places at different times, they get the same results – and that proves the theory.

In the magical view, who you are determines the result – your magical Identity, the accuracy of your self-image and your relationship to the divine forces governing the universe determine the outcome, not what you do.

For a Hero, "everything" does not depend on doing the right thing by the deadline. Whatever the Hero does will work.

The Hero knows that everything depends on dancing to the music of the spheres, (see the April ’07 column), dancing to the tempo of the Natal Chart. Move gracefully with the beat, be the plumber fixing the leak. Deliver your power on target with no collateral damage and just live your life to the fullest, and you’ll be cool, too. It’s OK to stop to help the injured rather than chasing the bad guy if you’re moving to the rhythm of the world. Bad guys destroy themselves.

How does the Hero learn this? By resolving inner conflicts thus dispelling neuroses that sensitize "buttons."

So the gift of a lifetime that you could provide to the most important person in your life is simply the magical view of the universe. It doesn’t cost money because you can’t buy it in a store. It costs attention, listening, responding, blood, sweat, tears, and most of all love, truth, honesty, wide open communication, an embrace of the soul.

Give such a gift and you will be "cool."