Magic is Being and Noticing
Plus, A Soul Family Recipe
An image of me, hello! © Joy LeDuc 2023
Recently, I was speaking to someone about magic. We were speaking about how humans perceive and define magic.
Since I share stories on the sweetness of life and the magic that unfolds when you listen to your soul, I am particularly invested in this topic. I believe this is because I have ample evidence of the existence of magic in my own life.
And that magic can range from the ordinary—perhaps thinking about a human and suddenly running into them—to the more elaborate and complex—like when energy and messages from my ancestors rush through me in the hours leading up to a Cacao Circle.
But, in fact, the more I open up to the mysteries and desires of my soul, to even the very presence of my own soul, the more I witness and notice synchronicities that seem to conspire to support me.
We’ll actually get to how they’re conspiring to support me in just a moment.
First, you may already know that humans are meaning makers.
William Perry, who was a cognitive psychologist, stated that what an organism does is organize and what a human organism organizes is meaning.
Robert Kegan, a developmental psychologist, calls this process, meaning-making, or the activity of making sense of experience through discovering and resolving problems.
I am not nearly as educated as they two men.
And yet, as a woman with deep lived experience following the call to my own becoming, as well as a soul with ritualistic imprints stamped across my lineage, embedded in my DNA, I feel it’s far simpler than organizing or resolving problems.
Magic is rooted in making meaning and meaning making is simply about being and noticing. So, in my far simpler scope, magic is about being and noticing.
Being—
Being yourself, your whole self, just as you are, separate from the constraints of societies and structures, separate from all those straight lines drawn upon you by systems, just being your true self, the self who is made up of all kinds of complexities—like 70,000 thoughts per day—and also curves—like the hill of a belly or the swell of a soul.
And, Noticing—
Noticing patterns, the ones that are quite obvious—like the intrinsic lines that make up the face of a leaf or the angles of a snowflake—plus the ones that feel far more compounded—like the feelings in a body when its magnified to another body—or even coincidental—like when those two bodies want the exact same thing in the exact same moment.
The ability to be and notice has surfaced within me progressively the more I listen to and act from the innate desire of the soul.
And to be able to do that required a lot of contemplation and consultation within, within the silence, within the body, within the kind of stillness that may make you or others uncomfortable.
I was thinking back to when I first started listening to and moving from my soul, and I remember it felt indulgent.
I felt like I was pampering myself, becoming too softhearted, as I sought and allowed silence to take up an increasingly significant part of my day.
But the more I did it, the more I sat with and surfaced my soul—first, as a method for soothing myself through grief, and then as a method for choosing me—the more I tapped into a well of magic that was all around me, waiting to conspire for my greatest and highest good.
Now, let’s get to how the magic of my life is conspiring to support me right now.
I decided to spend a month in Oregon.
Well, I actually decided to spend two weeks in Oregon and then a feeling of belonging, to something greater than me, influenced me to extend my stay to a month.
It may have been sparked by that dinner party my dear friend hosted for my birthday.
Sitting around their table, feeling rather overcome by a sense of belonging, I received a rush of a vision, almost like the feeling of déjà vu.
I felt like I had been around this same table with these same sweet souls previously, perhaps in another lifetime, perhaps in some dream, perhaps in some wish made by my past self.
It actually doesn’t matter which of those was the case, if at all. What matters is the feeling of belonging that I was able to tap into in the moment, which I attribute to magic, to being and noticing, practicing those behaviors from the silence of my soul.
I hosted an event of my own out here, a Cacao ceremony. It was a moving experience, especially since my ancestors were so present, communicating through messages and sensations in the moments before and during the ceremony.
I remember feeling almost sick before it started, later connecting the dots to similar feelings just before other ceremonies and other moments when magic was present.
The ancestors had said there was some heavy emotions that needed to be moved. When I mentioned that to the group that had gathered, some crying even as they walked in the door, they all giggled, perhaps nervously.
But over two hours, we each rewrote stories, made new meaning, heard vital messages, and moved deep emotions, myself included.
At the closing of ceremony, I jokingly referenced those heavy feelings the ancestors had mentioned and they all laughed again, this time even deeper, from the soul, realizing the magic that had unfolded between us.
And for a moment, I felt like they belonged to me and I belonged to them.
A few days later, I was visiting another dear friend in their place of business, exploring its newness and experiencing their joy for their unfolding soul work.
As I said goodbye while walking out the door, they said to me, “I love you.”
Not only did I believe them but I noticed that I shared those feelings. It was a beautiful expression of platonic love which highlighted yet another sense of belonging.
Between my old friends and all the new friends I’ve made out here, I keep returning to a statement that I’m not sure you’ll understand but I’m going to say it anyway. Because I want it for you, too, so much, so hard.
I like how I feel about me around some of these people.
It’s not just that I like these people.
It’s not just that I feel like I belong to these people.
It’s more so that I feel like I belong to me, that I can surface the most whole and vulnerable parts of me, through this series of experiences, when I am also more connected within, presencing my soul.
And it’s probably not about the people.
And it’s probably not about the place.
It’s about the magic that unfolds when I listen to my soul.
This feeling of belonging to me, of loving me, is allowing me to be more of me, to notice more of me, to presence my magic, and to even break out of old patterns and ideas around love and belonging.
I am noticing how my ideas of love and belonging are shifting, breaking open, and I really like that for me.
I like that the more I allow the magic of my life, the more I expand into even more possibility for this sweet soul.
And in allowing this for my soul, I allow it for all souls, especially those who are forever and ever a part of my soul family, here and in all dimensions.
I urge you to allow this kind of magic for yourself, to be, to notice, all of you. It will help you love yourself and it will overflow to others, promise.
While in Oregon, I’ve been assembling meals, stuffing various proteins—like skirt steak, roast chicken, tinned mussels—into lettuce leaves, eating my makeshift wraps while standing over the kitchen sink.
These Tuna Salad Lettuce Wraps offer a version of my sweet mother’s favorite tuna salad, one in which she stuffed tuna with a myriad of sharp, crunchy flavors. My version is a favorite of the sweet soul and chosen family who brings me to Oregon and who tested my cookbooks. So, in some ways, this is a soul family recipe.
Thank you for reading or listening. If this story and recipe resonates, I invite you to support my soul work by sharing it with others.
Tuna Salad Lettuce Wraps
Ingredients:
One 5-ounce tin of tuna in olive oil
1/2 small shallot, finely diced
2 teaspoons vegan mayo
2 teaspoons lemon juice
1 tablespoon finely chopped cilantro
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
2 large butter lettuce leaves, cleaned and dried
Directions:
Fork the tuna into a medium bowl. Add the shallot, mayo, lemon juice, cilantro, and salt. Stir well to distribute all the flavors.
Fill a lettuce leaf with half the tuna. Repeat with the other leaf and remaining tuna. Eat immediately over your kitchen sink.
