What Casts the Shadow?
(The Edge of the Known Book 1)
by Seth Mullins
Touring December 1st – December 5th, 2014
Book Tour Schedule: http://www.elitebookpromotions.com/book-tours/
Genre: Literature & Fiction, Metaphysical
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Creativity and Our Connection to Magic
I was strongly drawn to the Arthurian legends as a kid. I soldiered through T.H. White’s The Once and Future King and watched Excalibur in the theater at the tender age of nine. The story’s opening filled me with wonder. Its ending, though, left me with a sense of bittersweet nostalgia.
The legend of King Arthur is strongly rooted in the Christian tradition, and portrays the triumph of the forces of religion, reason and science over the magic of Faerie. It does so with an air of certainty. It manages to convince us that this transition was somehow inevitable, and that – however much may have been lost – Truth prevailed in the end.
The message was that our civilization must let go of magic in much the same way that adults should relinquish their childhoods, so that they can see life as it “really is”. Avalon becomes an illusion to all but those (often considered outcasts or, at best, eccentrics) who still possess the Sight to see it.So the Age of Reason had its day. We managed to conquer a lot of diseases and usher in a horde of new ones.
The quest of science to conquer death and suffering fell through. One great promise of technology – to simplify our lives and create a collective state of ease – also fell by the wayside.
Many of us now feel that the Keys to the Kingdom have not been delivered, and we long to welcome magic back into our lives. We can begin by simply acknowledging the desire, without embarrassment, without fear of ridicule. There is so much more to the human story than what has thus far been told.
Creativity in its natural state – free of hampering preconceptions – is most akin to the playful state of a child. He or she might be completely absorbed in a crayon picture one moment and then abandon it without a pang of remorse a few minutes later when another idea takes hold.
The society that we live in very much wants us to identify with our jobs and our social roles. It tells us that this is our true identity – not the feelings, ideals, dreams and visions that live within our hearts and souls. We invented machines in the hopes of simplifying our lives and bringing us ease; but the machine has come to set the pace for us, asserting its rhythm over our own natural ones.
Too many inner voices are stifled in the process. Art gives those voices an opportunity to announce themselves. It reminds us of our natural magic.
Our native creativity removes the mechanical masks so that we can behold out true faces. It shows us where we’ve been following the dictates of a system rather than the bidding of our own hearts. Art reveals that there is much more to us than we have ever suspected.Our self-definitions are, for the most part, too small and confining.
They don’t encourage us to explore and express our full potentials. They don’t accord us the magic that is our birthright as spiritual beings. One great gift of our innate creativity is the way that contradicts all of this by reminding us of the true depth and breadth of our inner lives.
We can say that art opens the doors for us to a much more expansive reality, one wherein we can feel the magic that is always a part of ourselves and our world. Its purpose is ultimately to make our lives richer, both inwardly and outwardly.
Book Tour Schedule: http://www.elitebookpromotions.com/book-tours/
Tamara Philip, Author 
December 2, 2014 at 1:46 am
Thank you for hosting me, Tamara. Kind regards 🙂
December 2, 2014 at 1:57 am
anytime, Seth!! good luck with your fantastic book! xoxo