Home World Magic
A playful attempt at finding wholeness in a shattered world
I’m sure you’ve had a moment like the one I’m about to describe. Say you are eating a mediocre sandwich at a local dive. Not a hip dive. Nobody cool or super important is here. Just you and someone you like, say a friend. It’s the kind of place nobody seems to care about. Even the staff. Maybe especially the staff don’t care. Which is to say, it’s the sort of nondescript place that big things never happen. But small shit happens all the time. Like say you’re friend is mid-sip and stale coffee dribbles down their chin. And a quickening, like lightening striking land, and warmth rising and then damn they are cute. And you see them. You see them for the messy beautiful human they are, and it nearly brings tears to your eyes at how fragile we all of us are and breaks down all of the guardrails you’ve built around your heart. And you, in this unimportant place, have a very important experience. But by the time you get to the parking lot, the magic is vanished and it’s all taxes, and childcare, and errands. I hope you’ve lived such a moment.
I’m trying to describe Home World Magic.
Main World and Home World
Our Main World isn’t our Home World. Main World, which we often find ourselves in, runs on winners and losers, first and last, ruler and ruled, more money and less money. Main World loves separation that makes a few people feel good and a lot of people feel badly. The primary poisons of Main World are Fear and Shame, which perpetuate the untrue story that we should fear each other and that we are unlovable beasts. People on Top love for us to feel this way about each other and ourselves because then they can profit off The Fear and Shame Algorithm.
This is why I’m curious about the magic that happened in the unimportant diner with your friend. For a moment, you left the shattered Main World and entered the wholeness of Home World. That’s not quite right because you didn’t leave Main World. Better to say that Home World broke through. Because Home World is always with us and it’s the most real world of them all, but we’ve forgotten our way into it and we’ve mistaken the poisons of Main World as real magic.
For example, pretend you are a house with a host of lovely windows. Let’s say that opening your eastern window offers a view Main World while your western window opens up to Home World. But, sadly, you are an adorable klutz and bonked your head and you forgot there is a beautiful bay window to Home World breezes and you spend all your days staring out the Main World window while a small inside part of you wonders if there’s anything new to see elsewhere. Bummer. I’m searching for the magic that opens our windows to Home World so we can live from there more abundantly and freely. The old story Beauty and the Beast comes to mind.
Belle Stuff
In Beauty and the Beast, the magic is that the Beast is loved before he is transformed into a prince, not after he’s all neat, and shiny, and kissable, and rich. Belle loved him as the beast, the scumbag father kidnapper, imprisoner. She saw beyond his Main World behavior and witnessed the forgotten Home World within his broken heart. She extended him mercy, grace, vulnerability, challenge, and finally tender acceptance. She wiped away his tears, and looked him in the eyes, and held him up, which are Home World activities. Bottle all of those forces up into a tidy package, and you have a vial of potent Home World magic. So let’s call that vial of love-challenge-mercy-grace-acceptance-holding Belle Stuff. Belle Stuff is the window into Home World.
But Main World doesn’t like Belle Stuff because things like profit, winners, losers, right, and wrong are the poisons that the Main World runs on. And the biggest of all is the Shame Fuel that Main World guzzles up. In Main World, if Belle Stuff can be turned for a profit, that is okay for those on Top. But Belle Stuff is a threat to Main World because Belle Stuff will neutralize the poison stuff. Which would not benefit people on Top in the Main World.
The Janus State
So, the key to Home World, is in living the Belle Stuff. This is where the Janus State comes in. If you haven’t heard of the Janus State, that is because I just made it up. Although the principle is more commonly known as non-dualistic thinking, let’s call this skill the Janus State because it sounds cool. And it’s an allusion to the two-faced Roman god, Janus, who was a symbol of paradox, thresholds, and transitions. The Janus State is an invitation into a non-dualistic world without heroes or villains, winners or losers, etc.
The Janus State is the mindset of believing contradictions simultaneously. For example, the sun is shining and it’s nighttime. It’s an important skill to harness if you want more Home World magic. If you are brave, you can pause now and practice this dangerous skill. Imagine sunshine and darkness simultaneously. It’s very difficult to do. You may feel your mind stretch from your left ear to your right ear. Or maybe you will pass out from the effort. Stay alive, though; that is important. Staying alive is most important. The Janus State is a big problem for Main Worlders because Main Worlders like some people on Top and most people on Bottom, which requires dualistic thinking like good guys vs. bad guys.
Here is why the Janus State is so important. If you want to return to Home World, you must make room for SUNNYNIGHT, or HEROVILLIAN, or BEASTPRINCE in your mind, otherwise the magic Belle Stuff doesn’t work. Because to love somebody is to love a Whole Somebody, not a Part Somebody. And a Whole Somebody contains multitudes.
Main World wants a lot of Part Somebodys because they are easy to turn into Profit through Shame and other poisons. To live from the Home World, you must love Whole Somebody (including your whole self), which requires the Janus State and Belle Stuff. That’s Home World magic.
To the Home World!!