“Enchantment” by Katherine May, Review: “The Beautiful Quest for Miracles in the Post-Pandemic Era”

In February 2020, Catherine May released a book that came in very handy. While it wasn’t explicitly about how to get through the pandemic without losing your mind, Hibernate: the power of calmness and retreat in difficult times explored a frozen period in the author’s life when she felt cut off from the world by a sudden illness, and how she felt.

For two years of self-isolation and restrictions, fear and sadness, inaction was the light in the window that attracted many and became a bestseller on both sides of the Atlantic.

Enchantment: Awakening to wonder again at a tiring time is a sequel that chronicles May’s attempts to recover from a “pandemic hangover” that left her unable to read, tired but confused, and looking for meaning beyond life’s mundane minutiae.

“I sit at my desk to work,” she writes, “but instead I move between Twitter and Instagram and the news, Twitter and the news, Instagram and the news…Twitter and Instagram and endless, terrible news.”

No, she was not at the forefront of the fight against Covid 19, but the experience of overcoming it left her and many of us burnt out and dead drunk.

This is not a self-help guide to find your life purpose or manifest a more magical existence. This is a thoughtful collection of essays that juxtaposes May’s personal quest for what to believe, what to think about, and her exploration of how and why people believe.

“Enchantment is a small miracle magnified by meaning, an enchantment caught in a web of fables and memories,” she says at the very beginning.

Her task is to visit the Art Nouveau standing stones erected on the outskirts of her seaside town and see if she senses anything but mocking disdain in them.

It means remembering what fascinated her as a child, from talking to the moon to solemnly watching her grandmother carefully peel an orange every day (“In a life without ritual, this was the closest we had. It was the closest, that I ever had). saw her go to prayer).

He explores the concept of hierophany, “transforming the way the divine reveals itself to us and the objects through which it works”, be it a standing stone or a host. These are repeated visits to the ancient well in the hope of feeling something.

She participates in a “witness” retreat run by the Extraordinary Order of Zen Peacekeepers dedicated to resolving the darkest moments in human life.

There are beekeeping lessons and fascinating tales of creativity and deep play, trepanation (drilling a hole in the skull for medical and spiritual purposes) and how our brains understand natural phenomena (thinking we see ghostly figures traveling over the hills: an optical effect ). called the Lumpy Ghost, which Mei has long been fascinated with).

spell there is more than inaction – As Mei finds her way of worship, I’m not sure that every reader will remain faithful to the faith – but it’s beautiful, thoughtful and unusual.

Her magpie brain collects brilliant facts, and she asks spiritual questions even if she doesn’t have the answers. After all, she is still looking for miracles in the post-pandemic era.

“If we passively wait to be enchanted, we can wait a long time. But searching is a kind of work,” she explains. “I don’t mean that you make wild car rides to see the stars shining above your roof. I mean making a lifelong commitment to notice the world around you, to actively seek out little bits of beauty, to take the time to reflect and reflect.”