In late July and early August I am often drawn to images of twilight, sylvan gatherings, fairy bowers, midsummer night dreams, or in a word—enchantment. I cannot explain it further than that my imagination lives in a cyclical space and this is where it often finds itself this time of year. In my monthly new moon circle, I like to surface the intersection between the new moon and the time of the year. And so for me, an early August new moon is one of enchantment.
When I looked, I found different definitions of “enchant”: “to fill with delight,” “to charm,” “to bewitch,” “to attract or move deeply”, or my favorite, “to rouse to ecstatic admiration.”
Enchantment suggests captivation, hints at decadence, and gathers to it the ephemeral quality of wonder and awe. In stories of magic and fantasy, enchantments are cast upon someone or something, and therefore carry an almost paradoxical pairing of intentionality and surprise. An enchantment requires intention to shape, and yet typically fall upon the recipient with an element of surprise, or unexpectedness.
In the less magical meanings of the word, “enchantment” typically suggests a positive experience. It’s an experience that charms our senses, our intellect, or our emotions—or creates a sensation of being immersed, completely, within a world of delight. And even as we use the word in a non-magical sense, the concept of enchantment reaps its meaning from its magical roots; an enchantment is created when someone’s intent is shaped, spoken or otherwise manifested into being. The catalyst for an enchantment lives outside of us.
To be enchanted then means that something has happened to us, hence the sense of beguilement and allure. Thus when the right ingredients are present, enchantment bubbles up with us, heady and effervescent. And just like any Champagne, it does not hold its fizz forever. It slips away again, elusive, once we become habituated to whatever caused it.
Certainly, there are ways to court enchantment. If we have the time and energy—which always seem to be in short supply—we can take something we love and lavish it with additional layers, flourishes, embellishments. The decadence indulges our senses and may conjure a feeling of enchantment. We can also seek to lure out the unexpected aspect of enchantment by taking some ordinary activity to an out-of-the-ordinary location. This is the charm of the picnic, sleeping under the stars, or bathing in a lake. But while these efforts can bring us delight, we all know the difference of a truly potent enchantment falling upon us through no will of our own—like a shower of shooting stars, or the first snowfall of the year.
If enchantment is something we wish to cultivate, we certainly might take up the role of enchantress ourselves. But that is a quest for the full or waxing moon. The lesson of enchantment, for the dark moon, I believe must be found back in the world of fairy. Different from a spell which can be cast upon oneself, an enchantment is nearly always cast upon someone else. Put another way, an enchantment must be received. By this way of thinking, we might think of an enchantment as a gift. And so perhaps these are the questions to ask ourselves during a time of rest and rejuvenation: Do we know what enchants us? Are we paying attention to those—especially from the more-than-human world—who may bring us enchantment? Are we allowing space for something unexpected into our lives? Are we quieting ourselves enough to hear the most silent moments of wonder? Are we resting ourselves, so that we may have the capacity to be roused to ecstatic admiration? Are we ready to receive enchantment?