I am going to tell you a story.
It's a story about magic.
A world full to bursting with the most wonderful glistening magic.
And within that world,
A story about the most magical creatures.
A story about children and the magic within them.
All you need to do to come along is to close your eyes.
Close your eyes and imagine a world where the flowers are as tall as trees and the children as small as fairies.
Where the grass towers and sways above the children's heads as they run,
Dance and laugh through the gardens.
The paddocks,
The fields,
With the sun on their faces and the wind past their ears.
Through the air all around them,
Drifting,
Glowing,
Flows gentle streams of light.
Hovering streams of gentle magic suspended in the air,
Twisting,
Gliding between the children and lighting up their edges.
Mirroring the magic glowing from within them.
With this magic,
The children here can do anything.
Anything in the whole of their imagination.
And in this place full to bursting with the most wonderful magic,
It feels as though you can too.
You run with the children feeling the tall grass brush against your outstretched fingertips and the soft earth cushion your bare feet.
The sun warms your shoulders as you reach to the top of a hill where the view stretches all the way out to sea.
You collapse with the other children all side by side in a muddle of bodies,
Smiling,
Laughing,
Your heart beating steadily.
The children begin to play a game.
They look up from the ground beyond the feathered swaying tips of the grasses.
They gaze through the wild flowers to the bright blue sky beyond and begin to trace their fingers around shapes in the clouds drifting above them.
A bird,
A bear,
A tree.
You close your eyes listening to their chatter,
Feeling the sun warm on your face.
The freshness of the air makes you want to breathe it in.
So you do so.
You take a long deep breath,
Feeling the air touch the inside of your nose and your chest rise until your body is so full of the most wonderful air.
And then you breathe out and as you breathe out you let go.
And as you breathe in the air fills your body and you notice a warmth in your toes like a part of that glowing magic light.
You breathe out more slowly,
Feeling the heavy parts of you flow out on your breath.
And as you take another breath inwards the glowing magic moves up through your feet into your legs.
And out again,
Breathing out again to the natural rhythm of your breath.
And each breath draws that magical feeling up through your body,
Up through into your belly,
Up through your chest and back floating over your shoulders.
Breathing in and out in a way that feels just right.
As the magic flows into your shoulders and neck you notice a grey heaviness that had filled them being pushed out in great swirling clouds onto your breath and then disappearing as it touches the glistening light.
And as you breathe out you let go.
And as you breathe in the light touches the glistening light.
The magic continues to move up through your neck,
Up through your body into your face until your whole body glows with this bright shimmering light.
You feel calm,
Your body feels at ease,
Soft,
Comfortable.
Thoughts roll into your mind and you watch as they land gently on soft clouds and drift back out again as if the wind had blown them across the sky.
You stay still for many moments,
Glowing from the top of your head to the tips of each toe.
You feel full of that same magical feeling that filled other children and suddenly feel like anything is possible,
Anything in the whole of your imagination.
You wonder if the feeling on the inside of you has changed the way you feel on the outside.
You slowly,
Cautiously wiggle your toes,
Then your fingers.
You run your hands along the ground beneath them,
Feeling the textures against them,
Hot or cold,
Hard or soft.
You listen,
Beginning to reconnect with the sounds around you.
You feel the ground beneath your body and as you do so you begin to listen again,
Allowing the sounds,
Loud and quiet,
Close and far away,
To reconnect you with the world around you.
And then as you continue to breathe you open your eyes.
You smile thinking of the children tracing their fingers around the clouds in that garden of flowers and magic.
You see the light of the sun,
The sun is shining on the sky.
You smile because you can still feel the warm glowing magic within you.
That magical feeling within all children,
That magical feeling that your imagination is possible.
