Motivational Magic Magazine #23 (March 2025)

Our community is growing on our private platform. If you are at all uncomfortable on Facebook and Instagram and would like to have another place to engage with like-minded people, please consider joining us at the Observation Deck level which is entirely free! You can get a feel for what’s going on, chime in, and level up when you so desire. Learn more HERE.

And I said I’d talk more about the Self Worth exercise this month! Try the next set of questions for your Morning Motivation and see how it starts to help you reflect on self worth and worthiness.

Your Morning Motivation

This section will be a thought to help you set yourself up for a more purposeful day. It can be a very simple thing to add a bit of focused intention to your day. More from the Self Worth workshops we have been doing in the Year of Magical Living 

Exercise: The Childhood Treasure

Think of a cherished childhood object:

• What made it special?
• Did it need to be perfect to be loved?
• If it was damaged, did it lose its value to you?
• Was its worth in its monetary value or its meaning?

Exercise: The Art Gallery

Consider different pieces of art:

• Does art need to be “useful” to have value?
• Does it need to be perfect to be meaningful?
• Can different styles all have worth?
• Is worth determined by others’ opinions?

Integration Questions:

• What gives these objects their value?
• How is worth different from usefulness?
• What makes something “enough” just as it is?

Tales of the Aboveground/Underground

Our friend Steven L. Sears (Xena: Warrior Princess) has a new book out! It’s an eclectic collection of science fiction, fantasy, horror, time travel and more. Each story is a unique journey, transporting readers to distant galaxies, mystical realms, and eerie dimensions. With his signature storytelling prowess, Sears crafts tales that are both thrilling and thought-provoking, exploring the boundaries of reality and the human experience.

A captivating escape into the unknown, where every page holds a new adventure and unexpected twists. Perfect for fans of speculative fiction, this collection showcases the creative genius of a master storyteller.

Read more, and order here: https://amzn.to/3QtCX06 

Article of the month

By Pat and Avery

With all the suggestions out there to help with coping with stress, there’s one simple and fun thing you can do to significantly contribute to your well being: Develop a hobby.

I call hobbies ‘soul refreshing’ because the best hobbies are! You should really enjoy doing them, love them! It should leave you feeling uplifted. Hobbies are something you can lose time in, because you become so engaged. It’s something you deeply enjoy!

Hobbies provide a much-needed break from the routine and stress of everyday life. 

Engaging in activities that we enjoy allows us to relax and recharge, reducing stress levels and promoting mental health. Hobbies give us an outlet to express ourselves creatively and emotionally!

When we invest time and effort into activities we are passionate about, we experience a sense of achievement that boosts our self-esteem and confidence. 

If you already have a hobby, how often do you engage in it? Do you need to refresh it or find a new one? Read on!

A substantial body of research has shown hobbies are linked to positive mental and physical health outcomes. Studies have found that people who engage in hobbies tend to have:

• Lower stress levels, with research showing that engaging in leisure activities can lower heart rate, blood pressure, and cortisol levels. Studies have indicated that even 20-30 minutes of hobby engagement can produce measurable reductions in stress markers.
• Better mental health outcomes, with studies finding that people who regularly participate in hobbies report significantly lower rates of depression and anxiety compared to those who don’t. Research has shown that having a creative hobby in particular is associated with better emotional regulation and reduced symptoms of mental health issues.
• Higher workplace productivity and satisfaction. Studies of professionals who maintain hobbies have found they tend to be more productive at work and report higher job satisfaction. Research has indicated that employees with hobbies are more likely to demonstrate creative problem-solving at work.
• And for those of us over 50, long-term studies have shown that people who maintain hobbies throughout their lives tend to have better cognitive performance and may have reduced risk of conditions like dementia.

One study found that those who engage in physical leisure activities for at least 20 minutes once a week are less susceptible to fatigue. Other research found that enjoyable activities performed during leisure time were associated with lower blood pressure, total cortisol, waist circumference, body mass index, and perceptions of better physical function. These activities were also correlated with higher levels of positive psychosocial states and lower levels of depression and negative effects.

All this hoity-toity language means a hobby that engages the body has a host of bennies!

How do you pick a hobby?

I think starting with a list of what you’d like to get out of it could help you find a hobby with the most benefits.

💡 Do you want to meet other people or be alone?

💡 Do you like being creative or building something?

💡 Would you prefer to be outside or inside?

💡 Would you like something to have been achieved like a good meal, a fitness goal, or an art piece?

💡 What did you do when you were a kid that you lost time doing, because you were so enthralled? 

💡 Do you envy people who can play an instrument or a game, or speak a language? That’s always a good clue.

Don’t let it get too complicated, just try things out and see how it goes!

How do you best start a new hobby?

Nice and easy!

Just block off 15 minutes or so every few days or weekly to get going. The idea is to enjoy it, not burnout from adding more to your schedule. Remember, you are most likely wasting time elsewhere like on social media and could put that time towards something more creative! If you have a fun hobby, you’ll look forward to it more than scrolling.

💡 Many towns have Meetups and there could be ideas there like swing dancing, walking, bowling or even cooking, with other folks for a social boost. Try Googling what’s available in your area.

Need to change up your hobby? Here’s a list of ideas

• Gardening 
• Learning a language
• Photography
• Scrapbooking
• Dancing
• Start and maintain an aquarium
• Puzzles
• Volunteering for an animal shelter
• Painting, coloring and drawing
• Getting physically fit
• Cooking healthy and delicious
• Knitting
• Playing an instrument
• Creative writing,
• Journaling

The Overlap of Fandom and Hobbies

There are also lots of hobbies that center around fandom that are both fun and practical depending on what you want out of them: community connection, a meditative skill, a way to pay tribute to inspirational media, or something to make into a career! 

Cosplay: Cosplayers learn skills like sewing, prop-making, and photography to capture the essence of their favorite characters in real life! In addition to these skills being valuable on their own, many cosplayers make a career out of it through social media stardom and paid convention appearances. 

Fanart: Paintings, graphics, animatics, embroidered quotes, amigurumi dolls… the list goes on! Being inspired by a character or world enough to want to replicate them has helped tons of artists hone their skills. Fanart also offers professional opportunities like when actors purchase art prints to autograph. AND it helps artists learn how to recreate another person’s style and designs, which is essential for many paid art gigs! 

Fanfiction: So many people credit writing fanfiction as their start in creative writing. Like fanart, learning how to play in another creator’s sandbox can help prepare authors for writing on other people’s projects.

Fanvids: Have you ever seen a fan video that puts clips of your favorite show to music? The fans behind them learn all about different kinds of software, file types, and video/audio editing skills to bring them to life. Some people even create their own audio dramas with these skills!

Cooking: Did you know Babylon 5 once had an official cookbook? You don’t need an official source, though! Many fans on the interwebs share recipes they’ve replicated from their favorite books or dishes inspired by an alien species. Cooking is essential for taking care of yourself, so this is a fantastic way to get more comfortable in the kitchen!

LARPing & TTRPGs: Live Action Role-Playing and Tabletop Role-Playing teach people improv, voice acting, creative writing, miniature-making, cosplay skills, and more! Not to mention, it’s a great way to connect with friends or make new ones. Lots of enthusiasts also go on to design their own games. 

Music: As Youtube grew in popularity, many fans used it to showcase covers of their favorite film soundtracks and even distribute the sheet music they made so other fans could play, too! An example you may recognize if you’re a longtime Whovian is ViolinistBAKA. 

Fansites: Fansites are probably most familiar to fans from the early days of the web! Many fans learned HTML, CSS, and community management skills from creating their own websites or forums in tribute to their favorite shows. 

Translation Projects: Many international fandoms thrive on the generosity of amateur translation work, especially for manga, anime, and video games. Some fans even learned languages because of foreign media! Not to mention speculative fiction fans diving into linguistics to create their own fictional languages (conlangs). 

Collecting: What do you collect? Fans who collect gaming cards, magazines, merchandise, props, and more gain a keen eye for value and play an important part in fandom archiving! 

Exercise: Do you remember the Pokémon Go craze inspiring people to get fit and meet other people hunting for Pokémon? Between this, character-inspired workouts, and cosplaying dance troupes like The Corps Dance Crew, even exercise has its place in fandom.

Charity Work: If you feel fulfilled by volunteering and contributing to charity causes, you may have found charities to support through actors! For example, Amanda Tapping’s “Sanctuary for Kids” program and our own “Be A Santa” for the foster kids of Penny Lane. The proceeds of many fan-made magazines (“fanzines”) go to charity, too!

STEM Interests: So many scientists became scientists because they watched Star Trek as kids! Media representation has had an amazing impact on marginalized communities in particular. Did you know that Dr. Mae Jemison, the first African-American female astronaut, cited Nichelle Nichols as her inspiration to reach for the stars?

And this is just scratching the surface! 

If you’ve been in fandom long enough, you probably remember how people used to treat fandom like it was something to be embarrassed about; and sometimes they still do. But now, seeing the level of community at fan conventions and in online nerdy groups like our own Magical Living Community, it’s clear the tables have turned! Fan hobbies are no less legitimate than other hobbies. Everything is inspired by something! So if fandom inspires you to explore a fun new way to get the benefits of hobbies–skill growth, community, relaxation, creativity, etc–then why not embrace it? 

Do you have other hobby ideas to share? Let me know! I’ll share them in the Magical living group! Just comment down below.

Our Quest Travel Adventures

I wonder if there is a correlation in getting older and appreciating birds more. This year, Glenn and I have become fascinated with the birds wherever we are.  Like the penguins I talked about in the last issue, New Zealand has unusual birds you won’t find anywhere else!

We started to become more in tuned with bird life when we got to Australia. The birds are so exotic to us, even their ‘bin chickens’ or Australian White Ibis. They are like pigeons to the Aussies. The ubiquitous ibis are in the cities as well as the countryside and considered a nuisance because they dumpster dive and make messes. We found them amazing! Flocks of huge yellow crested cockatoos squawk in suburban neighborhoods or in the outback. We almost wrecked the car when we drove to Chillagoe, an old mining town in the Queensland outback, and a large flock of black cockatoos (which are endangered) has settled on the rarely traveled road and neighboring field. At our rundown motel in Chillagoe, thousands of pink and grey gulahas deafened the town in the morning when they gathered before flying away for the day, and in the evening when they came back to roost.

It was truly amazing.

I’ll post on our Quest Retreats social medias: Instagram | Facebook

Here in New Zealand I have favorite birds and get very excited whenever I hear them. The Tui is a gorgeous bird who makes incredible sounds, even imitating other sounds and birds like our corvids can. But tuis sound very different! They really are a favorite of mine, and I get excited when I hear them.

We met some brand new birds this trip in New Zealand. I must have seen a Pukeko before. But this time some had chicks and where we stayed outside New Plymouth we had a resident 3 individuals. Many of the birds in NZ are flightless. Pukekos can fly, they are just very bad at it!  I kept confusing them with the Takehe. Takehe’s are very endangered and few are in the wild, and most of those are on small islands where there are no predators so the birds will survive. Keas fly well and are very beautiful with bright orange and yellow underwings. 

They are cheeky and curious. On a hike at Orokonui ecosanctuary near Dunedin, a young Kea fellow followed us along the path and while we took some photos of him, tried to poop on Glenn. He then squawked a kind of laugh (the Kea not Glenn).

The Keruru is the wood pigeon, which is roughly 2-3 times the size of a regular pigeon, and very beautiful. I haven’t seen as many on this trip. I hope that’s not because of declining populations. I seem to have an affinity for Piwakawaka, or the Fantail. They are gregarious little birds, perhaps because humans stir up little bugs when we walk, and that’s a happy meal to the Piwakawaka. There was one last week in Lake Tekapo that came by seemingly just to talk to me, even flitting up close to my face. There are so many small birds that are hard to watch long enough to i.d. 

One Australian ornithologist  said they call them LBJs or Little Brown Jobs. One tiny bird that’s little but bright blue is the Fairy Wren! OMG they are special. We had a pair in Exeter Australia that hung out everyday with us, in love with an outside round mirror our hostess had hung. We had a flock of local birds that waited until I fed the mob of kangaroos some oats and then cleaned up whatever the roos left behind.

Cockatoos, and a variety of parrots, plus fancy crested doves hung on the trees and wires waiting their turn. They cleaned the grass with some baby rabbits that loved the oats too.  But the king of my favorite birds has to be the Kookaburah. There’s nothing like them. And they live all over Oz. 

We stayed in an area called Mission Beach in Australia right after I finished my first Oz comicons. This was our first stay outside the city. This area was known for being the Cassowary Corridor, meaning the ancient and very rare bird was still seen here regularly. We rented this place because it had a Cassowary and his chick that came by. Our first night was maybe when I started to take my interest in birds to a new level. The rainforest came alive with haunting calls from something. Maybe many somethings. We still are not sure what it was. But I’ll never forget it. Maybe a kookaburah calling to it’s friends? Do they call at night? Haunting, loud and kinda fierce! 

I believe I wrote about the cassowary in a  previous newsletter. At the risk of repeating myself: We searched for a long time to find one. Shop keepers told us one had been seen but we just missed it. We were assured we would see them, just go out very early and at dusk. Which we did. We stalked areas they were known to cross through regularly. 

Cassowaries are huge, like emus. They have a casque on the top of their heads like a crest, bright blue faces and long red wattles. The males and females look the same but the female is larger. They are as tall as people. Flightless, with shining black thin feathers on the body. Quite striking. Known for being reclusive, and can seriously injure anything that alarms them.  So be cautious around any male when he’s raising his chicks! Yes, the guys do that. The huge females go from male to male, mating and leaving a clutch of eggs for him to incubate. 

It took us a long time to finally see our first cassowary. We drove to Etty Bay, where cassowaries are frequently spotted right on the beach. We did see briefly one as it headed into the bush to escape lookie-loos like us. We were thrilled! After seeing nada on the beach, we were alerted by another tourist that there were two cassowaries on the road. The narrow road to the beach was pretty steep and not easy for bird nor human to walk off of. Sure enough, there were two massive females, one on each side of the road walking sedately toward the beach. Maybe 7 or 8 tourists were respectfully spaced out along the road, taking photos from safe distances. Glenn dropped me off as he went to park the car. 

Being near a cassowary is like walking next to a dinosaur. I was not trying to be close to her, but she walked right up to me and passed by me so close I could have leaned into her. There wasn’t anywhere for me to go, I was already at the very dangerous edge.  She could have walked into the road, there were no cars, but she was very confident I wouldn’t try anything stupid.  S

he had a presence. Maybe it was a confidence in herself and her strength. She certainly was intimidating. And so very strange looking. And huge. Her feet were massive, with lethal claws, While death by cassowary is very rare, it has happened and I could see how. But she didn’t give off a ‘I’m gonna fuck you up’ vibe. She was calm and alert but peaceful. Her friend walked along the other side of the road, and they both proceeded to the beach. We didn’t chase after them but got back into the car absolutely thrilled.

Now we knew what we were looking for. Now I had a sense of them. My personal mythology is when I finally meet an animal, I can meet them again because now I could tune into them. I did that with many critters in Oz. We saw 10 cassowaries in Mission Beach and the last 2 were a dad and his chick!

Here in New Zealand you must find a way to see a kiwi. They are super rare, hard to see being nocturnal and very shy. We have never seen one in the wild. We have visited special places that have a kiwi habitat. The one we had the best viewing at was set up to be a nocturnal setting during the day, with very dim red lights that didn’t bother the birds. Glenn and I are pretty fascinated by all creatures and we had the patience to wait for our eyes to adjust and spend a long time in the enclosure waiting for kiwis to move about. There were only 3 in this habitat, but after about 20 minutes we were able to observe the super cute/strange birds going about their business. One was running back and forth building… maybe a nest? One was looking for food and another was also digging through leaves, grunting and puffing as he searched for food. Their nostrils are located at the ends of their beak so I guess they get stuff up their nose and have to clear it often! They were not bothered by people as long as we were quiet. Kiwis have a loud call that is reportedly very unnerving during their mating season! 

#funfact Koalas also have a disconcerting sound. Did you know one koala making its roar is the sound used for the T-Rex in Jurassic Park? That’s how intense it is!

Journal Prompt

(Each month I will give you a thought to fire up your mind. Use journaling prompts over and over again and see how the result changes.)

Try setting out a logbook near your coffee pot or on the desk or nightstand, and every day write down something you noticed that caught your imagination. Maybe some decorations at work  had you thinking of holidays past. What can you notice that gives you appreciation? When did you find yourself being fully present?   

Member result of the month – Testimonial

Each month we feature results and feedback from one of our Magical Living community members!

“Benefits of being a part of Patricia Tallman’s Magical Living:

– I can be myself and I get inspiration to be the best part of myself

– Get actionable recommendations to make life more meaningful and how to set a course to success.

– Works for my busy schedule and meditation on Mondays give a big stress relief.

– It’s easy to use!

– It’s not a cookie cutter program that is created for the masses, Pat Tallman provides individualized guidance.