The moment you doubt whether you can fly, you cease forever to be able to do it.
―J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan
Remember when dandelions were magical wish-makers, not weeds? When cardboard boxes transformed into spaceships and blanket forts held infinite possibilities? Somewhere between mortgage payments and Monday meetings, we misplaced our ability to see wonder in the ordinary.
My wife Ali and I rediscovered our wonder on the Camino de Santiago (see more about our transformational pilgrimage below) not long ago, as we spent countless hours walking amongst glorious nature, paying close attention to the splendor of it all. Each morning brought new fields of poppies, their delicate red petals dancing against the Spanish sky. As we progressed along the ancient pilgrim path, we noticed the poppy fields gradually disappearing until they vanished altogether. This slow farewell awakened something in us: a childlike curiosity about nature’s rhythms and mysteries that we’d long forgotten in our busy lives. We wondered; Was it the changing season that brought about their demise? Did the soil become infertile for poppies to thrive?
Wonder What Happened to Wonder?
We’ve traded fairy tales for Facebook feeds, and cloud-gazing for cloud storage. Our thumbs scroll endlessly through digital landscapes while real flowers bloom and wither outside our windows, unnoticed and uncelebrated. The poppies still dance in the breeze, but we’ve forgotten how to see them dance.
This isn’t just nostalgia speaking – it’s a call to reclaim something precious we’ve lost. Wonder isn’t childish; it’s the spark that ignites creativity, fuels discovery and makes life worth living. Einstein himself said imagination is more important than knowledge, yet we’ve created a world that values spreadsheets over stargazing.
We carry inside us the wonders we seek outside us.
—Rumi
The good news? Wonder isn’t gone – it’s just sleeping. Like a muscle, it can be strengthened with use. Start small: spend five minutes really looking at a flower, tracing its petals, imagining its journey from seed to bloom. Listen to rainfall as if it’s music. Draw terrible pictures with your non-dominant hand and laugh at the results. Build a fort, even if you’re 45 and your coworkers would think you’re crazy.
So, where have all the poppies gone? They have followed the natural course of life – growing, blooming, fading, and making way for what comes next. Their brief but brilliant existence reminds us to live fully, love deeply, and leave behind seeds of kindness and wisdom for those who will come after us.
The world hasn’t become less magical – we’ve just stopped looking for the magic. It’s still there in morning dew and midnight stars, in the perfect spiral of a snail’s shell and the impossible flight of bumblebees. It’s in the way trees know winter won’t last forever and in the courage of sidewalk dandelions pushing through concrete.
Our sense of wonder isn’t lost – it’s waiting to be rediscovered, one small miracle at a time.
In a world that often feels divided, wonder connects us all – the parent watching their child’s first steps, the scientist peering through a telescope, the artist mixing colors until they glow. When we embrace wonder, we embrace our shared humanity. We just need to learn to see it again, together.
Will you join me? Let’s be explorers again. Let’s turn off our phones and turn on our imagination. Let’s teach our children – and remind ourselves – that the most precious things in life can’t be bought or sold, only discovered with open eyes and hopeful hearts.
The poppies are still dancing. We just need to learn to see them again.
Editor’s Note: Enjoy our evolving Exploring Our Shared Humanity Series HERE
Great article, Dennis…
You wrote convincingly, ‘The world hasn’t become less magical – we’ve just stopped looking for the magic’.
How true! We need our senses to wonder and see the magic.
Wonderment is the gateway to creativity. Creativity means new possibilities and new realities.
I highly value your post my friend.
Thank you, Ali. It’s time for all of us to reclaim that elusive sense of wonder. We did that, and it has simply been life-changing, my friend.
I loved this Dennis it really makes me think. This year I let my patio garden go. I never took care of it. Always to busy doing other things. I normally have a beautiful flower garden. I think your right we spend wat to much time on our phones. We need to stop and smell the roses and look for those poppies dancing in the breeze. Thank you for making me think about this. Sometimes I get so down I forget how to live to appreciate God’s beauty right in front of us. I get to wrapped up into self I guess and forget my surroundings. There is still magic to be found and exploring to do! Thanks for this wonderful article.
“We need to stop and smell the roses” says it all, Eva Marie. So much beauty to behold, but first we’ve got to step back away from all the “noise”, and then step forward to embrace the magic of it all!
Wonderfully written and shared, DenAli, and very timely. Our new mentor Mickey Singer focuses on this very theme, the missed opportunities and tragic overlooking we all do in our rush to keep the lights on and the insurance bill paid. He says “We’re living in god’s version of Disney World, and we worry about a spot of ketchup on our pants? Why would we do that?”
Here’s hoping you spot more poppies!
BE
Thank you, Bryon. Mickey’s clearly a wise man with an invaluable depth of perspective. Let us all discover more poppies, my friend!
Actually, my sense of wonder has been steadily growing stronger the older I get, Dennis!
As I’m 78 1/2 (nearly 80), I’m amazed at how much life I’ve already lived and how much more I may have! And hugely grateful for every day I wake up on top of the dirt!
When I walk my dogs around this amazing little seaside village, I often take pictures of nature to keep myself reminded of the gorgeous world I live in. Flowers blooming. Bald-headed eagles soaring through the sky, something I never thought I’d see here, especially!
Sunsets! Glorious in all their colors that I take multiple pictures of! I wish I could show a few here, but apparently we can’t.
Never mind. I’ll just keep on keepen’ on … 🙂
You are clearly setting the gold standard for what we mean by keeping your sense of wonder, my friend. A model that we hope and pray others will follow, as it (in our experience) is such a euphoric departure from all else. Stay the course – because it matters. And of course, because YOU matter.