Wingardium leviosa!

Anyone who knows me knows that Harry Potter was tremendously important to my life (well, more Hermione, but still). Truly though, the books had a huge impact on my life that continues today.

One thing that really impacted me was surprisingly enough a specific spell that is found in the books-"wingardium leviosa". It was a charm that was used to levitate things, to make them rise.

As someone who suffers from anxiety and OCD, I have found that spell to be a saving grace. I use it as a mantra to rise above the noise in my head, to rise above the obsessions, to levitate in a sense from the repetitiveness.

Why am I bringing this up? Because I feel like we all need a little bit of the magic of wingardium leviosa nowadays, especially when it comes to our political conversations. We get so trapped in the noise and our own viewpoints. We get stuck in the idea that our view is the only right view and we can’t hear anyone else. We become obsessed.

And we forget that, if we just separate for a little while, to rise above it, to give it some space, we can start to hear some outside thoughts.

You’re not going to solve every argument in the span of five minutes. I can’t tell you how many times I get trapped in an argument on social media where if I had stepped away for a little while, “wingardium leviosa-ed” myself away from the computer screen, everyone would have benefited.

So today, my parting wisdom is that maybe we can all look to some guidance from Harry Potter. Use this spell next time you are having a heated conversation. Remember to rise above the passionate moment and take some time and reflect. It’s not magic (or is it?)