This is an I-Heart podcast.

Guaranteed Human.

Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of IHeart Radio.

Good morning.

This is Laura.

Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast.

Today's tip is that there is no such thing as magic.

What looks like magic is generally skilled labor that is kept invisible.

So if you want magic, it's up to you to make it happen.

But the good news is that you probably can make it happen.

And on those occasions when we see magic, sometimes it is even more magical when we acknowledge

this.

Today's tip comes from an unexpected source.

Longtime listeners may recall that in 2023, I wrote a sonnet every week.

That is a 14-line poem in Iambic pentameter with a certain rhyming scheme.

Late in the year, I wrote one of those sonnets about the seeming magic of Christmas,

with beautifully decorated trees and wrapped packages amid the bleakness of winter.

Here are a few lines from that poem.

I sit in silence, gazing at my tree.

I'll trimmed with baubles, softly glowing lights, a beacon in the window,

greeting me, acknowledging the lateness of these nights, when I was wrapping presents, tying bows.

All magic is just labor, hidden well. The poem goes on from there, but I heard from a lot of

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