Why Is Harry Potter 
So Phenomenally Popular? 

Have you ever wondered what the extraordinary success of the Harry Potter series is really about? Certainly, J.K. Rowling is a talented writer with the ability to create a fantasy world that almost seems real to the reader. Her stories are engaging and fun to read, but there are many great, well written stories that never enjoyed the astounding popularity of the Potter series. There is an element, beyond good writing and a well-constructed story, that strikes a chord in our collective consciousness and captures the imaginations of millions of readers all over the world. That element is Magic!

From the Arthurian legends, to the Lord of the Rings trilogy, magic has fascinated readers as long as books have existed. And why is that? Could it be that we naturally want to include magic in our lives, even if we can only find it in fiction? Could it be that there is a magical part of us that longs to come to the surface, even though we have been taught that it doesn't exist?


Our Magical Brain
& Our Muggle Brain


We actually have two brains, as you can see in the picture above. There are two separate hemispheres that work together, and they have very different functions. For most people, one hemisphere dominates the other, and often communication between hemispheres doesn't work so well. When that happens, we get stuck in a limited view of reality. Either we lose our creative spark of imagination, or we lose our grounding in rational logic. We need both for good mental health and balance. For many people in the modern world, the logical left brain has become dominant, keeping them stuck in a reality where magic cannot exist. That is the Muggle Brain.

But what if the other half of our brain was designed to be magical? Actually, it is! It's like we have Harry Potter's "muggle world" symbolized in our logical left brain hemisphere, and the "magical world" alive and well in our right brain hemisphere. We happen to live at a time when the functions of our magical right brain are generally disregarded in favor of "muggle" left brain functions, but it wasn't always so. Our modern, industrial world now favors linear logic, facts, rational thinking, and following rules, while imagination, intuition, the arts, psychic phenomena, and magic are often discounted as frivolous, or even nonexistent.

Even though the "muggle" half of our brain is needed to keep us grounded in the material world, the other half is devoted to the magical, ethereal, imaginative world-view that is embodied in the Harry Potter books. There must be a good reason for this. After all, nature doesn't waste any effort on organs that don't perform important functions! In fact, our right brain is essential to our happiness and even our survival as a species, because it is with the right brain that we can IMAGINE.

Why is Imagination Important?

Our linear-thinking, left-brain scientists are finally starting to understand the importance of the right brain. They are proving in the laboratory that our mind can affect our reality. What we think actually changes the reality we perceive! If we follow that thread a bit farther, we can see the importance of imagination, because we can imagine absolutely anything. So if our thoughts are affecting our reality, and imagination triggers new thoughts we have never thought before, it stands to reason that our reality will change in ways we never imagined before. That's what I call Magic!

The funny thing is that Harry Potter books are actually performing a sort of magic every time they engage the i-magi-nation of one of their readers. They are changing our collective consciousness by opening our imagination to the possibility of magic.

Our wonderful subconscious mind (that governs about 95% of our actions) does not distinguish between what is "real" and what is imaginary. It simply takes in and processes information and accepts all of it as real. So every time we read a Harry Potter book, there is a huge, subconscious part of us that is accepting it as real. Imagine how that could change our collective view of the world around us as millions of readers immerse themselves in these stories!

We have a conscious mind that screens out all that imaginary stuff, but underneath the surface there are magical changes taking place that will eventually move into our conscious awareness. A whole generation is growing up with the idea of magic as seen through the Harry Potter books and films. Eventually that will have to make a difference in the way we approach life as a culture.

Magical Solutions to Global Crisis

And what a time for it! Now, as we are faced with global warming, widespread pollution, and overpopulation, we may need magical solutions to solve our problems. Instead of a "dark lord" there is a great ecological crisis to face, brought on by our dependence on "muggle" left-brain thinking. We don't have the answers to solving these problems, but we DO have our imagination. It is time to engage our magical right brain to "think outside the box."

Could it be that we crave magic now more than ever, because we face such huge problems in our world? Could it be that we collectively know that it is time to awaken the magical mind and bring our right brain intuition back into balance with left brain thinking? Could this be why we are seeing such a resounding response to the Harry Potter series? I would have to say yes. That is at least part of it.

It looks like we are getting ready for a leap in consciousness. Through fiction and film, our minds are being prepared for a new way of shaping our reality. Rather than struggling with mechanical ways of cleaning up our problems, we will imagine solutions into being. We will use magic to heal our world and improve our reality. This doesn't mean we won't be DOING anything practical. Imagination is at the root of every great invention and technological advance. So as we imagine a better world, we will also be inspired to take action to improve things.