Don’t Become A Helpless Ghost

“The air was filled with phantoms, wandering hither and thither in restless haste, and moaning as they went. Every one of them wore chains like Marley’s Ghost; some few (they might be guilty governments) were linked together; none were free. Many had been personally known to Scrooge in their lives. He had been quite familiar with one old ghost, in a white waistcoat, with a monstrous iron safe attached to its ankle, who cried piteously at being unable to assist a wretched woman with an infant, whom it saw below, upon a door-step. The misery with them all was, clearly, that they sought to interfere, for good, in human matters, and had lost the power for ever.” – Charles Dickens

By far, the best and most important thing about Christmas in our house is not the story of Jesus or Santa, but Scrooge.

We used to go see the play every year when we lived in NJ, and now that we live in Vermont, we read it as a family. My kids have seen several of the movie adaptations; from the Muppets and Jim Carry’s cartoons to the classic with Alastair Sim as Scrooge. Is it a little scary? You bet. Who didn’t get slightly freaked out when the Ghost of Christmas Present lifts his robe to show Ignorance and Want?

Sometimes a scare can do a lot of good.

The part that scared me most as a kid reading the book, the part that I think should scare us all the most, is not a vision of Christmas Past, Present, or Future or even the warnings of Jacob Marley. Its a scene that usually doesn’t make it into film adaptations. I quote it above.

The scene happens just after Marley leaves Scrooge. Scrooge looks out the window to see hundreds and hundreds of spirits living in agony. But here’s the catch: their agony and their torture is not regret at what they did or did not do in life. It is agony about their inability as ghosts to render service to the living.

As Sorcerers, Witches, Magicians etc we often place spirits and shades on a high pedestal, putting value on the powers of influence that they possess which we don’t.  But we are also spirits. Spirits who are lucky enough to possess bodies. As practitioners of magic, we have a foot in both worlds: we can set the machinations of spirits in motion to solve a problem, but we can also be the agents of those spirits, interfering for good in human matters in a way that spirits cannot.

In a way that even gods cannot.

Too many people worry about going to hell when they die, or becoming a Hungry Ghost. Take a moment and consider what it would be like to be a Helpless Ghost.  

Since most of us are not lucky enough to have three ghosts visit us spontaneously, perhaps its worth your time to stay up one night and  spend time looking at key moments of your past for an hour. A Full Hour. Don’t just think about it, remember it, relive it, and contemplate it. Use the whole hour. Then look at your present for an hour and all the people that you effect and intersect with. Then for the last hour imagine what life looks like 10 years from now if you don’t change anything from how you are now.  Follow this into the future. Be honest and be brutal. Imagine that the Dickensian afterlife is real: Do you move on with a clear conscience knowing you used your human existence to do something worthwhile, or are you the helpless ghost whose misery is that you can no longer intercede in human affairs after a wasted life of self-interest?

Don’t be afraid to scare the shit out of yourself. That is what a good ghost story is for.

“Therefore Christian men be sure,
Wealth or rank possessing,
Ye who now will bless the poor,
Shall yourselves find blessing.”
– from Good King Wenceslas