Wednesday Workshop 3: Documenting Evolution in Your Backyard
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Welcome to week three, fellow magickians! 🌱🐛
This week in our Digital Renaissance of Rational Self-Enchantment, we step into the living workshop of your own backyard. Here, we witness physicalist magick in action: the real, observable transformations of embodiment (form), activity (change), and emergent essence (the wonder that arises). No mysticism, just mechanics, eyes, a notebook (or phone), and nature’s quiet miracles.
What You’ll Do
Create a Backyard Development Journal: a short sequence of written entries that captures the growth and change of a backyard plant or insect. When you read the pages in order, the development unfolds like a story coming to life. This turns everyday observation into enchanted documentation through words.
Materials (Keep It Simple and Local)
- Paper (index cards, cut printer paper, or a small notebook — about 8–15 small pages)
- Pen or pencil
- Stapler, tape, or binder clips
- Optional: Phone/camera for reference photos, magnifying glass, drawings, small ruler
Choose Your Subject
Go outside (or to a park/window box). Pick one thing that is changing:
Go outside (or to a park/window box). Pick one thing that is changing:
- A plant bud, sprout, leaf, or flower
- An insect (caterpillar, aphid, beetle, ant — whatever you find)
Observe Like a Magickian
Visit your subject regularly (same time of day helps). Notice:
Visit your subject regularly (same time of day helps). Notice:
- Embodiment (Form): Size, shape, color, parts (leaves, petals, legs, wings).
- Activity (Change): What is moving or growing? Any new buds, molts, or movements?
- Emergent Essence (Wonder): How does this feel alive? What small miracle is happening?
Build Your Journal Pages
Stack the pages in order (earliest on top or bottom — test both). Staple or bind firmly along one edge (left side like a book, or top like a notepad). Flip or read through the pages in order to watch the development unfold like a story.
- Make 8–15 small pages (3x3 or 4x5 inches works great).
- On each page, write a short description of your subject at that stage. Focus on the same view or part of the subject so the changes stand out when read in sequence.
- Keep the writing simple and consistent — just honest words about what you see and notice.
- Number the pages lightly on the bottom.
- Add a short note on each: date, weather, and one key observation.
Stack the pages in order (earliest on top or bottom — test both). Staple or bind firmly along one edge (left side like a book, or top like a notepad). Flip or read through the pages in order to watch the development unfold like a story.
Share Your Work (Optional but Helpful)
Photograph your journal pages. Post in the Commons forum.
Tell us: What surprised you? What small physical process felt magical when you wrote it down?
Photograph your journal pages. Post in the Commons forum.
Tell us: What surprised you? What small physical process felt magical when you wrote it down?
Example Ideas
- Plant: Track a sunflower seedling → first true leaves → bud → flower (in writing).
- Insect: Watch a caterpillar’s daily changes, a ladybug’s movement, or an ant trail (describe the transformations day by day).
- Start small — 5 minutes a day is plenty.
- Rainy day? Write from photos or memory.
- Involve family/kids: Make it a shared ritual.
- No perfect writing needed. Honest words and observations capture the truth beautifully.
As Richard Dawkins explores in The Greatest Show on Earth, these everyday changes are visible evidence of evolution at work. Development and growth in plants and insects echo the vast processes that have shaped all life over deep time. Your journal lets you witness tiny chapters of that greatest show right at home, the physical transformations that connect your backyard to the story of all living things.
What will you discover in your backyard this week?
