Wayne Coyne's Twelve Reasons Why Christmas Matters: Part Two

Wayne Coyne of the Flaming Lips counts down his twelve reasons why Christmas matters. Missed reasons twelve through seven? Find them here.

Reason No. 6:
When I was 6 years old, my older brothers told me that Santa Claus was not real. I said, "What do you mean he's not real? I see him everywhere I go." And they replied, "That's just your dad or some guy at the store dressing up like him." For a brief moment I despaired, but I quickly recovered and thought, "If there is no real Santa, then maybe we could all be Santa. That way we don't really have to wait for him to drive all the way down from the North Pole. We'll just be him right now." And so maybe Santa himself is not real, but we can easily make the idea of Santa real.

Reason No. 5:
We have sympathy for those humans that are suffering. We also have sympathy for all the creatures of the world that might be suffering. There is a mechanism within the human mind that allows us to have a psychic "oneness" with the people and animals around us. If we are lucky, they are happy and healthy and in turn make us, in a psychic sense, happier and healthier. But when we are around those who are suffering, we have a psychic suffering as well. So we want to relieve their suffering because it relieves our suffering.

Reason. No. 4:
We get to look at colored lights in the darkness of winter. It is a great coincidence that as our days -- in the Northern Hemisphere, anyway -- get shorter we battle back with artificial light. And so, as we all cooperate by adding our own little light into this cold, dark world, we transform this bleak void into a place of hope and wonder.

Reason No. 3:
To be hopeful and to be happy -- these are strange, silent sensations that seem to happen only in our minds. But as Christmastime proves, it is a contagious way of being. To show each other that we believe in each other is an energizing event. To be in the company of other humans who are being optimistic and enthusiastic is like a form of real magic! Anything is possible!

Reason No. 2:
Christmas celebrations encompass all the wonders of our natural world. It is full of animals, trees and even weather. So even if there are not humans in our life to give love to, we can always give love to animals, give love to trees and plants, and we can always have experiences that illuminate the grandeur of existence by simply realizing how helpless we are to the patterns of our planet.

Reason No. 1:
It shows us and proves to us the power of giving love. We sometimes think it's about giving gifts, but what the gift represents is love. And so, to some, it's awkward and maybe for some it is even embarrassing, but you see, it's the giver who is actually getting the greatest gift. So we set aside this day to have this powerful interaction with the people around us. If we did not get to do it once a year, our world, as we would eventually see, would not have experiences with "giving love" and the human race would slowly evolve back to its medieval nature.

--Wayne Coyne

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